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BUCHANAN — The Buchanan foodie scene is heating up with the addition of a new BBQ restaurant.

Ariel and Anton Lockett, of Evelyn Mae’s BBQ, opened their first restaurant, Fifteen-2-Twelve, located at 15212 Redbud Trail, Buchanan, Thursday afternoon.

“We’re ready to finally be in the building and open,” Ariel said. “We’ve been waiting for this day for a long time, so we’re very excited to finally be here.”

The restaurant – which features traditional BBQ items such as ribs, pulled pork, brisket, and chicken as well as signature cocktails, wines, beer bottles and drafts – will be open from 4 to 9 p.m. Thursday through Sunday.

The Locketts culinary journey began in November 2019 when they decided to open Evelyn Mae’s BBQ as a catering only company. The company was named in honor of the couple’s first born Evelyn Mae Lockett, who due to complications passed away shortly after being born. 

The Locketts expanded their business to operate out of a food truck in the summer of 2021 before deciding to purchase the vacant Wheatberry space for their restaurant.

“My husband had been searching around for a while,” Ariel said. “This happened to just fall in our lap. The more that we looked at it, the more we were like ‘this is the perfect location.’ It’s already got the aesthetic we want, we didn’t have to put a lot into it, it had the smoker already. So we were just like this is the place for us and we scooped it up and now it’s ours. It’s home.”

Katrina Moss was the first customer in line and was excited to celebrate her husband’s birthday at the new restaurant.

“We’re just really excited to have it open,” she said. “(My husband) has been waiting for it. He was like ‘make sure you’re first in line.’”

Dennis Bentley was also one of Fifteen-2-Twelve’s first customers and was happy to welcome the restaurant to the community.

“I’m excited for it, I really am,” he said. “We need something like this around here. We don’t have a lot of choices in the area and I’m excited for this place to be opening.”

Bentley believes that Fifteen-2-Twelve can be a destination restaurant for the community, especially during motocross season.

“It’ll help with the track during all racing and everything that goes on,” he said. “It’ll give you something to do other than just being there at the track.”

After months of anticipation, Ariel is excited the restaurant has finally opened its doors to the community.

“They’re excited,” she said. “They’ve been asking and asking and asking when we’re opening, and we’re finally here.”

For more information on Fifteen-2-Twelve and Evelyn Mae’s BBQ, including opportunities to join their team, visit facebook.com/evelynmaesbbq/.