If You Know, You Know: The GRIT Brings Big Flavor, Fast Service, and Local Pride to Downtown Elizabeth City

By Tanya Johnson-Wiker, ECDI Board Member, Promotions Committee

There is something about a great local restaurant that becomes a big deal before their official opening. Downtown Elizabeth City recently welcomed The Grit. Very quickly it became part of the rhythm of our community, a place where coworkers meet for lunch, families stop in after church, visitors discover something worth coming back for, and regulars quickly become familiar faces.

For The GRIT, one of downtown Elizabeth City’s newest restaurants, that sense of connection starts with the name itself.

For a certain generation of Elizabeth City residents, “The Grit” needs little explanation.

“There are people of a certain age who came of age here in the ’90s, and that’s just what the city was called, the Grit.” Exactly where the nickname originated may be difficult to pinpoint, but for those who remember it, the name immediately feels…. familiar. Conversations about the restaurant’s name led to a simple observation…if you know, you know… and a tagline was born. It is fitting for a restaurant that already feels deeply connected to Elizabeth City.

Real Food for Real People

From the beginning, the vision for The GRIT was straightforward: real food for real people.

The restaurant focuses on familiar favorites: burgers, hot dogs, wings, tenders and hand-cut fries. What you might know is The Grit puts significant work behind seemingly simple food.

The burgers are made with house ground combo beef. Potatoes are cut by hand. Chili, coleslaw and sauces are prepared in-house. And while the food takes plenty of prep work behind the scenes, the goal is to make the customer experience uncomplicated. Great food. Great price. Great speed.

The restaurant’s most expensive burger is around $12, and the team works to keep ticket times short, often getting meals out in about 10 minutes. That matters, especially downtown.

For someone working nearby with only an hour for lunch, every minute counts. By the time a customer leaves work, walks or drives downtown and eventually has to return, a restaurant that takes 30 or 40 minutes to prepare a meal may simply not fit into the day. The GRIT wants to be the place that does. “You’ve got 30 minutes to actually sit down and enjoy your lunch before you have to get back to work,” the owner explained. That combination of quality, affordability and speed has quickly captured the bellies of their customers.

The People Are the Atmosphere

Walk into The GRIT and you may notice something different about its approach to atmosphere. It is not about elaborate décor or trying to manufacture a particular vibe.

The people create it. “The atmosphere is the people in here. I don’t need to put anything on the walls. It’s the people in the seats that make the difference.”

Originally, the team anticipated a relatively simple operation: a couple of people working in the kitchen, someone at the front counter, a steady flow of burgers, wings and fries.

Elizabeth City had other plans. The response was much larger than expected.

Since opening June 25, The GRIT has added a growing staff, including a prep crew that begins working as early as 5 a.m. Cutting potatoes, soaking fries, grinding meat, portioning burgers and preparing ingredients all happen long before many customers ever walk through the door. And no single person makes The GRIT work. Almost every plate that reaches a table has passed through multiple hands. One employee may prepare burgers. Another works the grill. Someone handles fries. Another expedites orders. Someone else is taking orders at the counter. It is, very intentionally, a team kitchen. “Everybody is part of it somehow,” the owner said. “It truly takes a team effort to make all of this work.” The philosophy is simple: take the food seriously, but do not take yourselves too seriously.

The result is a kitchen that works hard, moves fast and still manages to have fun.

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Downtown Showed Up

Perhaps the biggest surprise since opening has not been any particular menu item.

It has been the response from the community. The GRIT opened shortly before downtown Elizabeth City’s July First Friday celebration. With crowds already expected downtown for the city’s 250th anniversary festivities, the restaurant simplified things with $2.50 specials designed to keep food moving quickly.

By the next First Friday, The GRIT had experienced its first full version of the monthly downtown event. The result? “Very amazing,” according to the owner. The lines were longer and the kitchen was busy, but diners kept coming. In fact, business has been so strong that The GRIT has not yet needed to turn on online ordering or third-party delivery services. Even weekdays have remained busy. Thursday, in particular, seems to signal the unofficial beginning of the weekend, with momentum carrying into Friday and Saturday. Sundays have also brought a steady crowd, including many customers stopping in after church. The GRIT does not serve alcohol, a decision that is intentional and consistent with the atmosphere the restaurant wants to create. The focus stays exactly where the restaurant wants it: Good food. Good service. Good people.

