Canadian poutine, Nashville hot chicken share space at Cary's beer shop BottleDog

The folks behind BottleDog Bites and Brews chat with the 919 Beer Podcast about their new bottle shop in Cary.

Posted 5:37 p.m. Feb 25, 2017 — Updated 5:45 p.m. Jul 13, 2018

Food and beer aren’t new to the people behind BottleDog Bites and Brews, but the new bottle shop concept is different than what they have done before.

Joe Hatch and Shawn Whisnant already own the longstanding Woody’s Sports Tavern in Cary. Add in Todd Buff and BottleDog is up and running.

The food at BottleDog is eclectic. Poutine—french fries drizzled with brown gravy and dotted with thick white cheddar cheese curds—is a Canadian staple, as is the Montreal smoke meat sandwich.

Throw in a smattering of Nashville-style hot chicken, with two optional levels of heat, and you get a taste of what BottleDog does. (Hatch said there used to be a third, hotter option of chicken, but they had to back off the fire a little bit.)

“(The owners) have done a lot of traveling, a lot of beer drinking, and this is food that these guys love to eat when you’re drinking beer,” BottleDog manager Max Zettle told the 919 Beer podcast. “These are dishes that they’ve found on their travels between Nashville, into Montreal and Quebec.”

The mix of regional food keeps the menu fresh, but Zettle said the Canadian flair draws customers by itself: A few weeks ago, a group of people who are all originally from Quebec flooded the shop to get a taste of poutine like they had back home.

To wash down the food, or put out the fire from the hot chicken, BottleDog rotates brews through 12 taps and stocks more than 200 options in bottles and cans that you can buy to take home. There’s also a crowler machine that fills and seals 32-ounce aluminum cans.

Word of warning: If you're ordering the hot chicken, make sure you have a beer on hand first.

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