Photo by Erin Nelson.
Jamey Shirah, owner, and Kyle Biddy, executive chef, stand outside the new Little Betty Steak Bar in Mountain Brook’s Lane Parke on Sept. 13.
A new restaurant concept is coming to the Lane Parke area of Mountain Brook this fall.
Little Betty Steak Bar will be the sixth concept for Revival Restaurant Group, led by CEO Jamey Shirah, including The Southern Kitchen & Bar and Uptown Cantina in downtown Birmingham, The Ivy and The Family Dog in Atlanta and The Valentine in Nashville.
“Little Betty was a family dog, a blue heeler, that everyone in Athens, Georgia, [where I grew up] knew,” Shirah said. “Little Betty embodies what we want this restaurant to be: service-focused, always aiming to please, a good friend, someone you can trust and rely on. Those are the things that we want to be in this restaurant.”
Shirah said he chose Mountain Brook for this new concept’s location because it reminded him of home.
“We love Birmingham. Mountain Brook is a beautiful, homey, comfortable environment for us,” he said. “My brother and I both live in Atlanta, but we grew up on a farm. The people that we’ve met and relationships we’ve built over the last seven or eight years [made it] feel like a natural progression for us.”
Shirah said that he is a big believer in letting things happen naturally. While looking for a head chef, he learned about Chef Kyle Biddy through mutual connections in Atlanta and was impressed with his resume. From the moment Biddy and Shirah met, the chemistry was evident, in addition to Biddy’s talent in the kitchen.
“If Kyle wasn’t such a great chef, we’d try to put him in the front of the house because he is just so personable and likable,” Shirah said. “He’s one of those people that, when you’re around him, he just puts you in a better mood. This [restaurant] is a chef-led concept, and we are so excited to have him in the back of the house. He is just so talented.”
As for the menu, Shirah shared his love for Italian fare and said that Chef Biddy’s other passion and experience, besides steak, also happened to be Italian cuisine.
“You’re going to have your classic steak cuts, chicken, lamb and we’ll have a vegetarian option, but your appetizers are where things are going to get super interesting,” he said. “It will be one of those places where you can have very different experiences with the same menu.”
The restaurant’s space in Lane Parke will be small, and they anticipate accepting reservations for dinner on OpenTable, an online restaurant reservation platform, when they open for business. However, Little Betty also plans to offer a walk-in list in the future. The restaurant will have a private dining space that groups can reserve for different gathering needs.
“This will not be a mass-scale business. Our intention is to open up four or five more [restaurants], all with their own brand. It is going to be a premium experience,” Shirah said.
Little Betty Steak Bar is expected to open in late October or early November. For more information, visit littlebettysteakbar.com.
