IT WILL be an emotional reopening of a Tamworth favourite tonight, with SSS BBQ Barns tonight throwing open its doors for the first time in 18 months.
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The steakhouse was badly damaged in a fire in May last year caused by tea towels that spontaneously combusted after being in a dryer at the restaurant.
"It's fantastic that we are reopening," owner Graham Manvell said.
"It's a very good feeling.
"We have had our pressures, but we never lost sight of the fact that we were reopening."
Mr Manvell said it would be a soft opening, because they wanted to make sure everything was "spot-on".
"Each night we will take on more and more people," he said.
"We are really starting from scratch, with a lot of new equipment and new people, and a lot of good staff are back."
The owner and chef said the business would return with many of the same dishes on the menu, because so many people had their favourites, with only very minor changes.
Changes that diners will notice, though, is the new Round Room at the far end of the restaurant, and the new building, which has taken six months to rebuild.
"The building looks fabulous and it's going to be special," Mr Manvell said.
The challenge is also on for diners to be among the first to get their names on the honour roll for the famous 2.4kg beef shank challenge, with the old honour roll having been destroyed in the fire.
The Manvells will also continue to run The Ritz in Centrepoint Shopping Centre.
"Some of the team there we have been bringing up and they are coming over here," Mr Manvell said.
"The Ritz has been a bit of a saviour for us, because it's meant we've kept our hand in and kept building up from there."
The steakhouse reopens tonight.
