Episode 3508

- [Announcer] Tennessee Crossroads is made possible in part by.

- [Woman] Truist is committed to the communities and people it serves across Tennessee, offering in-person and online banking, investment, and other financial services for individuals and businesses. More at Truist.com.

- This time on Tennessee Crossroads, we visit a different kind of natural bar scene, then enjoy a Smoky Mountain high in Gatlinburg. We'll get a down-home barbecue fix at McMinnville and break out our kilts for the Highland Games, even if you're not Scottish. Hi, I'm Joe Elmore. Welcome to another edition of Tennessee Crossroads. Rich and creamy, decadent and delicious. Well, nothing says comfort, like the perfect milkshake. Even though they've been around for a long time, the frozen treats are gaining popularity thanks to a new trend. In our first story, Miranda Cohen takes us to a downtown Nashville bar where the whole family can join in.

- [Christina] I think that they really like coming here, mostly because it's a family friendly kind of bar. You know, it's a new bar in Nashville that kids and families can enjoy together.

- [Miranda] Christina Barnett may just have the perfect job. She spends her days making milkshakes and making people very happy.

- Let's make it fun.

- [Miranda] Not just any milkshakes, her creations are colossal.

- [Christina] I just thought working with milkshakes could allow me to feed the creative person that I am and create these almost like milkshake works of art. It's almost like milkshake artistry, like fine art with food.

- [Miranda] Christina calls herself a small town girl, but armed with a business degree and the support of one of the most important people in her life, her father, she knew she had all of the ingredients to open her own unique shop.

- We did it, we just kind of took a leap of faith and we both had that gut feeling that it would be successful and we're both really hard working. We just knew all along that we can make this a successful business. My dad and I are really close, we're like best friends. We decided to just start a milkshake bar. This new freak shake kind of concept was floating out there.

- [Miranda] Located just one block off of Broadway on Third Avenue, the word is spreading of this new family friendly bar to tourists and locals.

- [Christina] We know how to treat people. We always put the guests first, no matter what. That's what my dad has always taught me. We came into this understanding that it's not milkshakes that we're selling, it's an experience.

- Okay, so we've been planning this trip for weeks and 'cause we're really obsessed with milkshakes and she's out from California and we're like, "We have to go to this place in Nashville" and that was our sole purpose of coming to Nashville.

- We were on a tour and we saw this shake shop. I'm like, we have to go. So we actually came last night, but we couldn't even get in, it was so packed. So we came back early so we could definitely get a shake.

- [Miranda] The Legendairy Milkshake Bar is family-owned and you will always find owner Christina or some of her family hard at work. And just where did they get that catchy name? Well, that's a family treasure too.

- My husband loves this question because actually he's the one that kind of coined the name. I was just getting so frustrated. I was like, I just want it to be an epic name, I want it to be awesome, I want it to be like a legendary name. And he was like, "Legendairy? "Ha ha ha" and he just made like this joke 'cause we're very punny people. So he just made like this pun and I was like, "Legendairy." I was like, "That is it, that is the name."

- [Miranda] The Legendairy Milkshake Bar serves up delicious masterpieces for every holiday and occasion. Or you can always create your own.

- [Christina] We start with holidays, Mother's Day and Valentine's Day and our New Year's Eve shake, that one has a sparkler on it. We do a shake every year for Harry Potter's birthday. That milkshake is mixed with a cream soda, so it's like a butter beer milkshake. May the Fourth, we do the Yoda shake. I mean, we're just constantly coming up with new and crazy ideas. It's one of the reasons why I love owning this business so much. The opportunities and the creativity is really endless.

- [Miranda] And they even have a secret menu, only their social media followers know, like the Breakfast of Champions.

- [Christina] We'll start with coffee ice cream, and then put a waffle on it and then what else do you eat when you have breakfast? Bacon, so it has bacon on it and it's doused in maple syrup.

- [Miranda] Making an epic milkshake is harder than it looks. They start with a decadent, Blue Bell ice cream, and then comes the real fun.

- Do about three or four healthy scoops. That's a really good scoop right there. And you just kinda wanna fill it up like that.

- [Miranda] Oh, it's so soft.

- Wow you're getting really good at this. This is how I do my test of how thick it is. And just go, look at that, nothing's coming out. Dab, dab, dab, kinda dab it, there you go. Make them stick on there, dab, dab, dab, dab. So you see the icing is kind of like an adhesive, like a glue and it just like, the toppings just kind of get glued to 'em. And don't worry, mine has two sauces, yours only has one. So you only have to this once.

- Excellent, excellent good. A little on the outside.

- Yes, there you go. You're surprisingly good at this.

- [Miranda] Well, I like chocolate a lot.

- There we go. Take a cookie bite, and just kind of toss it.

- [Miranda] Toss it on there, oh that is.

- [Christina] Oh, I missed that.

- [Miranda] Now that's fun, okay.

- [Christina] This one is really fun to make. There you go, she started the opposite way that I do. There you go, that's perfect. Now we can take them to a table and eat 'em.

- [Miranda] The Legendairy Milkshake Bar is open from 11 to 11 every day and because every shake is scooped, hand decorated and made to order, you may have to wait in line with other milkshake lovers, but as they say, good things come to those who wait.

