The term barbecue can be used many ways, either as a noun, adjective, or verb. There are several ways to do barbecue, from the Carolina pulled pork style to the Kansas City variety that uses a variety of meats.
But the debate about the best kind of barbecue can become as contentious as the parley about whether the “Star Wars” prequel trilogy released from 1999 to 2005, or even the recent sequel trilogy under the purview of Disney, are as bad as people believe.
There are multiple barbecue places across the plateau, including the Cashiers Valley Smokehouse and the Highlands Smokehouse.
Soon, there will be a third barbecue restaurant in Scaly Mountain known as Blue Hound Barbecue, and the owners are already known in the Highlands community.
Kyle and Erin Bryner, the owners of the Blue Bike Restaurant in Highlands, plan to open Blue Hound in mid-May and are potentially looking at May 17 as the start date. Kyle said they will not compete with the Highlands Smokehouse and wanted to bring something to the Scaly Mountain community, which he said is lacking in food options.
The restaurant is in the former Annie’s Café at the Scaly Mountain Outdoors Center across from Allan Dearth and Sons Generators at 7420 Dillard Road.
“I’ve been in the restaurant industry since I was a child,” Kyle said. “My dad was a chef and I kind of grew up, six, seven years old, in the kitchen making banana puddings, biscuits and gravy, that kind of stuff.”
Kyle is a Sarasota, Florida, native, but he and Erin live in Clayton. The Blue Bike Café is in the former location of Sky Pie Pizza in Creekside Village on North Fourth Street in Highlands and was originally supposed to franchise off the Rusty Bike Café in Rabun County, Georgia.
“We’ve kind of branched away from that, that tie with the Rusty Bike, and kind of brought it toward creating our own identity there and just really being there for the community,” Kyle said.
The Scaly Mountain Outdoor Center is a tourist attraction, but Kyle said there are not a lot of options for places to eat unless people stop in Dillard, Georgia, or Highlands.
“This is where we lived when we first moved to the area was the Scaly community,” Kyle said. “So, it’s kind of special to us. We’re excited about being part of the community and kind of growing something here.”
Like someone who grew up in a time where George Lucas and his original space opera trilogy dominated the box office in the late 1970s and early ‘80s, Kyle was decked out in a Star Wars T-shirt, an Atari hat, and one of his arms is covered in Star Wars tattoos.
He said Blue Hound Barbecue is named after the couple’s two dogs, Mando and Ahsoka, which are both popular characters in the Star Wars universe. Mando, otherwise known as Din D’jarin, is the main character of “The Mandalorian,” while Ahsoka Tano is a character that originated in the Clone Wars animated series.
Barbecue is his passion, and he calls himself a purist when it comes to the slabs of meat covered in sweet wood smoke. The menu is going to be varied, from pork and sausage to brisket and chicken.
There will also be 10-12 different types of sauce at the sauce bar, so everyone should be pleased. Kyle has his own sauce up his sleeve known as the Scaly Mountain Screamer, the rollercoaster that was recently built at the outdoor center, which he said is going to light up anyone like a firecracker who tries it because it incorporates the Carolina Reaper, the Scorpion, and the Yellow Bonnet peppers.
The Carolina Reaper pepper is the hottest pepper in the world, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, clocking in at 2,200,000 on the Scoville scale.
“Anything with barbecue is a three-hour argument between people on what is the best type of sauce,” Kyle said. “We’re going to try to please as people as possible with having a wide variety of different types of sauces that they can choose from. They can find their favorites.”
The restaurant’s head cook, Josh Bailey, is from Alabama, and chicken and ribs are what he grew up on.
“I love Texas style barbecue, the briskets, the sausage, you know, the beef aspect of it,” Kyle said. “But we are in the Carolinas, where pork is king, so you got to have the pulled pork, you’ve got to have the ribs. And, of course, you know chicken is chicken, we’ve got to have chicken.”
The restaurant will also have its specials, such as the Cuban sandwich, which is popular where the couple is from in Southwest Florida. Although it’s never wise to play with your food, Kyle said Bailey also likes to experiment with his menu choices.
“How can we make this kind of smoked barbecue theme similar to how we did with the Reuben at the Blue Bike?” Kyle said. “We took the corned beef and, I love smoking meat, let’s smoke a corned beef and make pastrami and now we have the pastrami Reuben and pastrami hash. Those are some of our favorite things and our staples on our menu at the Blue Bike.”
What will separate his eatery from chain barbecue restaurants, though, is his attention to food that is not only fast, but consistent. In addition, Kyle said everything will be made from scratch, from the pickles, the sides and sauces, and the puddings. He said he hopes customers will either recall old memories or create new memories when they stop by to eat.
“We’re not going to have anything that, when you come in to order, it’s going to hold us back from spilling out orders,” Kyle said. “Barbecued food takes a long time to cook, but once it’s cooked, it should be ready to go, right? Especially if you’re cooking it daily. So, all the hot side items will be ready to go, we’ll keep those in warming things. The baked beans, the mac and cheese, the collard greens, whatever we have on the menu that is hot. The cold foods, the cole slaw, the chips, those kinds of things, will be ready to go as well. I think speed and consistency are going to be what separates us from really everyone else in our area. And, just the variety.”
- By Michael O'Hearn/Crossroads Chronicle