A Moniteau County business has expanded into new territory.
After a year and a half of operating in Jamestown, owners of the Twisted Pickles restaurant have established a second location in Osage County. According to co-owner Deanna Harris, she heard through Facebook that BJ's Restaurant and Lounge in Linn was closing and that it was up for sale. Soon Twisted Pickles' owners reached out to see what they could do about expanding into the area.
"We talked to Scot Drinkard, who owns the building, and just kind of talked to him about the ins and outs of (establishing a second location) and what was kind of going on and decided, "why not," Twisted Pickles co-owner Deanna Harris said. "The Pickle in Jamestown...we have fun with it. It runs really well. We have the same obstacles many businesses do as far as staff, many times we're short-staffed, but we get through that. And so, this opportunity came and we decided, why not? We'll try it."
Harris told the Democrat that talks for the expansion began on Jan. 28 and, soon after, Twisted Pickles began settling into their new location. She said the remodel began when they took the previous restaurant's bar out and replaced it with a pizza kitchen. The new location now sells handcrafted pizzas made in the restaurant, a feature that was not offered previously. Twisted Pickle owners also altered the structure's original sports bar by adding smoke eaters to it. She said she wants to offer the option for patrons to smoke and drink if they desire while still catering to other customers. The smoke eaters help eliminate the smoke smell and maintain a comfortable dining experience for all patrons.
"(Sunday) was our first day open, and we almost ran out of hamburger, ran out of lettuce, ran out of tomatoes, and onions," Harris said.
She said staff bought enough food for the new location to last for a week. However, within nine hours, much of their stock was diminished due to the popularity of the business.
"We basically stayed busy from the time we opened the door until we closed down at eight o'clock," she said. "We were doing a soft opening, just like we did with Twisted Pickles in Jamestown. I think we actually kind of opened around November or December when we took over the Jamestown location. But then we didn't do our actual grand opening until January because you had the holidays and stuff in there. So that's what we'll do here. Just kind of get all of our new staff trained. And we brought some of our guys from Jamestown here to help the kitchen staff learn the menu. Our menu here is completely different than BJ's, which was homestyle cooking."
The new restaurant offers cheeseburgers, chicken tenders, pizza, pickle chips, tacos and much more.
"Our menu was the exact same as what it is in Jamestown. We didn't take anything off, we didn't add anything. It's the exact same," Harris said. "We're gonna kind of work out the kinks and see what the people of Linn would like to add and then we'll go from there."
"We just posted on Facebook, I think mid last week that we were even going to open. That way we weren't slammed with people. But I mean, we were slammed with people anyway," Harris chuckled.
She said the restaurant will have a grand opening "a month or two down the road." Like with many events at Twisted Pickles' Jamestown location, Harris said the grand opening will have live entertainment provided to customers when the day finally comes.
The Twisted Pickle is open 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Sundays; 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays; and 11 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays.