King of the Coop owner Joe Dodd is known for coloring outside of the lines when it comes to the Tampa Bay restaurant scene. First by introducing Nashville hot chicken craze to Seminole Heights, selling out regularly upon opening, expanding into the neighboring space, while simultaneously signing a lease on a new Wesley Chapel location.
Now, Dodd is on a mission to designate Sundays to family meals. That means shutting down all tender and catfish service and switching up the menu to strictly family-size buckets.
We’ll get some games to have here with family and friends and enjoy the time.
All day on Sundays.
Beginning, Sunday, February 16, KOTC and then every Sunday going forward, the kitchen will be cooking up 4-piece and 8-piece mixed buckets of fried chicken ($14.99 and $25.99) served with house-made biscuits and sides. Dodd says customers can either eat it at the restaurant or at home, but make sure to set the time aside to enjoy it with family or group of friends.
“Everybody has been asking us to do brunch and I don’t want to do brunch. Everybody does brunch, plus we don’t sell alcohol — so no good brunch is complete without alcohol.”
Instead, the owner looked inward and realized what he was missing.
“I looked at my family with my wife and kids. Everyone is so busy all the time, sitting down and having dinner together is not the norm nowadays. Everyone is running around and forget about what is really important. So King of the Coop is trying to set aside time for that.”
There will be games on every table throughout the restaurant so that groups can eat, play and get some quality time in. Dodd told CL that the best way to reconnect is through food, and although his heart is in the right place, he knows it might be an unwelcome change for fans in the beginning.
“I know we’ll get some push back at first because people are used to what we’re doing, but it reminds me of my favorite quote by P.T. Barnum, ‘You’ll never make a difference being like everyone else.’ We’re trying to be different and do something that means something.”
The Nashville hot chicken slinger hopes that this sparks the initiative to make meals together a priority. Whether it be one night, or seven nights a week. “That might be a stretch,” Dodd said with a laugh.
In the future, Dodd hopes to expand this Sunday Dinner concept into a Christmas Eve meal with customers, employees and his own family at the restaurant. “The tradition originated in 1969 when my grandfather got back from Vietnam. Every Christmas Eve my family gathers to eat fried chicken. It means something to me.”
This, or maybe next Christmas Eve, you may find yourself at a table with Dodd and the gang with a fresh bucket of chicken making new friends. Until then, you can get in on Sunday buckets with your gang beginning February 16.
King of the Coop is located at 6607 N. Florida Ave. in Seminole Heights.
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This article appears in Jan 23-30, 2020.
