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Rendering courtesy ZZQ and Fultz & Singh Architects
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At ZZQ's brick-and-mortar spot, you'll find full trays of by-the-pound barbecue. (Photo by Stephanie Breijo)
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The ZZQ and Ardent team making it happen, from left: Bobby Bono, ZZQ staff; Felix Gotschalk, ZZQ staff; Brian Dolenti, ZZQ pit crew manager; Erik Tsow, ZZQ staff; Russell Cook, ZZQ operations; Chris Fultz, ZZQ co-owner and pitmaster; Greta Gotschalk, ZZQ staff/"pit boss"; Alex Graf, ZZQ co-founder and pitmistress; Tom Sullivan, co-owner of Ardent; Bob Rupe, ZZQ operations/sound design; Austin Fultz, ZZQ staff; Lincoln Smith, Ardent taproom manager (Photo by Stephanie Breijo)
UPDATE, Aug. 10, 2017: ZZQ is currently aiming to open its brick-and-mortar location in January 2018.
When Chris Fultz and Alex Graf think about Texas barbecue, they think of the journey. Long drives across the state's sprawling landscape to family-owned meat meccas are not uncommon for a good meal under a metal roof, sometimes a dot in the middle of nowhere, hours outside of a major city.
It's something the husband-and-wife team strove to create here in Richmond, making ZZQ Texas Craft Barbecue an experience worth traveling to with friends who'll linger over that 18-hour smoked brisket and share an enormous tray of sliced meats, sausages, sides, pickles and white bread on butcher paper. Over the last few years, ZZQ has expanded beyond a simple passion project for the two architects, gradually evolving as an event vendor, caterer, biweekly pop-up series, and, most recently, a Saturday-afternoon resident of Ardent Craft Ales' patio. Now, the operation approaches a new milestone on its journey: In early to mid-April, a ZZQ restaurant is set to open at 3201 W. Moore St. in Scott's Addition.
“[It will be] a more comprehensive experience that’s not only an extension of me and Alex and our personalities and who we are, but also trying to bring a little piece of the Texas barbecue culture to Richmond in a really authentic way," Fultz says. "There’s nothing like it between Redhook, Brooklyn, and Charleston, South Carolina. There’s no other place like it.”
The Texas barbecue culture and experience extends far beyond a journey, as Fultz and Graf are well aware; it's the way the meat is prepared — almost always dry rubbed and cooked for hours in a wood-fired, offset smoker — as well as how it's served. ZZQ's restaurant at the corner of Moore Street and High Point Avenue will feature a traditional serving line, a fixture in Texas barbecue, where guests will snake past a serving station that includes market-priced, carved-to-order brisket, pulled pork, brined and quartered chicken, an array of sides, and perhaps a few weekly specials the pair has been tinkering with: smoked lamb, beef ribs and bone-in pork belly.
You'll find new sides, such as cheddar grits, street corn and butter beans, as well as new sausage, like the habanero-fontina that will be released in the next few weeks as ZZQ closes out its Ardent residency (ending Nov. 19). The shining, 3,200-square-foot prefab metal restaurant will open with lunch service only, Wednesday through Sunday, but by three months in, the team hopes to have both dinner service and brunch — with items such as breakfast tacos — up and running in its modern, wood-accented, 80-seat dining room and 70- to 90-seat patio.
Those who've grown accustomed to the barbecue outfit's presence at the brewery won't have to go far; the bulb-lit, tree-shaded ZZQ patio will connect to Ardent's parking lot, an intentional pathway between the two businesses hoping to continue their partnership once the barbecue restaurant steps out on its own. Ardent's very first Swine & Brine event was, after all, the first public ZZQ appearance, and the brewery's co-owners — Tom Sullivan, Kevin O’Leary and Paul Karns — encouraged Fultz as early as six or seven years ago.
“When I first started getting into barbecue, they had this little beer club they started and were experimenting with their brewing, and I actually used to cook barbecue for that,” Fultz says, adding, “Then and now, they’ve taken us under their wing. They’ve nurtured this thing, they’ve promoted us, they’ve given us pretty much everything we’ve ever asked for."
ZZQ's plus-or-minus 12-seat bar, in addition to serving other Richmond beer and Texas labels such as Lone Star, will serve Ardent brews on draft. You can also expect a pared-down menu of drinks designed by Derek Salerno, the brain behind the cocktails at Shagbark and Peter Chang Scott's Addition, plus an ample selection of Texas-beloved spirits: tequila, whiskey, mezcal. In addition to a classic margarita, you'll also be able to try one sweetened with Graf's house-made jalapeño syrup.
The lot at 3201 W. Moore St. is now largely empty save for a small house and a former auto garage structure that dates back to the early '40s. Over the winter, the ZZQ team will tear down all existing structures but preserve one original brick wall, which will become the foundation of the 1,000-square-foot smokehouse: the home of two 23-foot-long smokers and Mabel, Fultz's original, self-designed offset smoker. Guests on the nearly 3,000-square-foot patio can take a break from their tables or watching the occasional live band and witness their meat getting made.
“Sharing that process, sharing how that food is prepared — it’s not happening in an industrial stainless-steel smoker behind a wall and you never see it," Fultz says. "We’re bringing all that forward for people to understand that process.”
That process involves 16 to 18 hours of labor for the brisket; with the exception of approximately 11 p.m. or midnight until around 3 a.m., the smokers will be up and running. Two teams will work the pit shifts, ensuring the meat is ready to serve by the restaurant's 11 a.m. daily opening. Multiple batches of smaller meats such as pork, chicken and sausage will smoke in the barrels as the day wears on. Don't ever let anyone tell you that barbecue is quick or easy: “I think that’s the thing I want people to try and comprehend," Graf adds. "I mean, even to me, it seems absurd.”
Fortunately, the advisory team and on-the-ground staff to help keep it all running includes revered barbecue guru John Lewis — formerly of Austin and now of Charleston, he designed ZZQ's massive smokers and serves as a chief advisor. Richmond's Russell Cook, a chef and instructor at Culinard who came up through Millie's Diner and opened Balliceaux, will help with the restaurant's daily operations.
The staff, Graf and Fultz say, are just as integral to the journey as the destination itself.
"That relationship between our customers and everybody in the serving line, and your relationship between the customers and the smokehouse, or the customers and the bartender, however that’s going to transpire," Graf says, "that's just another important layer of comfort.”
ZZQ is set to open its first brick-and-mortar restaurant in early to mid-April at 3201 W. Moore St. in Scott's Addition. In the meantime, find the barbecue on Saturdays at noon on Ardent Craft Ales' Patio, through Nov. 19.
