Waudby's Sports Bar and Grill to be Featured on America's Best Restaurants

Local restaurant Waudby's Sports Bar and Grill in Russell will be hosting a visit from America's Best Restaurants in late July.

America's Best Restaurants, a national media and marketing company focusing on bringing attention to local, independently-owned restaurants, will bring its ABR Roadshow to the restaurant on July 31. Popular dishes will be highlighted, along with an extensive on-camera interview with owners Shanda and Brent Mooney about the restaurant's special place in the community. The episode will be aired extensively on social media channels at a later date.

The building that houses Waudby's was built in 1885 and 1886 and is on the National Register of Historic Places. The Mooneys have owned it since 2009. It has been a post office, hardware store and pool hall, this last due to demand from area oil workers looking for fun on their off time after oil was discovered in Russell in 1923.

While the building has not been structurally changed, the Mooneys did knock out a wall between two areas to expand the seating, an endeavor that Shanda said took a year to get permission from the city to do. They can now seat about 165 people, no small feat when the kitchen is "about the size of a dining room table" according to Shanda. The dining area showcases original wooden booths that have been restored, a tin ceiling and original ceiling fans.

In addition to Waudby's, the Mooneys also operate an event center called Chet's Place, named after one of the Waudby brothers. It provides a space for private parties and events.

"It's something that the town of Russell needed," noted Shanda.

The extensive menu offers a wide array of sandwiches, salads, burgers and appetizers. Popular menu items that may be featured include steak fingers - "we go through 50 pounds of steak fingers on a Friday," said Shanda - homemade mashed potatoes and hand cut french fries. They have also introduced grass-fed-and-finished beef for the burgers from Shanda's family farm.

"Our burgers are our niche, for sure," she said.

America's Best Restaurants will be filming on location on Monday, July 31 from 9 AM to Noon. The press is invited to attend. The restaurant's finished episode premiere date will be announced on their Facebook page and will be featured on America's Best Restaurants' website at https://americasbestrestaurants.com/rests/kansas/waudbys-sports-bar.

Restaurants featured on the ABR Roadshow are found through customer nominations or by a restaurant applying to be featured at www.americasbestrestaurants.com.

Open daily, Waudby's Sports Bar and Grill is located at 719 North Main Street in Russell. Telephone is 785-483-2532. For more information visit www.waudbyssportsbar.com.

America's Best Restaurants, a national media and restaurant marketing company based in Florence, Kentucky, travels the country telling the stories and highlighting the unique food of locally owned independent restaurants as part of their ABR Roadshow. Restaurants are featured not only on ABR's Restaurant Network of social media channels and website, but also each individual establishment's Facebook page. With over 900 episodes filmed, America's Best Restaurants is the premier marketing agency for restaurant owners and operators to have their story broadcast coast-to-coast. Visit AmericasBestRestaurants.com to learn more and to view the episodes and profiles of hundreds of America's Best Restaurants.

(Information courtesy America's Best Restaurants.)