INTRODUCTORY NEWSLETTER – JANUARY 2007

INTRODUCTION...

With a great family of staff and guests, Sunfire has become a meeting place for many; a truly enjoyable culinary experience with friends. We have stocked the cupboard, the fridge, and the bar for you to come enjoy the warmth of our home whenever you can. (If the grub, the family, and the music don’t get you—don’t forget, we clear the table and do the dishes, too!)

With thanks to all of you for trusting us with your enjoyment and your offers of opinion that help us grow, please accept this newsletter as a way for us to stay connected as each of you have done for us. When you finish reading it, print it out and bring it to us—We’ll knock 10% off of your dinner bill. (applicable for the months of January and February)

Again, many thanks;

Looking forward to a safe and prosperous year with YOU, our family, at our home away from home

Every month, we’ll introduce someone new.- We start this month with a few “someones.”

The management staff here at Sunfire Grill: Joe Levi, Kristi Forbes, Daniel Hamrick, Dave Bucks, and Jessica Kirby (Chad Luik not shown - he was too busy making Happy Hours happy...).

NEWSWIRE

An IDENTITY found:

Everyone knows the kitchen, the restrooms, the patio—but what about our living room? To the staff, the living room is where we live and love what we do best, our guests may call them dining rooms. We have given them names of a common language. The smaller room (accommodating 25) has been unveiled as the Champagne Garden Room. Our larger of the two rooms (accommodating 55), featuring art from local artists, has been dubbed The Gallery. Our lounge, full of vibrant music 6 days a week, we have chosen to call the B & B Lounge or more properly, the Blues & Boogie Lounge.

NOW comes your part. . .we need to decorate them to further support the vision. WE LOVE your thoughts and ideas! Please e-mail an idea for the Champagne Garden Room to us at info@sunfiregrill.com and the winner will receive dinner for 6 in the room they decorated.

SUNDAY

Dinner for Deux?

Sunday night (4pm-10pm) is now dinner for two for you. . .

Any couple can come in and join us on Sundays for choices from a featured menu and a bottle of wine for $40.00 plus tax and tip... Rachel Ray would love this!

Brunch

Sunday from 10am-3pm is the brunch extravaganza—regular menu, brunch menu, mimosas, Gillian’s specialty bloodies, blueberry muffins, cappuccino, and hot tea.

MONDAY

Original music in the B & B Lounge from the Singers and Songwriters Association 7-10pm. You have to hear this to believe the amount of talent!

TUESDAY-SATURDAY

Get away from the phone calls at the office for a nice lunch, avoid traffic by coming in for happy hour and join us for dinner and a show. (see website for details)

ACCOLADES:

If you haven’t been to our website yet, GO! Our designer, David Robert Wooten of 9august.com, got us up and going—with an award winning site! We keep menu information, music schedules, special offers and fun pictures there for you to view.

SALAD BAR- our salad bar won the Best of West Ashley award on bestofwestashley.com! Thanks again to you!

RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE DRIVE

This year went better than ever! We donated over 100 items to the house for use all year long!

ROASST, SLAINTE AND CHEERS …

Happy New Year to all! The Sunfire team is looking forward to a fun and entertaining 2007. But first, let us not forget some of our highlights from 2006 –

