A sacred Southern staple gets the rockstar treatment at Biscuit Bros.
by Lorne Chambers | Editor
Grits, country ham, sausage gravy, baked apples, buckwheat pancakes, chicken and waffles. These things are all commonplace on breakfast tables across the South. But there’s one item that rises above all of these in the hierarchy of classic Southern standards, and that’s the humble biscuit.
Biscuits are revered in these parts, ranking somewhere between church and college football (the exact order may vary in your household depending on the time of year). Let’s just agree that biscuits are sacred.
So, if you’re going to open a restaurant with the word “biscuit” in the name, well, you better bring it. Bringing it is exactly what Biscuit Bros. owner Danny Romero is doing with his new West Ashley eatery, which puts his biscuits front and center.
“You have to start with a good biscuit,” says Romero, a Virginia native, who began making biscuits for his buddies (aka his “Bros”) while he was still a college student at Marshall University in the ’90s. “It needs to be fluffy, but sturdy enough to hold everything together.”
Romero grew up in a household with four brothers and three sisters and remembers his mother making biscuits on the weekend to feed all the hungry mouths. He took that family tradition to college and now decades later is bringing his passion for biscuits to West Ashley.
Biscuit Bros. opened last month along Sam Rittenberg Boulevard in the same shopping center as the Charleston Sports Pub. in the space formerly occupied by The Gathering Café, which moved to Summerville earlier this year.
Romero, who lived in Charleston for a stint in the late ’90s, relocated back here with his wife with the goal of opening a fast-casual restaurant centering around his famed biscuits. Initially, he says he looked to open Biscuit Bros. in Northern Virginia, but he and his wife wanted to head south and he says they both agreed that Charleston was the place to be.
Romero says he looked at several locations around the Tri-county area to put his restaurant but ultimately decided that West Ashley was the best fit for his concept.
“West Ashley is cool. It’s grown so much since I was here back in ’99,” says Romero. “We have friends that live here and the people have been great.”
He says that while he initially thought of Biscuit Bros. as a drive-thru concept, when he saw the former The Gathering Café space, he knew it was the right place. “When it comes down to breakfast places, there’s just not much around here outside of fast food,” he says. The location has plenty of parking and is centrally-located to several West Ashley neighborhoods.
Romero did some renovations to the space, giving it a rustic but modern feel. A mural featuring Charleston landmarks adorns one wall of the restaurant, with limited seating outside and inside.
While everything starts with the made-from-scratch buttermilk biscuits, Romero and his staff take it to a whole other level at Biscuit Bros. with what he puts between the bread. Ranging from classics, like the Lil Bro (sausage, egg, and cheese) and Low Tide (bacon, egg, and cheese) to the more nontraditional, like the Country Comfort (country-fried steak, gravy, egg), El Zorro (chorizo, egg, and cheese), and of course, and The Virginian (shaved ham and cheese). And these are just a few of the creations at Biscuit Bros., which also offers breakfast platters and pastries, including house-made cinnamon rolls.
Beyond the breakfast fare, Biscuit Bros. also has lunch options, like a smash burger. “Honestly, most of our lunch crowd is still ordering biscuits,” says Romero. And who can blame them, especially with options like the Hillbilly Philly (grilled steak, hashbrown, fried egg, and cheese), the Low Country (fried chicken, pimento cheese, and pickle), and Kara’s Fav (Pepperoni and cheese) to name a few.
“And don’t sleep on the burritos,” warns Romero. “If you’re not in the mood for a biscuit, they’re really good.” Biscuit Bros. offers more than a half dozen breakfast burrito options on its “South of the Biscuit” menu. All are served with scrambled eggs, most are served with red New Mexico hatch chili sauce, and are just as inventive as their biscuit brethren.
Biscuit Bros. is open for breakfast and lunch Monday-Saturday, from 7 a.m.-2 p.m. with plans to open on Sunday in the near future. It is located at 1124 Sam Rittenberg Blvd. To place pick-up orders or for more information, call (843) 834-0415.
