The announcement that the group behind FARM Bluffton and Savannah’s Common Thread would be opening a more casual eats establishment in Savannah’s Victorian District turned some heads. Make that a lot of heads. Yes, the Streamliner vintage diner holds sentimental value to a lot of people in Savannah, but it’s the new tenant that is creating the most buzz.
Strangebird has been a very popular food truck in the region for a number of years. Now it is a free standing brick and mortar restaurant. There will be a lot more than just burgers and chicken sandwiches too. Here is my conversation with Executive Chef and Co-Owner Brandon Carter on what you can expect from Strangebird, with a couple of surprises mixed in. The conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.
JB: Joining us now is the Executive Chef and owner of the budding empire, I dare to call it. It’s a series of restaurants, the new one is around the corner, we’re gonna talk about it with Brandon Carter, first of all, how are you, sir?
Brandon Carter: I’m doing great, you know, busy busy.
JB: Staying busy, thanks so much for taking a few minutes. First it was Farm Bluffton…you came to Savannah, you had eyes for Savannah all along as I recall it, Common Thread has been great. Then you threw me a curve ball, personally, when I saw Wildflower Cafe open in the Jepson Museum, I went, “Oh! I like the idea.” And then this one totally caught me by surprise. Have you been looking for a space for a brick and mortar for Strangebird?
BC: Yeah, we’ve been looking for a while. The idea of it becoming a brick and mortar has been a thing for a long time, maybe since its inception. But I really started looking hard about a year ago. And there was this one space we had our eye on and I thought it would be really interesting, and I still think it would’ve been, but you know, the stars just didn’t line up.
JB: Yeah, it happens that way sometimes. For those who aren’t familiar with the brand and the food truck, Strangebird… was it on the street before 2020? Because I knew it exploded in 2020.
BC: It was, we had been around a little bit pre-pandemic. We’d pop-up here and pop-up there, but we really started to dive into it when the world came to an end in 2020. We used it to sling burgers on the corner in Bluffton, or, you know, when Savannah started to reopen, we became a common fixture over at Starland Yard… over at Service Brewing, that was one of our first stops when we started.
JB: I remember.
BC: Lot 9 Brewing Company (In Bluffton). You know, there was just several different places where we were popping up. That’s all great and everything; it was a great way for us to market our brand as a whole, and also to kind of test this new brand, Strangebird.
JB: Would you describe it as street food?
BC: Yeah, it’s street food-ish. Adjacent. I definitely think that there’s a little bit more refinement than what you probably think of when you think of street food, and we share the same sensibilities that we do throughout our company with local sourcing and seasonal cooking and cooking from scratch, by hand, those big flavors… sometimes a little too spicy.
JB: (laughing) I don’t know that there’s any such thing.
BC: I don’t either, but, you know, I read about it from time to time.
JB: Yeah, right? So, Strangebird is going to open here at the corner of Barnard and, is that Anderson?
BC: Henry.
JB: You would think I’d know by now. I only live three blocks away. But yeah, right there at the corner, the Streamliner Diner, owned by SCAD, correct?
BC: That is correct.
JB: Did they approach you? Because I know they’re persnickety like that, they like to hand choose their tenants, or did you approach them?
BC: Well, I asked them to hand choose us.
JB: Gotcha.
BC: I was driving down the road one day– you know, I think you probably remember, but the original Strangebird was a vintage Airstream.
JB: Yeah, I remember.
BC: Yeah, so I was driving down the road one day, and I was kind of licking my wounds from this other space falling through and I rolled up on the Streamliner, and I was like, “Man, that would make a great location for Strangebird. It kind of feels like the Airstream a little bit. And we reached out to our real estate agent and I was like, “Who owns that building?” And lo and behold, it was SCAD. So we reached out and pitched them our concept, and they loved the idea.
JB: That’s awesome. I heard a little bird share that you guys had to– what, would you consider it an audition? You cooked for them at Fleeting, is that accurate?
BC: That wasn’t– so, the pop up that we did at Fleeting was more of a way to start the marketing engine and get out there. The project was already underway when we did that pop up.
JB: Oh okay, very good. I wondered about that, I was like, ‘Man, they need to cook for SCAD, get outta here, I’m sure there’s people who– the people in the know who make decisions at SCAD I’m sure had been to Common Thread and/or Farm multiple times. So tell us now, the menu on the Strangebird food truck changes here and there, you’ve got a few staples, how are you going to apply that to a brick and mortar?
BC: Well, it’s kind of a ‘greatest hits’ from the truck with a couple of new things added in. You know, the Streamliner used to be Sandfly BBQ, as I’m sure you remember, so there’s this beautiful smokehouse behind the building and a great smoker back here, so all of the meats that we’re gonna be using in the tacos and the burritos and the sandwiches are gonna be coming off the smoker. So that’s something– you know, we had played around with some different smoke stuff on the truck, but we’re gonna kind of dive head first into it here. You’re gonna see a lot of the tacos that we were doing on the truck, the fried chicken sandwich, the burger, you know, things like that… the refried butter beans that everybody loses their mind over… you’ll see things like that here. We’ve also added burritos to the line up and a couple more sandwiches. What I think is cool about the sandwiches that we’re gonna be doing here is that everything is gonna be patty melt style, so we’re baking this bread that’s kind of like a Parker House roll dough? So we’ll slice them and griddle them nice and toasty, and it’ll be served like that.
