Michael Donahue
5 Spot is slated to re-open early 2018.
The 5 Spot restaurant is in the same spot – behind Earnestine & Hazel’s – but it’s getting a facelift.
The restaurant is slated to re-open early 2018, said owner Bud Chittom.
As for the decor, Chittom said, “Much like the same with some new stuff. Bigger kitchen. More cool stuff on the walls. And we’ll probably change the chairs. We did some painting.”
The menu, he said, will include “some stuff with pork shank, some shrimp stuff.”
Veteran restaurateur John Wills is helping develop the menu. “I have tried to develop a menu that’s kind of the best of New Orleans to Memphis. Including all the Delta.”
The menu isn’t set in stone, Wills said, but he’s planning to put “Delta-style hot tamales, which Bud has had experience with at Blues City Cafe for years, going back to Doe’s.”
Wills, who owned the old John Wills BBQ restaurant, wants to add barbecue spaghetti, an Italian soul classic. It’s the best. Memphis has a heritage of Italians doing barbecue restaurants – Coletta’s, Beretta’s, Fracchia’s. There was an Italian barbecue place everywhere.”
They plan to feature shrimp and grits among other shrimp dishes. “Shrimp is in a lot of applications on the menu. Six different times.”
The plan on serving shrimp remoulade crostinis – a little cracker with lettuce tossed with remoulade and then the shrimp with more remoulade. Wills described it as “like one bite of Heaven.”
One shrimp dish – Willie T’s shrimp – is in homage of the late Russell George, who owned Earnestine & Hazel’s. “We’re putting a new twist on it and serving it on pasta.”
The 5 Spot also will serve French press coffee and beignets late into the evening.
“We’ll have a bar menu after 10:30 during the week and after 11:30 on the weekends,” Chittom said. “We’ll keep the bar open.”
They’ll also deliver food in the Downtown area, Chittom said. “Remember our delivery motto: ‘We not only put out, we deliver.’”
