After months of fundraising, renovating, and planning, The Bunker youth ministry’s Industrial Eats BBQ & Smokehouse finally opened its doors to the public late last month.
The Winkler restaurant, located at 545 Industrial Drive, is now offering take-out every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and 4-6 p.m. Stop by in person or order online at industrialeats.ca.
“We kind of surprise opened,” said general manager Alycia Hildebrand last Thursday as they were in the midst of their second week of operations.
Hildebrand explains they’re working with a very small staff to start—just herself, chef Chris Hildebrand, and employee Amelia Kehler.
“It’s a little helter-skelter at times, figuring out the best way to approach producing for a barbecue restaurant,” shared Chris Hildebrand. “There’s certain expectations with barbecue that you want to be able to fulfill, but at the same time there’s a lot of different ways to do any given thing. It’s been a lot of fun kind of playing around with new tech in the kitchen, paired up with the traditional way of doing barbecue, and how those two can come together to make something maybe more sustainable or to make the menu more fun.”
Renovations to the former Central Station/Winkler Food Cupboard location have been ongoing for over a year now, giving Hildebrand plenty of time to see the kitchen is just the way he wants it.
He even did a road trip to Texas to check out authentic American BBQ firsthand and bring what he learned back to Winkler.
“I wanted people to be able to have the full barbecue experience here,” he said. “So I started out in West Texas and I worked my way toward Austin.”
What he learned is there’s no such thing as one way of doing anything when it comes to Texas barbecue.
“There are certain things that are going to be consistent from place to place to place, just out of tradition, but, ultimately, barbecue is about figuring out what works for you and your circumstances. And as long as the result is smokey, tender, and moist, you’re good to go.”
It gives him as a chef free reign to determine what works best here, and Hildebrand says he’s having a blast coming up with the various meat-focused menu items and sides.
“The core of the menu will always be traditional Texas barbecue,” he said, noting they also have a robust selection of non-alcoholic craft beers to pair with the meals.
Offering take-out is a way to get their food out into the community while they continue chipping away at finding the funds needed to get the sit-down dining room renovated, said Alycia Hildebrand.
“We still have to fundraise the entire dining room,” she shared, estimating that just to get the renovations done they’ll need upwards of $150,000, plus more to purchase the furniture and decor.
Proceeds from their summer food truck have been going towards getting the smokehouse up and running, and now the takeout will do the same. Industrial Eats has also been contracted to run the canteen at the Meridian Exhibition Centre, so there will be some funds coming in from that.
The long-term goal, of course, is for the restaurant to be self-sufficient so that its profits can serve as a fundraising source for the youth ministry.
There’s no firm timeline on when they’ll be able to get the dining room completed, but Hildebrand has faith it will happen.
“We will be open one of these days,” she said. “We will get it done.”
In the meantime, they will focus on takeout orders three days a week to start, but eventually expanding to five.
“In restaurants, it can be hard to give staff adequate time off, which is not good for anyone’s mental health, it’s not good for their physical health, and it’s not good for your team health,” reflected Chris Hildebrand. “So we want to make sure we have that openness in our schedule that we can give people time off.”
Creating a supportive work environment is what the Industrial East project is really all about.
The intention behind this project for The Bunker is to create a workspace for youth who need a more supportive environment than might be offered elsewhere, with flexible shifts and varied tasks.
Chris Hildebrand explains they intend to create an environment built around understanding for people whose “brains maybe function a little bit different than what a lot of places are set up to accommodate. We are set up to accommodate exactly those people … having a management team that actually understands [those needs] is critical in us being able to create the space where those folks are comfortable.”
“As of right now, we’re not actively hiring,” added Alycia Hildebrand. “But we do have some people kind of champing at the bit to get in here. We will slowly be bringing them in.”
Future plans call for them to hire seniors as well, she said, to draw on their wealth of experience and give them the chance to serve as mentors for the younger employees.
“We’re hoping that once the dining room does get open and we’re actually running at full capacity with full staff, we will be able to take on more people—more seniors and others who just need to get out of the house for a few hours every week. Everyone has something to offer.”
