Eats
Alongside award-winning Kansas City style BBQ favorites like ribs, burnt ends and pulled pork, our menu includes original BBQ-inspired creations that are to to hit your spot. Our BBQ Nachos have been voted some of the best in the city and our smoked and sauced wings earn rave reviews.
Brews
We support our local brewers by tapping some of Missouri and Illinois’ finest craft beers. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram for the latest updates!
Good Times
There’s always a friendly face, a game to watch, and something fun going on at Bootleggin’! Play a game of Bags on our large patio. Catch the game on one of 6 TVs. Shoot a round of Golden Tee. Don’t worry, we gotcha covered.
Our Mission
BOOTLEGGIN’ BBQ’s mission is to bring smoky goodness to the world and enrich the lives of our guests, employees and owners. We believe this is achieved by providing quality BBQ and brews, legendary customer service, sales growth, cost control as well as treating our employees and customers like family. We believe our employees are our most important resource. Our success depends on creating and retaining a staff capable of delivering an exceptional dining experience to every customer, every time.
Our story
Bootleggin BBQ was created to give the world smoky goodness.
In 2006, Brenton started Bootleggin BBQ while living in Chicago with a longtime friend and his wife, Tim and Hayley McCormick. Having grown up in Kansas City where BBQ is one of the 4 main regions of BBQ, Brenton was well versed in what quality BBQ should taste like. Along with the McCormick’s, Hayley a KC native and Tim a KC transplant, they realized there was a need in Chicago for good, quality smoky goodness. So they started to cater.
Life happened and the business separated; however, Brenton continued on with the Bootleggin name together with the catering business in KC and eventually in Saint Louis.
Meanwhile in Saint Louis, Eddie and a friend started to go after their passion of brewing beer. During this lengthy process, they realized they needed to eat so in their downtime, they started to BBQ. This passion and opportunity of necessity turned into an annual party for them, The Church of Blues, Brews and BBQ.
This annual party is where Brenton met up with Eddie, which led to where we are today.
It's all in the name
The name “Bootleggin'” is a nod to the Prohibition Era, bootlegging, and infamous Kansas City Alderman, Tom Pendergast. “Boss Tom” as he was called is the main reason for keeping Kansas City wet during prohibition. This led to the rise of the great jazz scene and eventually the great BBQ restaurants. While Boss Tom is notorious for his nefarious ways in politics, we focus on the positives that he brought: the Booze, the Brews, and the BBQ.
THE FUTURE
Having good quality BBQ and our own Brews alongside great Brews from around the world has always been the concept. We are not satisfied until we get to pursue all of our passions on a daily basis and offer the world the ability to experience them. We will be pursuing distribution of our sauce, our rub and of course our Brews. This is just the beginning and there will be many opportunities for us, and for you, to pursue passions.
We will also be pursuing another location where we will introduce to the world the concept as it was from the beginning: Brew ‘n Que.
