Classic Southern charm is the vibe that hits you on first entering BRQ Seafood and Barbeque at 10423 Jefferson Hwy., 225 Dine reports.
The restaurant, which opens Tuesday, has butcher block tables with wrought-iron legs, long white benches hugging the walls, and chalkboards highlighting down-home daily specials like red beans and rice or country fried steak, plus whole pies.
“But look a little closer, and it isn’t all prim and proper,” 225 Dine reports. “That diagram of pig and cow parts on a large chalkboard has become trendy to the point of overdone at many barbecue and Southern food-focused joints. But here, the labels say things like ‘Where we get bacon,’ ‘Ass meat’ and ‘Steak?’ The tongue-in-cheek theme goes even further in the bar area, where a diagram of a copper still assures diners it is ‘not a bong.’”
For chef and partner Justin Ferguson, that’s all part of the goal with his new restaurant.
“I want to be able to really create an atmosphere and a restaurant that’s maybe a little bit more unique, a little more fun,” he says. “There are several fine dining and high-end restaurants around here, and by all means that is not what this is.”
Ferguson and general manager Jonathan Nunez have been working on BRQ for more than a year, brainstorming what would work best for the Baton Rouge scene. Both are locals with experience in other cities—Ferguson was one of the first graduates from Louisiana Culinary Institute and went on to helm corporate restaurants in Boston and Chicago—and they wanted to bring their skill sets back home.
“When I came back, the question was, ‘What kind of restaurant do you want to do?’ And that could have literally been anything,” Ferguson says.
He narrowed his focus to two pillars: barbecue and Southern cooking, with a dedication to sourcing as locally as possible and making everything in house.
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