SPANKY'S GRILLE 

     THE DREAM:  Spanky's Grille started as a longtime dream.  I got lucky, on May 16 (1999) my wife married me, anyways.  In 2001 we purchased a commercial lot, in 2002 Narrow Shores started construction and in 2003 (four months after our first daughter was born) we opened for business. 

 

      THE PROBLEM:   A restaurant kitchen is a hot and fast paced place to work.  I work in the kitchen as I wanted my wife to work the register.  I still have nightmares of the first day; we had so many tickets I ran out of places to stick them.   

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      THE ANSWER:  I was ready to quit until my wife walked into the kitchen.  "I've got a lady who doesn't understand that cooked to order fries require seven minutes. Deal with it!"  We switched spots, BUT I dreaded the moment I would have to return.  We quickly discovered the truth; my wife was a natural in the kitchen and I love talking to our customers. By the end of our first week, we had developed a crowd of regular customers, 20+ years later, most are still regulars.

 

     THE BIG 3:  My wife and I had three goals.  (1) All food is cooked to order (2) all food is served fast (3) all food will be affordable.  

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     THE ORIGINAL MENU:   Our original concept was a simple old fashion hamburger/hot dog restaurant with a VERY small menu; burgers, hot hogs, corn dogs, chicken tenders, fries, chili/cheese Fries, onion rings, BBQ, and Fresh Brewed sweet tea (of course!!!)  

 

     THE EXPANDED MENU:  Over the years we tried many fun specials, some were so popular they became menu; add an item or two a year over twenty year and you find your small menu isn't so small.  Some of our expanded items are fried Shimp, Reubens, Okra, Buffalo Chicken, Alligator, Catfish, Country Style Green Beans, Fried Pickles, Hamburger Steak, Sweet Potato Fries, mashed potatoes, Funnel Fries and well check out the menu to see everything.

  

     ZING:  I admit that we couldn't leave well enough alone, we wanted some ZING on our menu, so we added an extremely hot HABANERO VOODOO BURGER, and we added a surprisingly popular 2 LB. MAD VIKING BURGER.  At this point, 5,000+ Vikings have been finished. Check the Viking link to learn more about it. 

            

     AWARDS:  Spanky's has won a lot of awards, such as being named Top 40 Hot Dog Stands Across America (2013), The Trip Advisor Award of Excellence (6 years in a row), top 10 North Carolina Burger restaurants by  America Top 10 (6 years in a row) and the same honor was awarded by The Urban Spoon (5 years in a row).  In 2024 we were named a Best of The Outer Banks winner AND Yelp named Spanky's the #6 best burger restaurant in North Carolina (that's just a few of our awards).  

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