After just over 26 years, the wild ride has reached the end of the road for Deb and Jeff Tinker, longtime local restaurateurs and owners of B&S Crossing, which closed for good on Saturday.
The Tinkers announced they would be closing B&S in October of last year, and tributes poured in from around town – and around the country.
"I'm sorry to hear you're closing," Pam Betts replied. "Everyone is right, your med bread is the best in town."
"Guess a trip back to the Grove needs to be in my very near future," wrote Kristan Gunter Jirak
"Such sad news" wrote Joan Slater, "Although I'm now living in Kansas with my daughter, I will always remember your Med Bread!"
In a post made to the B&S Facebook page in December, the Tinkers reminisced about their time as Eagle Grove business owners, and gave a hint about B&S's legacy, and future. "The time has come to say Good-bye," they wrote. "Jeff came to Eagle in 1976, we also had Jake’s Pizza in Clarion, Belmond, and Mason City. We ran the Golf Course a couple times; ran the Mainstream (old Pastime) for a couple years. He also recruited for the National Guard. We moved to Sanborn, but our roots are in Eagle. So for the last 26 years the B&S would be our last business."
Long before they went public with their plans to retire, locals were asking for the secret recipe to Med Bread, which has been a favorite local dish ever since Jeff invented it in 1978 when he was running the old Jake's Pizza.
"Med Bread began at Jake’s in 1978," the Tinkers wrote, "the people of Eagle have loved it from the start!" Jeff gave the Eagle a little more background on the delicious dish on Saturday. "We were always eating stuff" at Jakes, Jeff explained, "and we got tired of always eating pizza. So we got to experimenting." The full name they chose for the bread was Mediterranean Bread, Jeff said – which gives a hint to it's inspiration. But that "took up too much room on the ticket," and so they abbreviated it "Med Bread", he recalled. The name stuck.
Deb and Jeff both have fond memories of their years running B&S. Back in October, Deb spoke about how the old Karaoke nights, their "celebrity bartenders", and the times Ragbrai came through were favorites of hers. On Saturday, Jeff related one of his favorite B&S memories.
We were one of the first bars in town to have darts," Jeff pointed out, "and it became a big thing. In the early days we did a lot of traveling," he said, which took the team to nearby towns like Webster City and Fort Dodge, and far away cities too. "One time we were in Chicago for a dart tournament," Jeff said, pointing to a stack of dart team plaques he'd brought out for the last night. "We played a team from Alaska. Hoo boy were they good! That was sometime in the mid '80's." Jeff related how when they got to the convention center in Chicago "there must have been 200 boards. Everyone throwing at the same time. I remember that so vividly!"
Jeff also made a point of explaining where the name B&S really came from. "It means Broadway Spirits," he said. "That always made people think it was a liquor store instead of a bar," he said with a chuckle. But the real meaning has to do with a different kind of spirits, and an urban legend about the building being haunted. "We've seen some stuff," he said with a laugh, but noted that if there is a ghost, it's a friendly one.
Another way the place is infused with spirits is the memories it holds for the Tinkers and so many of their customers, of friendships and good times. "We have made and lost so many friends associated with B&S," the Tinkers wrote on Facebook, "lots of wonderful memories to hang on to!"
On the last night, and indeed the last several nights of business, B&S was busy again. Packed, in fact. And sales were so strong that they were selling out of everything. On Saturday, they ran completely out of pizza crusts, and ended the night out of several flavors of beer and soda, and with only 3 hamburger patties left. "We're going out strong," Deb said with a grin.
They know a lot about being strong. "As many of you know Jeff is fighting Prostate cancer," Deb wrote on Facebook. "We will now be able to focus on him beating this!" And she added "We want to say Thank-you to all of you for supporting us thru thick and thin!"
As for the future of B&S? "Good news is we are selling to a local," the Tinkers wrote. And, yes, they told the Eagle – the Med Bread recipe is included in the sale.
