A new barbeque restaurant is opening in Chattanooga. Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q is located at 2040 Hamilton Place Blvd., Suite #150. The old Fox and Hound restaurant in front of the Shoppes of Hamilton Place was razed for the new building that the Birmingham-based restaurant chain has built.
This will be the 41st restaurant that Jim ‘N Nick's management has opened, including those already in Nashville, Atlanta and Birmingham.
It is the first location in Chattanooga. A beer license was approved unanimously by the City Beer Board.
Lupi’s Pizza Pies downtown at 406 Broad St. has expanded into the space formerly occupied by Greyfriers Coffee Shop, almost doubling the seating capacity. The restaurant has been open in this location for the past 22 years. The changes required the owner, Dorris Shober, to get a new beer license for which she was approved.
Texas Roadhouse-Hixson is opening at 5362 Highway 153 in front of the old K-Mart building. The business is considered to be a family restaurant but will have a separate bar area. The business was approved for a beer permit. Not selling beer to minors is a priority with all servers required to have TABC training, and daily meetings that each end with discussions of properly checking IDs.
Samir Patel, a former five-year employee of Pin Strikes bowling alley, has, along with investors in the Hari Family Entertainment Center, purchased the business and renamed it Splitz Alley. The location is 6241 Perimeter Dr. The 39,000-square-foot business has 15 servers that are all professionally trained in the sale of alcohol. The bowling alley has been tested and passed three undercover operations for selling beer to a minor and passed all of them, said Mr. Patel.
Although there is no requirement that employees of a restaurant are professionally trained in beer sales, training is viewed as a preventative measure for reducing the sale of beer to a minor. The beer board declined to approve the new restaurant, China House Hibachi & Wings, 4762 Hwy. 58, for a beer license until training is provided to the employees that would handle beer sales. Because the owners had no previous experience in operating a restaurant or in alcohol sales, it was felt that some training would be necessary. The restaurant will open Sept. 17 and operate without selling beer until a license is issued. Owner Xi Lin is scheduled to reappear before the board at the meeting on Sept. 20.
Mystic Food Mart, 2413 4th Ave., was in the process of being sold when an employee sold beer to a minor during an undercover operation on July 26. The new owner, Nihavika Jiwani, had signed the lease in April and so, was responsible for the sale, said Attorney Reisman, but the beer license was not yet in his name at the time. At the beer board meeting on Thursday, the business was approved for a license in Mr. Jiwani’s name. Because the beer coolers had been locked for the past two weeks and there had been no sale of beer, it was decided that a letter of reprimand concerning the illegal sale be placed in the file for the Mystic Food Mart and there will be no additional restrictions on beer sales with those two weeks considered time served.