JB: Nice. We’re chatting with Brandon Carter, Executive Chef and Owner of Farm, Common Thread, Wildflower Cafe and now Strangebird at the Streamliner Diner on Barnard and Henry in Savannah’s Victorian District. I saw, driving by, you’re gonna be open, to start, I’m sure it’ll change; what is it, Thursday to Sunday?
BC: Thursday to Monday, so we’ll be closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but I think we’re still gonna activate the space on those days, but we’re gonna use it to do chef residencies. So, for instance, one of our chefs over at Common Thread has a pop up that he does called Jacaranda. That’ll probably be one of the first residencies we do, where he’ll do, say, every Tuesday for a month.
JB: Love it.
BC: Right? So, that way we can kind of get some of these newcomers to the Savannah scene in there, get them some exposure, and who knows, maybe we’ll see a Jacaranda restaurant pop up.
JB: Love it. Yeah, you know, I gotta hand it to you, and I don’t think I’ve ever shared this with you, but, you know, of all the restaurants that have come to town, the one that’s been the most aggressive with inviting outsiders, other chefs to come and do their thing here and give them a platform has been you guys. And I notice, I appreciate it, I’m sure the people in this town do, I wish we had more of it, but you gotta start somewhere, right? When you make the call to someone in Atlanta, “hey, you wanna come down and do a guest night?” Has the word gotten out that you’re doing this down here?
BC: For sure! We’ve got the guys from Staple House potentially coming down in September, they’ll do a pop up in the courtyard where we’re gonna showcase their oysters, Shiny Dimes, that they’re farming in the panhandle. We’ve invited some chefs from Nashville, we’ve got some Virginia chefs showing up this year–
JB: You had one from Miami last year I remember?
BC: Yeah! That one was awesome, the Peruvian food… Yeah, so, for me, I kind of geek out about food and I’m always like, what are we missing? You know, what is it that I crave that we don’t have here? And that’s typically what I’m trying to invite in, and I’m hoping that one of them stays.
JB: Yeah, right? No kidding. We need a few more to stay. Is the food truck still gonna be on the street?
BC: Yeah, I think that if nothing else we’ll use it as a catering vehicle, but we may roll it out as Strangebird from time to time, we may rebrand it and give somebody else a shot in it. I think that we have a lot of ideas and we’ll see what direction we’re gonna go in once the dust settles over here.
JB: Very cool. Now, my last question for you, when you guys opened Farm Bluffton it was popular, I think, right away, if I recall correctly. I know early on you guys had eyes for Savannah, you’ve done that, but did you think the whole group would grow this quickly? Was this part of the plan?
BC: I did. (laughing) I’m not sure that my business partners, Ryan and Alan, thought we were gonna grow this fast. It’s a blessing and a curse of a little bit of an overactive imagination. I see opportunities and I wanna go after them.
JB: And, you know what, knowing you, I know that it’s also confidence in what you do, and an understanding of the market, and ‘you know what? Screw it, we’re gonna do it, and it’s gonna be good and people are gonna love it, and let’s go.’ That’s kinda how you guys have evolved I’m guessing.
BC: Yeah, definitely. We’re very fortunate to have this team as a bedrock for us to be able to have this confidence to open Strangebird, to open Wildflower, to open whatever our next concept is. Because the reality is, you know, one restaurant? Yeah, I got that. Two restaurants? Yeah, I probably got that too. But you start getting above that, and my ability to be in all these restaurants is just not possible. So if I don’t have the Ashley Cunha over at Farm, or Joseph Harrison over here at Common Thread, or Annie Coleman… if I don’t have these people around me… the Felipes and Daniels that are gonna be over here at Strangebird, if we don’t have them on our team, none of this is possible.
JB: Yeah. No, I get it, I get it, and it’s great that you’ve been able to surround yourself with this much great talent. Because it’s good to have one or two or whatever, you’re fortunate that they decide to come and stay here in Savannah, but you’ve got a bunch, and that’s pretty awesome.
BC: Yes, we are very lucky.
JB: Very good. Well, it’s Strangebird at the corner of Barnard and Henry, it is great stuff, I mean, I could go down the list right now of everything I’ve had from your truck and I’ve loved it all, so you’ll have to get over there. And I’m more than a little excited that your refried butter beans are going to be in existence 3 1/2 blocks from my front door.
BC: (laughing) And next month hopefully we’ll have our beer and wine license as well. We’ve got frozen sangrias and frose in our sights, and until then we’ll have some delicious homemade agua frescas, we’re making a horchata with Carolina Gold rice and coconut milk, it is nothing short of outstanding.
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