New Tavern Spoils Beer Gourmands
By Becky Billingsley
The new Carolina Tavern in Murrells Inlet has gone to tremendous lengths to make beer lovers, gourmands and sports fans extremely happy.
From the outside, the white building with black accents is an unassuming remodeled Hooter's restaurant. On the inside, televisions are everywhere you look, and it's a woody world with a high ceiling that lends an air of spaciousness. Hurricane lamps are suspended over high-backed booths that have their own televisions ... pick your game!
Plenty of seating is available at the long bar, and another area features cocktail tables. There are even "Tap Tables" with Bud Light, Miller Lite and Yuengling taps built into them, and customers help themselves. A meter measures how much beer is drunk, and the price is the same as regular draft prices. If you drink only half a beer, that's what you pay for.
Tap Table reservations are accepted, but if no one reserves them they're up for grabs on a first-come, first-served basis.
Other draft beer selections include Blue Moon, Shocktop Raspberry Wheat, Guinness, Rogue Dead Guy, Skullcoast IPA, RJRockers Son of a Peach, Flying Dog Doggie Style, new Belgium Fat Tire and PBR. Carolina Tavern also serves wines and has a wide variety of cocktail and specialty drink choices.
Sports and drinks are covered, and the third piece to complete the triumvirate of happiness is great food. Kitchen manager Todd Roth, a longtime local chef who is also a well-known local blues musician of the group My Buddy Todd, is cooking up batches of brew-influenced happiness all day long.
First there's an $8 lunch special from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. when diners eat all they want from a cold salad bar and a hot bar. Choices change, but normally the hot bar has at least two varieties of wings, soup, pulled pork, side dishes and more. The salad bar has Romaine lettuce, crumbled blue cheese, fresh tomatoes, sunflower seeds, freshly made dressings and more.
A few appetizers are house-made Twisted Pretzel Dippers, Cheesy Garlic Flatbread, Barbecue Chicken Nachos, Ale Gravy Cheese Fries and Buffalo Chicken Dip. Many recipes such as the Ale Gravy and Onion Rings have beer as an ingredient, Roth says.
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A friend and I tried the wings, and they have 20 flavors: Mild, Medium, Hot, Fire, Ridiculous Hot, Teriyaki, Teriyaki Hot, Teriyaki Cajun, Tavern Classic, Lemon Pepper, Garlic, Garlic Parmesan, Cajun, Honey Mustard, Mild Honey, Hot Honey, Cajun Honey, Sweet & Sour, Hot Ranch and Beer Rub. That Beer Rub is excellent; the wings' exterior is crispy and flavorful, and the meat is pull-your-fingers-away hot and delectably juicy.
Half and Full Rib Racks come in Tavern Rub, Honey Barbecue, Tavern Gold, Tavern Classic or Chipotle Honey. The ribs can be paired in combo platters with chicken, shrimp, wings and pulled pork.
Want burgers? Carolina Tavern has a Fried Pickle Burger, Turkey Burger, Barrel Burger (chicken fingers and wing sauce are involved), and The Tavern Burger with a pile of toppings including onion rings and barbecue sauce.
Sandwich selections are ambitious, such as the Fried Turkey Club made with fresh turkey breast that's fried in-house; The Inlet Hot Brown ($8) based on the famous open-face sandwich of Kentucky Derby fame; and Barbecue Smoked Sausage served on a soft potato roll.
Carolina Tavern also has sandwiches on flat bread called Tavern Flats, and those fillings include Buffalo Chicken, Shrimp Scampi and Philly Style with either shaved ribeye steak or shredded Beer Can Chicken.
About that Beer Can Chicken - it's also offered as an entree for $13.50, and Roth says it's already a top seller.
"Beer Can Chicken is absolutely the dish to have," he said. "We slow-cook it in Guinness in a house rub."
Roth also recommends The Big Pig sandwich, which has pulled pork, applewood smoked bacon, baked ham, smoked sausage and Cheddar cheese on a potato roll.
A few other entrees are Corned Beef Brisket with Creole Mustard, Hand Cut Ribeye, several burgers, Jumbo Lump Crab Cakes and Beer Battered Fish & Chips. Cedar Plank Salmon comes with one side and a trip to the salad bar, and it is cooked to pink-in-the-middle moist perfection and has a savory/sweet Creole mustard and brown sugar crust.
The Carolina Tavern has happy hour from 4-7 p.m. daily with 50 cents off domestic beer bottles, $1 off domestic drafts and $1 off house liquors.
The Carolina Tavern is at 852 Mall Dr. in Murrells Inlet, and the number is 843-947-0708. It's open daily from 11 a.m. until at least midnight.
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