Owensboro shopped local for Thanksgiving. According to three restaurants, known for smoking and barbecuing meat, food for Thanksgiving meals was ordered and picked up until the restaurants literally ran out of the items.
The Moonlite Bar-B-Q Inn co-owner Pat Bosley said that even though Nov. 17 was the deadline for custom cooking, they still took orders through Wednesday. He said Thanksgiving was the test run for Christmas as they cater and the holiday is celebrated over a wider time.
Moonlite averaged “hundreds of pounds of sides going out,” Bosley said with broccoli casserole being the most popular side item.
“I don’t usually have the numbers ahead of time because we just keep cooking,” Bosley said. “I look at last year’s numbers and make more – it is a logistical challenge.”
Keith Cook, manager at Old Hickory Bar-B-Que said they cook more at Thanksgiving than Christmas and they will custom cook most meats — ham, turkey, beef, ribs or deer.
The pitmasters cooked all night with employees who live close to the restaurant coming every couple of hours to take meat off the pit, wrap it in foil and put more meat on, according to Cook. Old Hickory has five pits and three of them are rotisserie pits. Cook says Thanksgiving at Old Hickory can be especially challenging because the restaurant hosts out-of-town families who come in to eat during the week and at the same time, the staff is fulfilling custom orders.
Cook said that people choose to pick up their sides because it is so much easier and it is all homemade. In fact, Old Hickory’s baked beans are also barbecued. They add spices and brown sugar to the beans then put them on the pit for 20 hours.
Steph Boling, manager of Ole South Bar-B-Q said that over 250 custom meats were brought in to be cooked. They also pre-sold thanksgiving dinners, which went over really well, according to Boling.
Many customers also purchased cobblers and pies because they are made from scratch.
Boling also said many would come in for breakfast over the holiday weekend.
Scott Hardison, owner of Dalisha’s said that over 40 strawberry pretzel salads had been made, 200 sugar cookies, 30 cakes and 112 pies.
Alisha Hardison, owner of Dalisha’s took to Instagram to thank their customers for their support.
“I hope that our pies, cakes, strawberry pretzel salads and cookies brought a sweet ending to your Thanksgiving tables,” Alisha wrote. “The sheer volume of items that my very small staff was able to create this week was record breaking.”
