Famous Ribs restaurant opens in Collier

The promise of good food knows no boundaries, including state lines.

“I have actually made the trek out to Weirton to partake in some Dee Jay’s wings, and they did not disappoint,” Devlin Robinson said. “They were definitely worth the drive.”

The state Senator from Bridgeville made the acknowledgment prior to a mid-July ceremonial ribbon cutting for the first foray from West Virginia into Pennsylvania for Dee Jay’s BBQ Ribs & Grille. And Robinson hardly is alone in his journey.

“What I like to say is, you’ve been to the Weirton store or you know somebody who has been to the Weirton store,” Scott Watson, general manager of the new restaurant in Collier, said.

He and other staff members joined local officials in a ceremony organized by Mandi Pryor, executive director of the South West Chamber of Commerce. The chamber office is a short distance on Route 50 from Dee Jay’s location at Great Southern Shopping Center in a space previously occupied by eateries, including Rumfish Grille.

Further expansion by Dee Jay’s is on the horizon, with a restaurant in Washington planned before the end of the year and one in Wexford by spring, according to Watson.

The menu features a variety of American favorites as far as food and beverages, but the main attraction is Dee Jay’s Famous Ribs: “Baby back pork ribs hickory smoked with Dee Jay’s BBQ sauce.”

“We’re keeping the recipe,” Alexis McCormick, who handles marketing, said about the Weirton version of the sauce. “There was some debate about if the recipes were going to be the same for ribs, and they are.”

To indulge in the ribs, some of the folks who cross the state line actually are from the other side of Pennsylvania.

“The Philadelphia Flyers send their people down every time they’re in town,” Watson said. “That’s a pretty good advertisement, if you ask me.”

He evoked memories of a good-natured 2012 flap involving Peter Laviolette, then head coach of the National Hockey League team, who previously had led the Wheeling Nailers and struck up a friendship with Dee Jay’s owner Dewey Guida. When Laviolette basically cited Dee Jay’s ribs as a good-luck charm against the Pittsburgh Penguins, Guida said he wouldn’t sell them to the Flyers anymore.

Once the Penguins started beating the Flyers again, the ban apparently was lifted. And Watson certainly welcomes anyone who wants to sample any of the cuisine in Collier.

“We just plan on being a very good community partner,” he said. “I’m proud to work for an organization that allows us to go ahead and do so.”