Tradition's great, but it can also benefit from the occasional twist, except when it's your big brother giving you a wedgie every night before bed...now with a twist! For a resto whipping up classic yet innovative Southern food, hit Smoke't.

From the hungry crew and the CIA-trained chef behind Town Kitchen & Bar who wanted a Southern joint in their neck of the woods, Smoke't feels like a gussied up roadhouse, with a shuffleboard table, walls stuffed with wood for the smoker or covered w/ corrugated steel, roomy booths, stools made of polished tree trunks, and eight high-def TVs around the perimeter, which stand in direct opposition to how much definition you'll be losing there. Starters take Bible-Belt ingredients and get wacky, with options like beer-battered onion rings topped with pulled pork, melted cheddar/jack, jalapeños, and chipotle sour cream; the Pot Boil (1/2lb of peel-and-eat shrimp, cooked in beer & Old Bay w/ habanero cocktail sauce); and sushi rolls like blackened catfish w/ avocado, tomato, crispy onion, and spicy pepper sauce called the Red Neck Roll, plucked from its natural environment of peeking out the top, bottom, and sides of a Nascar t-shirt. Entrees divide into non-BBQ Southern faves like fried chicken 'n' waffles and grilled 14oz double-cut pork chop, and awesomeness from the hickory pit BBQ: meaty St. Louis spare ribs dry rubbed with 15 spices then smoked, 18-hour brisket finished with Coca Cola BBQ sauce, smoked "wet" baby backs slathered in house sauce, beef ribs marinated overnight and smoked for 6 hours, or a combo of them all in a ridiculous platter called the Over The Top -- to eat it properly, you have to turn your hat backwards and win the affections of your estranged son.

They thoughtfully stock a full bar, with specialty cocktails like the Black Cherry Lemon Drop (Jim Beam Red Stag, Limoncello, fresh sour, mint leaves), plus 80 beers that go way beyond Southern, like Chimay, Seadog Apricot Wheat from NY, and "large format" brews like Double Bastard from CA, and from Oregon, Rogue Double Dead Guy, which is exactly what your bro's gonna be the moment you unhitch your Jockeys from the bedpost.

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