Treylor Park brings PB&J wings and pancake tacos to Bay Street!
That’s right, peanut butter and jelly chicken wings and pancake tacos are on Treylor Park’s menu. So too are their fried banana pepper rings, grilled apple pie and rice krispy s’more rolls.
Sounds like a good time, right?
Well, that was owner Trey Wilder’s goal – to keep the menu simple with fun food that sells itself, bring it back to customer service at a place where his customers could enjoy themselves.
“That was kind of what I wanted to be known for,” said Wilder. “Not necessarily a good cocktail menu or extensive food menu or the best dessert, but if you wanted to go to a cool place and have a good time, you go to Treylor Park.”
The restaurant + bar has an indoor cocktail bar, outdoor beer garden and a large kitchen. Wilder’s partner and chef, Hunter Sattlewhite, creates the trailer park-inspired meals from their fine-tuned menu.
Though their menu is separated in groups of five – five brunch, lunch, shares, entrees and deserts. There are three items, Wilder said, they’re known for: their pb&j chicken wings, chicken-pancake tacos and popcorn shrimp.
“We make items that are just different and unique, and kind of themed with the trailer park, but it’s a little upscale,” said Wilder.
Take their peanut, butter and jelly chicken wings. They make their own pecan butter and peach jam in-house. After cooking it, they blend it together to make a sauce for the wings. Then they dip it, flip it and serve them just like any other chicken wings.
But their top-seller is a different chicken dish—their chicken and pancake tacos. I is just their version of the chicken and waffle, but with a pancake instead of a waffle. Sattlewhite even makes a maple glaze and strawberry and jalapeno salsa to top it off.
Even the popcorn shrimp has a twist—actual popcorn. Instead of frying little shrimp, they grill and lay them on top of a bed of popcorn. It is then drizzled with a chive ranch dressing.
But that’s not even the end to their fun menu.
Their fried banana peppers, chicken biscuit and baloney sandwich—a baloney classic with Italian baloney, a fried egg and cheese on a brioche bun—are a few of their other notable items.
And they couldn’t make such a playful food menu without having a few fun drinks on the flip side. Their Shot in the Dark consists of white rum, lime juice, ginger beer and float dark rum .The Chablis Deveau is concocted with pecan bourbon, peach simple syrup and peychaud bitters. And the Flying Wasp is a three-ounce mint tea vodka with simple syrup, lemons, topped with ginger ale.
Customers can also get a Cactus Pear Margarita or Georgia Peach iced coffee with pecan bourbon. They offer an assortment of different Bloody Mary’s (or Bloody’s as they call them), draft beers, bubbles, white and red wines. But although they have a variety of different drinks, their list isn’t extensive or exhaustive. They keep it simple with a selection of about five or six items per category even on their drink menu.
“The base of the menu was quality over quantity,” said Wilder.
“The places I worked for in the past tended to do too much.” Which included a slew of upscale restaurants and bars owned by the Gerber Group, and bars at W Hotels in New York City. Wilder worked in there for 10 years, before moving to Savannah in April 2014 to open up his own bar.
“The last three years I had opened up three different places in Manhattan for three different companies,” said Wilder. “I did a bar, a restaurant, a rooftop lounge at a hotel. All of the owners were my age—like mid or late 30s—so once I got that under my belt, I said, ‘Ok, now is the time.’”
With some help from his dad and chef, Wilder got the money together and bought the space on Bay Street. Chef Sattlewhite came to Savannah to start making and testing the food. They got everything together in time for their opening in October, which they decided not to advertise.
“It’s really just been word of mouth,” said Wilder.
“I wanted that natural build up, I didn’t want to have a huge opening or a huge rush and then us not be prepared.”
They’ve had guest DJ’s and private parties use their video projector and sound system. They’re perfect for movie screenings, wedding receptions and parties. They also offer a special prefix menus for such events. Wilder said depending on a party’s budget, they can put together a $25, $35 or $45 per person prefix menu.
“We’ve already got a nice little stable following of regulars and some local people,” said Wilder.
Which is good for Wilder, because he wants to stick around.
“I want to do it long term,” said Wilder. “I don’t just want to be hot for six months and then people forget about us.”
And once he’s really got everything down, he hopes to expand and make a franchise out of Treylor Park, branching outside of Savannah.
“It’s not just a one time thing for me, I want to do a second and third and fourth one,” said Wilder. “We’re getting everything set. Then we’re just going to do a second one in the next year, somewhere else.
Treylor Park is located at 115 E. Bay St. For more information, call