Fried chicken and waffles all day at new restaurant coming to Tacoma’s Lincoln District
Buddy Brown, Tacoma’s king of chicken and waffles since introducing his ghost kitchen in 2021, has new — and arguably superior — plans for a brick-and-mortar restaurant.
Buddy’s Chicken and Waffles will move into the former home of Uncle Thurm’s Soul Food, a beloved Black-owned business that closed in 2021 after 16 years in the Lincoln District.
“To be able to pick up where he left off, or continue that legacy — I’m in the space that I’m supposed to be in now,” Brown said in a phone call this week, referring to the former tenant. Located across the street from Lincoln High School, Thurmond and Linda Brokenbraugh were essential to the fabric of the neighborhood, Brown has learned, serving plenty of chicken tenders and fries after the last bell.
For more than 18 months, Buddy’s Chicken and Waffles has captivated Tacoma with a simple menu: hand-dredged buttermilk fried chicken, crackly and crunchy and excellently seasoned, served over waffles in flavors like red velvet, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, strawberry shortcake and Southern cornbread. The only catch was that you couldn’t order in-person and sit down with fork-and-knife.
The pickup-only concept is not new to the restaurant industry — it had picked up steam pre-pandemic and gained noticeable momentum in the past few years — but it is still relatively uncommon in the Tacoma area. Brown’s success has inspired others, notably Side Piece Kitchen, the biscuits and cheesecake enterprise from Hailey and Dante Hernandez. (They, too, are expanding to a brick-and-mortar this year.)
You order and pay online, select a pickup time, drive to the business and then, from a somewhat nondescript door emerges Buddy himself (or his niece, currently his sole employee) with your to-go bag.
Brown hit the scene with this business model largely out of necessity when a downtown cafe marketed as “turnkey” (1127 Broadway) he leased almost two years ago turned out to need a lot of work. He installed a grease trap, per city requirements, only to learn that the fryers could not be hooked up due to a dated electrical system. He has been trying to get out of the lease since last fall.
A follower on his lively Instagram page, where his playful memes and refreshing candor have also amassed avid fans, suggested that he check out Uncle Thurm’s space. He did but hesitated about the price. About a month later, the real estate agent called to say another business was interested; on the same day, he recalled, the new owner of the Broadway building said they were willing to negotiate with him on ending that lease.
“I kinda took that as a sign,” he said.
The 3,400-square-foot Lincoln District restaurant is already outfitted to accommodate frying, for one, and it’s much bigger than the downtown possibility.
“We’ve already outgrown the kitchen there because we’re a lot busier than I imagined,” he said.
Now he is firmly on the brink of making his brick-and-mortar dreams a reality, where chicken and waffles will reign supreme from morning, noon to night and all the way through what he calls “midnight brunch.” A Kickstarter campaign runs through 7:30 a.m. Sunday morning to assist with purchasing equipment and permits.
“This whole experience — everything’s happened the way it was supposed to happen,” he added.
He plans on cooking at Edison Square, his commissary kitchen in South Tacoma, through the end of that lease in August. Soon after, he hopes to open the doors at the full-service restaurant.
BUDDY’S CHICKEN & WAFFLES
▪ Soon: opening full-service restaurant at 3709 S. G St., Tacoma
▪ Order now: online for pickup only at Edison Square, 5415 South Tacoma Way, Wednesday-Friday 11 a.m.-5 p.m. and Saturday-Sunday 11 a.m.-4 p.m.
This story was originally published June 23, 2023 at 5:15 AM.