A Menu That Knows What It Is

One of The GRIT’s strengths may be what it does not try to be. There is no sprawling menu attempting to satisfy every possible craving. The menu is intentionally focused. Burgers. Hot dogs. Wings. Tenders. Fries. “We’re being really disciplined about who we are, who we’re serving and what we’re serving.” That means you will not find a long list of salads or vegetarian entrées and the team is comfortable admitting it’s not their niche.  At The GRIT, the specialty is burgers and the foods that belong beside them.

And customers appear to appreciate that focus. In roughly the restaurant’s first month and a half, The GRIT sold approximately 7,500 burgers! The Smash has emerged as the best seller, topped with Grit Sauce, pickles and grilled onions. Customers often use it as their starting point. The Smoke, featuring bacon, cheddar, grilled onions and barbecue sauce, is another favorite, while the pimento cheese burger has also developed a loyal following.

Like many great burger joints, The GRIT has its own house sauce, Grit Sauce. Grit Sauce is a mixture built on familiar flavors  along with the restaurant’s own touches. Simple? Maybe. Forgettable? Apparently not.

A Taste of Elizabeth City Nostalgia

Another one of the restaurant’s most popular offerings is not a burger at all. It is an orangeade. For longtime Elizabeth City residents, orangeades carry a little bit of history with them. Customers have shared memories of getting similar drinks from beloved local establishments from years gone by. For many, seeing an orangeade on the menu produces an immediate feeling of nostalgia. The GRIT recognized that connection and brought its own version to the counter, along with fresh lemonade.

The response has been remarkable. In the restaurant’s first month and a half, nearly 1,000 orangeades were sold, with some busy days approaching dozens of drinks. On certain days, keeping up with orangeades and lemonades can practically become a job of its own. It is another example of what The GRIT seems to understand well: sometimes the foods and drinks that connect most deeply with people are not complicated. They are familiar.

A Restaurant for Everybody

Spend a little time inside The GRIT and one of its most striking characteristics becomes visible. Look around the room. You may see construction workers eating beside attorneys. City employees sharing the dining room with doctors, judges, business owners, families and retirees. There are blue-collar workers and white-collar professionals. Young people and older residents. Customers from different racial, social and economic backgrounds.

Everybody seems to find their way through the same door.

“I believe you can walk into almost any restaurant in this area and not find as diverse a clientele as you’ll find here,” the owner said. “We’ve got everybody.” Perhaps that should not be surprising. Burgers are universal. So are affordability, good service and not wanting to spend your entire lunch break waiting for food. That broad appeal is part of what makes The GRIT feel particularly well suited for downtown Elizabeth City, a district where residents, employees, entrepreneurs and visitors constantly cross paths.

Becoming Part of the Destination

The GRIT has only been open a short time, but repeat customers are already becoming regulars. The owner estimates there are dozens of customers who have already visited numerous times. The social media response has been equally strong. Staff members wearing their GRIT shirts around town routinely get stopped by people who want to talk about the restaurant, people who have been there, heard about it or plan to visit. That kind of word-of-mouth is difficult to manufacture. It has to be earned.

The long-term vision is for The GRIT to become more than somewhere locals grab lunch.

The hope is that it becomes part of the Elizabeth City experience. “I think ultimately we’re going to become a destination,” the owner said. “When you talk about a weekend in Elizabeth City, I don’t think the weekend is going to be complete without stopping by The GRIT.” And that kind of destination benefits more than a single restaurant. Every person who comes downtown for a burger also discovers the shops, businesses, waterfront, events and people surrounding it. That is the power of a thriving downtown business district: one destination helps strengthen another.

Great Food. Great Price. Great Time.

Ask the team behind The GRIT what makes the restaurant work, and the answer repeatedly comes back to people. The employees who arrive early to prep. The kitchen crew working together behind the line. The customers filling the seats. The regulars bringing friends. The people posting pictures and recommendations online. And the Elizabeth City community that showed up in numbers no one quite expected. “We definitely wouldn’t have done this without Elizabeth City,” the owner said. “It’s just been overwhelming.”

There have already been days when the volume was greater than anticipated and moments when the team had to adjust, learn and improve. But that is part of building something.

And The GRIT appears determined to grow without losing the very qualities that created its success in the first place. They are not interested in sacrificing quality just to serve more people. If wait times become so long that the restaurant can no longer deliver the experience it promises, then it is no longer being true to what The GRIT is supposed to be.

So the mission remains refreshingly uncomplicated: Make good food. Make it from scratch whenever possible. Keep it affordable. Get it to people quickly. Take care of the team. And have a little fun while doing it.

For a restaurant carrying an old Elizabeth City nickname into a new generation, that feels just right. The GRIT. If you know, you know....If you don't come find out!