Charleston Pitmaster Rodney Scott Is Bringing Whole Hog Barbecue to Adair Park

A location of Charleston-based Rodney Scott’s BBQ opens at the Met in the southwest Atlanta neighborhood of Adair Park near the West End MARTA station next spring. The restaurant, owned by James Beard Award winning chef and pitmaster Rodney Scott, offers South Carolina-style whole hog barbecue, ribs, and chicken as well as Southern sides like collards and Scott’s popular cornbread, and banana pudding by the pint or quart.

Scott partnered with Nick Pihakis and the Pihakis Restaurant Group in the Atlanta restaurant. Phiakis opens Hero Doughnuts and Hot Dog Pete’s later this year on Georgia Avenue in Summerhill, one mile east of the Met.

“Southwest Atlanta is a place rich in African-American business leadership, and we’re confident this is the perfect place for the third location of Rodney Scott’s BBQ,” Scott says in the press release. “Atlanta is a big stage. Food has a way of bringing people together. The table is an equalizer and the barbecue is the medium that brings us all closer.”

Scott began cooking live coal-style and whole hog barbecue when he was 11 years old and worked for nearly 25 years at his family’s Hemingway, South Carolina barbecue restaurant. He opened his first restaurant in Charleston’s North Central neighborhood in 2017, followed by a second location in Birmingham, Alabama earlier this year.

The restaurant will be on hand at the Meet at Met event taking place during Atlanta Streets Alive, stretching nine miles from Cascade Avenue to Georgia Avenue, on Sunday, September 29.

Angie Mosier

Rodney Scott’s BBQ joins art and event space the Mammal Gallery and a two-story coffee and cocktail bar, lead by 8Arm bartender Isabella Corwell, located inside the Met’s iconic blue water tower. The first two floors of the water tower house the coffee and cocktail bar, with a patio surrounding the base.

Real Estate developer Carter (Summerhill, City Springs in Sandy Springs) purchased the Met property last June as part of an adaptive reuse effort in the area. The property covers 1.1 million square feet between Murphy Avenue and Metropolitan Parkway, and will eventually include residences, retail, offices, and creative studios.

[Official Photo]

A second Atlanta location of North Nashville pizza restaurant Slim & Husky’s Pizza Beeria opens this fall in Adair Park on Metropolitan Parkway. The Metropolitan Parkway restaurant includes a takeout window to serve students attending Morehouse, Clark-Atlanta University, and Spelman. Slim & Husky’s Howell Mill Road location opened in May.

680 Murphy Avenue SW, Atlanta. rodneyscottsbbq.com; metatl.com.

• Mammal Gallery Is Opening a Bar Inside This Iconic Blue Water Tower [EATL]
• Charleston Brings Home Two Monumental James Beard Awards [ECHS]
• All Adair Park and West End dining coverage [EATL]