• Corniest holiday joke by a musician:
      I was fortunate (or some may say unfortunate) enough to overhear this story from Rob Posey of the Cotton Blue Band:
      It seems that in search of that perfect holiday gift, Rob found himself in a pet store, surrounded by talking birds. He became incredibly interested in a parrot that had an uncanny gift of wassailing. (That would mean singing carols, Daniel.)
      What a perfect gift for Debbie, thought Rob. She could teach the bird to play bass, and maybe the bird could help Debbie learn to sing. (Just kidding Debbie, you sing quite well, and a bass playing bird, well that’s just silly.)
      Anyway, after finally getting the attention of a store associate (It is the holiday season, you know, and they are very busy, and edgy, and tired, and cranky and hopefully not carrying guns) Rob found out that the bird’s name was Chet, and that there was a very unique way of getting Chet to sing certain songs.
      “You see,” explained the associate as she pulled out a matchbook from her bird dripping-drenched apron, “Chet has been trained to sing in response to pyro-technics.” She swiftly lit a match and held it under his left talon. Immediately, Chet burst into song:
      “Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way…”
      (I think we all know how this ends, but to spare the suspense, HA HA HA, we all end up riding in a sleigh and having a merry time.)
      “If you are ready for a different song,” the associate continued, struggling to light the next match (It seems Chet had become very excited and leaked a bit in the direction of the matchbook) “Ah, there we go. If you are ready for a different carol, hold a lit match under his right talon.”
      Cue Chet:
      “Silent Night, Holy Night ….”
      Bah, Blah, Blah … Anyway, Rob was already convinced that he was to make this purchase. But, Rob being Rob, he couldn’t resist the temptation of one more question:
      “So,” querried Rob, barely able to disguise his giddy inner child, “what happens if you hold the match (tee, hee!) under his nether regions?”
      It seemed a silly and perhaps even absurd question to the associate, but the long hours, the constant sounds and smells (I’ll leave that one to the imagination) of the animalia, the barrage of clueless holiday shoppers – they had all rendered her a bit numb, and, to be honest, she never had held a match under Chet’s nether regions. It would be worth a try.
      Writer’s note: We are about to get to the punch line, but, to all of you anticipating this one, no, Chet does not pass gas as the match is held underneath him, burning Rob’s hair and creating mass chaos in the pet store. No, he didn’t. But that would have been kind of funny to watch. Back to the story…
      “Ok,” continued the associate, sensing a sale (and we all know that the sales commission on singing birds is through the roof nowadays) “lets give it a try.” She took her last remaining dry match, lit it, and held it under the singing bird.
      Silence.
      She held it closer.
      Silence.
      Closer.
      Silence.
      (It’s one of those wood matches with the really long stick.)
      Closer.
      Now directly under Chet, the match finally seemed to spark some creativity into the bird, and he finally began to croon:
      “Chet’s nuts roasting on an open fire…”
      (I warned you in the intro that it was corny.)
• Best use of small spaces:
       As our nightly entertainment in the lounge continues to expand and blossom, so has our guest’s ability to enjoy them. I would be remiss not to give a shout out to Melanie for turning that small space between Booth 310 and the band (yeah, that’s restaurant talk – Booth 310 is the table that used to be behind the shrubbery, but the shrubbery is now under the window, so it’s the booth directly in front of the musicians who are now in front of the shrubbery which used to be in front of them at Booth 310, until it was moved behind them to the window ledge.) into the Sunfire dance floor. Melanie started giving new meaning to “dancing Queen” on Thursdays for Cottton Blue, and it has pretty much evolved into an every night thing. Even if she isn’t there, Calvin Taylor still gets everyone to boogie down on Tuesdays. And every other Friday – just wait till Susie Summers bursts into her rendition of Mustang Sally. (Cotton Blue does a great “Mustang Melanie!) Word is that Melanie is working on a new dance for Juke Joint Johnny and Drew Baldwin on Saturdays. That may be a 2007 highlight!
• First (and youngest) musician fan club:
       Not only does Wednesday’s performer Adam Isgit have the first official fan club at Sunfire, but also its youngest member!  Kudos to Ron for donning an “Adam Isgit’s #1 fan club” T-shirt, and for later being joined by his wife and 4 week old son, who also sported an identical shirt! I really hope that someone got a picture of that – if so, we’ll post it in an upcoming newsletter.
• Most difficult liquor to keep in stock/ aka Thank you to our regular guests:
       2006 saw many liquid refreshments pass from our wells to your mouths – some more than others. We (And by we, I mean Jim Beam, Mr. Crawford and the Fleischman’s conglomerate) would like to thank all of our loyal guests for their patronage. You are the cornerstone that supports our “House of good times.” Beamsters Rob, Charlie and Carl, Crawfords Consumers Bill, Bea, Bubsy, GP, Barbara and Harold, along with John W., Sammy, Joe, Tom, Rocky, and Tony, and our Old Grandad Dave assure us that there will always be smiling faces at the bar.
•      But, for some reason, the liquor that kept running out most often was Stoli. Wait a minute, isn’t that what Skye drinks? Coincidence? I don’t know. But, heads up to Mr. Van Gogh – seems she’s taken a liking to your espresso vodka. Tell ya what, nothin’ says fun like the trifecta of vodka, caffeine and Skye!
      Special note to one of our favorite performers, Ted McKee: If you are ever having trouble finding Skye, just follow the trail of sparkling tinsel (Inside joke).
• Best recovery from a biking accident:
       This one amazed me.  Merely weeks after his devastating injury, David Moulton preformed his original song at Susie and Al’s first annual Singer and Songwriter’s Holiday Song contest. I still don’t know how he managed to hold his pick with his injured hand. And even better – he placed third!
      That was a wonderful evening! Thank you to Susie and Al for hosting our Monday night extravaganza. Every Monday from 7:00 PM till question mark is open mike night with an asterisk. Asterisk = Sure, we can all grab a mike and sing karaoke, but can you write, sing and perform your own creation? That is what Mondays are all about. Fun to play, and, personally speaking, even more fun to watch and listen.
      And congrats to second place winner Chris, and first place Ricky, as well as to all the participants – Frank, .. …… …… .et al .. (Jess- I have the full list of names at work.)
      Next up: St. Patrick’s Day song contest: Date TBA
• Finally, the best change of 2006:
       Free pour. Enough said.
• And the best thing about the beginning of the New Year:
      I have 11 more issues of the newsletter to include all of you who were not mentioned in this issue. Beware … Do something strange, tell me a joke, walk backwards while lighting a cigarette with your toe and holding your empty drink glass on top of your head with no hands (Hi Bill!) … I will be watching … and writing … ‘cuz that’s what I like to do!

So, what will happen in 2007? Will Melanie drink us out of Diet Pepsi? Will we have a celebrity guest at Monday’s Singers and Songwriters Showcase? Will Chris Tidestrom finally entertain us with a Swedish accent? Can Rob tell a better joke?

   Whatever the case,

   proasst, slainte and cheers

   from all of us to all of you.

   And all Best Wishes

   in this year that is new.

-- CHAD

Sunfire Grill and Bistro

1090 Sam Rittenberg Blvd, Charleston, SC 29407

Phone: (843) 766-0223          Fax: (843) 766-0296

Email: info@sunfiregrill.com

It is not our intention to SPAM.

If you wish to be removed from our mailing list, please click HERE to advise s of your request by email