Walk into Krabby Kirk’s Saloon on Main Street and you’ll see timber framing, mounted animal trophies and TVs airing sporting events. What you won’t see is the vision behind it.
“The village is gonna change,” said Dick Kirk, owner of smokin’ barbecue saloon which opened at 55 Main Street in January. “In about another year, the [Camillus Cutlery building] will be sold. The new [Sunoco] gas station’s gonna be built.”
And eventually, two more buildings on Main Street, 74 and 75, both owned by Kirk, will look just as sharp as the newest restaurant downtown, the developer says.
“When I get done, the fronts of the other buildings will look like something out of the 1800s,” he said.
Kirk opened up his saloon in January after two years of intense gutting and remodeling. Before Kirk got his hands on the building, the village was ready to demolish it.
“I’d been looking at the building for about two or three years and it was in really bad shape, and of course the price on the building at that point was astronomical,” Kirk said.
At the last second, Kirk came to village officials with an offer. For the village to tear it down would’ve been complicated and expensive; it’s attached to the building next door.
“It would have cost the village probably two or three hundred thousand dollars,” Kirk said. “To make a long story short, I basically got a hell of a deal on the building.”
Kirk said he bought the building first and then figured out what he wanted to do with it.
So why open a smokin’ barbecue?
“Well you have to do something with the building, and in the village of Camillus, sales are tough … you can’t just open up a building in the village and rent it out to let’s say, a grocery store,” he said.
A smokin’ barbecue in Camillus, complete with NFL packages and busts of animals Kirk hunted himself in Wyoming, turned out to be a great idea with a clear niche.
“It’s a man’s bar,” Kirk said. “Not that we don’t want to sell to women.”
Kirk said sales have doubled in the last two weeks. On Friday and Saturday nights it’s been standing room only.
“All those tables downstairs are filled up, which is great, and we haven’t even advertised,” he said. “If we advertised we couldn’t do it, people would be walking out the door.”
Which is why he hopes to get the second floor – host to 20 to 30 tables, a dance floor and a space for bands to perform – open within two weeks. Kirk also bought the property next door, 57 Main St., which will hold around 25 tables, and in the summertime the newly constructed back porch will offer even more dining space – and live music.
Krabby Kirk’s Saloon has been catching the eye of villagers and passers by since the storefront was renovated.
“It’s rebuilt but it’s to the original tone of the building from 1890, and we were subject to that with the Restore NY grant,” Kirk said.
Kirk said village Mayor Michael Montero, who owns the String Corner at 69 Main St., worked with him to secure grant funding for the restoration of 55 Main St. Village officials continue to assist Kirk in securing community development grants for other projects in the village. In addition to 55 and 57 Main St., Kirk has purchased 74 and 75 Main Street with plans to renovate both.
“When I get done, the fronts of the other buildings will look like something out of the 1800s,” he said.
Kirk said village codes officer John Williams has been helped him keep everything in compliance. Montero, Williams and all the village trustees “have bent over backwards” to get this project going, he said.
Kirk has owned apartments in the village of Camillus for years, but this is his first restaurant. He said he couldn’t have done it without the help of his friends in the restaurant business – especially Tom Mafrici, owner of Frank’s Plank Road Caf in Cicero, who has been a mentor for him throughout the process.
“I’ve known Tom for years, and he’s helped me out,” Kirk said. “You can’t go into this business blind. You have to have somebody to guide you through it.”
What’s on the menu, and who’s behind it
Kirk compared the style of his restaurant to that of Dinosaur Barbecue in Syracuse.
“Everything we serve here we make … and that’s why our food business has taken right off,” Kirk said.
That includes the ribs, corned beef, pastrami, baked beans, and all the rubs and sauces. Of course, it’s not just that the food is made on site, but how it gets prepared – and who’s in the kitchen.
“We smoke all our own meats, including brisket corn beef and pastrami,” said head chef John Kenny.
“I don’t know anyone who makes their own pastrami, it’s kind of unique,” Kenny added.
Like Kirk, Kenny grew up in Camillus, but he’s traveled all over the world as a chef since graduating from the Culinary Institute of America. In his 30 years of experience he’s prepared food in New Orleans, Florida and Hawaii among other places. The menu at Krabby Kirk’s is informed by his travels.
“What we’re aiming for is the southern style barbecue, but we’ve taken a little bit from different barbecues,” he said. “Some of it’s Memphis, some of it’s Kansas City. There’s a pretty good influence from the south, cause that’s where I felt more comfortable.”
Kenny said he’s partial to the Texas brisket, which gets smoked for 12 to 14 hours.
The customers are showing their approval by coming back for more.
“People love it, they really do,” he said. “I’m not just blowing smoke, either. People really love the food.”
Kenny has help from sous chef Allan Watson, who he’s worked with for around 7 years.
“He’s a young guy,” Kenny said. “I just kind of brought him along.”
Kenny got paired up with Kirk when a mutual friend thought they’d make a great team. So far, it’s been a successful partnership.
“This place, I’ll be honest with you, I think working with Dick and working in this environment has kind of refueled my passion for cooking that I probably haven’t had for a few years,” he said. “I give a lot of credit to Dick and [his wife] Mary for pretty much letting me do my thing and what I do best – they’ve been very supportive about it.”
What’s on tap
Krabby Kirk’s has 12 different beers on tap – everything from Pabst Blue Ribbon to the more expensive Caged Alpha Monkey, an American East Coast IPA brewed in Honeoye Falls.
“That’s 140 dollars a keg, and it turned out to be our best-seller, which shocked me,” Kirk said. “It’s more expensive than Guinness. Of course, we still have Guinness.”
Kirk is proud to serve the beer out of a state of the art cooling system installed by Onondaga Beverage.
“When I say state of the art, our beer is cooled out of the cooler at 29 degrees,” Kirk said.
“When you grab that glass, it’s cold, I mean really cold,” which does two things, Kirk said. “It eliminates bacteria in the line and it gives you a heck of a cold beer. When we have our lines cleaned, which is about every 2 weeks, the guy coming in, he wonders why we ever call him.”
What brought him into town
Kirk lives in Skaneateles, but he grew up in Camillus, and has had family in Camillus going back to 1840. His grandfather, William Kirk, was the mayor of Syracuse in 1880.
“When I was a kid the village was a viable place, had a lot of nice businesses down here,” he said. “It’s a nice place, it’s been going downhill ever since. So for me it was just a way I could put some money back into the community and maybe make it like it was yeas ago. And I think that’s gonna happen.”
In the fall, Kirk acquired a permit to install a 3 by 7 foot programmable LED sign, which he plans to put on the side of 75 Main and use to advertise the saloon.
“Of course we’ll let the village use that sign for their functions, and anyone that lives in the village, we’ll let them use it too,” he said.
Kirk said according to numbers provided by Onondaga County, 10,000 cars come down that hill into the village every day.
“So when I put that sign up, 10,000 people a day will see that sign,” he said. “That is the best advertising we could ever have. We’re on a heavily traveled road, we might as well utilize it.”
Kirk’s saloon is opening in a village that already has a few pubs in McNamara’s, the Green Gate Inn and the Camillus Grill. He said it’s not his intention to run them out of business.
“It’s gonna make the place a destination, just like downtown,” Kirk said. “Once you get a whole bunch of businesses here, people are gonna come into the village in the summertime just to walk around.”
