Sitting in the crowded dining room of Pig Out BBQ in Belfast recently, co-owner Stephanie Guerry guessed at the success of the business, which opened just two months ago in a secluded corner of Marshall Wharf not known for heavy foot traffic.

On nearby Front and Lower Main streets, large flags beckoned diners down from the main drags, but Guerry didn’t mention them. People have just found it, she said. Boaters, tourists and enough locals to make her optimistic about the off season.

She turned to look at a boisterous group that had just come through the door and were talking with her equally boisterous husband, Ted. A moment later, one of the men announced that he was from Alabama.

“The Southerners always find us,” she said. “I think it’s the smell.”

The Guerrys moved to Belfast from Atlanta six years ago, and according to Stephanie, loved just about everything about living here, except the absence of good Southern barbecue.

Neither of the two had any special desire or qualifications to open a barbecue restaurant — her work as a nurse and his as a funeral director notwithstanding. But when at 4 Points BBQ and Blues House in Winterport last year, it was enough of a nudge that they decided to try. Ted found the space, a storefront located beneath and behind the Purple Baboon. He called Stephanie, who was out of town at the time and explained where it was. She couldn't picture it, but she gave him the go ahead, anyway.


<p style="float: left; width: 100px; margin: 5px 5px 5px 0; padding: 5px; background-color: #fff1dd;"><span style="color: #000000; font-size: medium;">'The Southerners always find us. I think it’s the smell.'</span></p>The Guerrys paneled the walls with salvaged subflooring to give the lower-level space what Stephanie termed “barn appeal.” The rest was kept simple: a drop ceiling, painted plywood floors, cutout silhouettes of pigs chalked with a simple menu of ribs, pulled pork and a slate of sides (when in doubt, add cheese or bacon). Round tables with plastic tablecloths were set around the small dining room, each crowded with condiments and outfitted with a roll of paper towels.

Buried amid the standard fare on the menu is what might prove to be Pig Out's signature dish. The Pig Bomb, as it is called, is a hot dog encased in sausage, wrapped in bacon, seasoned, and and topped with sauteed onions and cheddar cheese. Barbecue sauce is optional unless you're sitting with Ted Guerry, in which case your Pig Bomb will be smothered with mustard-based South Carolina-style barbecue sauce. Pig Out makes a half dozen regionally-inspired sauces, including the extra-mild New England-style, made with maple syrup.

The South Carolina sauce just happens to be the one Guerry thinks goes best with the Pig Bomb. 

“That’s hog heaven,” he said, cutting off a bite and in the process exposing the perfect pink circle of hot dog at the core of a small mountain of savory brownness. He loaded up his fork again and aimed it at his wife, who politely declined. One of the changes Stephanie hopes to make in the coming months is to add salads and soups to the menu as a lighter alternative to the standard barbecue fare.

The fork didn't move and Ted continued to insist that she try. Eventually she consented to a messy bite.

“I think it’s a teenager novelty,” she said.

“No,” he said. “Men love these things.”

The Guerrys’ daughter, Candace Godwin, circulated the room, greeting customers as they came in, occasionally stopping by her parents' table with an affectionate comment or a playful dig. While the Guerrys may own the business and a team of experienced restaurant workers keep the wheels turning, Godwin is arguably the face of the business — her southern hospitality so fitting of a barbecue restaurant that her mother recalled overhearing customers questioning whether her accent was real. (It is.)

“She says, ‘Would you like some pecan pie, or peach cobbler? I made it myself.’” Guerry said, drawing out the vowels in an approximation of her daughter's delivery. “And she really did make it.”

Charm and good food aside, Pig Out BBQ's greatest asset may prove to be it's location. 

The dirt path that passes alongside the restaurant on its way from the public landing to Front Street Shipyard may not be much to look at today, but the corridor — once a spur of the Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad — has already been termed “Restaurant Row” on drawings for a planned waterfront recreational path. The Belfast Harbor Walk was slated to break ground earlier this year, and though it was delayed amid some financial uncertainty, a completed walkway would like change Marshall Wharf from a backwater into a hub of sorts.

If that happens, Pig Out will have a front row seat.

As of Labor Day weekend, Stephanie Guerry wasn't thinking about some future stampede of hungry tourists. The restaurant was busy for the moment, and while it may keep shorter hours as the tourism season winds down, the plan, she said, is to stay open through the winter.

“When other people can’t get out and turn on their barbeques, we’ll have ours going,” she said.

Pig Out BBQ is at 31-B Front Street (behind the Purple Baboon) and is open from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily. Call for winter hours: 338-6009