- My customers say it's worth the wait and it's delicious and it's the best shake they've ever had and I'm just so blessed and so humbled. I'm just a small town girl. It's a small family owned business, it's crazy. It's the All-American dream. I'm really humbled and I'm also just in shock that there's so many customers that come through here. If you treat your customers right, they will always come back and it will become a yearly tradition. They come into Nashville and they just keep coming to see us because of the way that we treated them.

- Thanks Miranda. If you haven't been to Gatlinburg in a while, you may be due for a return visit. Since 2019, one of the top attractions there is the Gatlinburg SkyBridge. You probably heard about it. Well, now you're going to experience it, thanks to Marcus Watson. His job is spreading the word about this Smokey Mountain marvel. It's the longest pedestrian suspension bridge in North America, 680 feet, longer than two football fields. It all started with a quest for even better views of the surrounding gray Smoky Mountains.

- Our general manager, Randy Watson, one day, he said, "How cool would it be to put a bridge across this ravine "and just enhance the view "of what this attraction is all about?" You know, everything that we do here since 1954 for the past 65 years has always been about enhancing the view of these beautiful Smoky Mountains that are out here in front of us and that's what this bridge has done. It's enhanced the view, and that's why people like to come back year after year, is to get that experience when they come to Gatlinburg. Really the part that took up the most time was just the actual foundations of the bridge. That's probably obviously the most important part of it, but they just take one cable over first and then they take another one over and then like so on until you have the finished product of being this bridge.

- The journey begins at ground level downtown with a ride on the now legendary Gatlinburg Skylift. It's an eight minute journey to the top of Mount Crockett. The first skylift was built back in the early 1950s. It's been upgraded over the years and now they have these chairs that whole three people. It's still the most popular ride in Gatlinburg. When you arrive at the new sky deck, you're already 500 feet above the city, 1800 feet above sea level and for some visitors, this is satisfying enough with great views and panoramic photo ops but it's the challenge of the sky bridge that draws people from all over the country and beyond.

- We get a lot of return visitors to Gatlinburg. We also have a lot of people now who've never been to Gatlinburg before and that's something that we like to look at in a positive way, because this bridge is attracting people who wouldn't typically come to Gatlinburg.

- [Joe] Now, if you're concerned about safety and why not? Marcus says some reassuring facts that might suspend your fears.

- You know, there's over a million pounds of concrete in the total foundations of the bridge, over three miles of cable that's holding this thing together. So if you had 500 people on the bridge and each person weighed 400 pounds, it'd still be way beneath the max capacity of what it can hold so as far as safety goes, the glass and the 1400 Cedar planks that we have on the bridge, it's secure and safe and ready to go.

- Actually, your cell phone may be the only thing in danger. If you drop it well, you can say goodbye to it. Now, if anything's going to make you want to turn around and go the other way, it could be this. Walking over three clear glass panels, looking down 150 feet.

- Hello babies, we're doing it. Ah, oh my gosh, this is incredible.

- Ain't no cracks in it?

- [Joe] You're not looking down.

- That's pretty cool.

- You're not in a hurry, are you?

- Just trying to get across.

- They want to be able to come up and say that they've walked across north America's longest pedestrian suspension bridge. That's usually the first thing. The second thing is when they get to the panels and they cross it, they kind of get that adrenaline factor and people look for that, you know? So that's the second thing they get when they come and then the third thing is the view. So either way, if you walk all the way to the other side, or you stop at the panels or you take just a few steps out and say, okay, I stepped on it, you're gonna get the experience either way and we just love seeing the reactions from people when they walk on it or all the way across or just to the glass, we're always going to get a good reaction from them and that's what we love to see as workers here.

- [Joe] There's a little sense of victory when you make it to the other side for some rest and more sightseeing. Of course, the only way back is the way you came. So whether you linger on the glass awhile or hurry past it, the Gatlinburg SkyBridge is an unforgettable place to hang out.

- It's a great attraction the whole town of Gatlinburg is fantastic.

- It's so cool to hear the stories. Oh, I traveled all the way from, you know, the west to see it and we came just here from England to see the bridge and all these different locations that we've heard that people travel just to see this record breaking bridge and that's something that we're really proud of, but more importantly, we're just proud that it can help this community 'cause Gatlinburg is a really special place.

- Now, since we made that visit, they've doubled the size of the glass. Now it's 30 feet of thrills. If you were to make a list of things loved by Tennesseans, barbecue would surely make the top 10 with love of family at or near the top. Well, Ed Jones founded a restaurant in Warren County that combines both just about every day. The O'Neil brothers share their love of smoke goodness with the citizens of McMinnville.

- [Ed] When you're out of town and looking for a place to eat, the best thing to do is find out where the locals go.

- The food is phenomenal.

- We come here often.

- They're friendly and their food is wonderful.

- The music is good.

- It's one of the best restaurants in town.

- And they have really good beer.

- The wings.

- [Ed] Wings?

- Mild Buffalo wings are just right.

- [Ed] All right, I'm sold, what's the name of this place?

- Hi y'all, welcome to Collins River BBQ and Cafe.

- [Ed] Collins River BBQ and Cafe, just off the square in McMinnville. That's where you'll find Chris and Joe O'Neil, two local boys who know how to keep the locals coming back.

- Born and raised here. We actually grew up with the Collins River right behind our house and so we played at the Collins River all our lives and stuff. So that name just kind of, was a perfect fit for this place.

- [Ed] And co owning a barbecue restaurant was the perfect choice for these brothers. After years of cooking for others, they brought that experience back home and in a way, helped bring downtown McMinnville back as well.

- Downtown was revitalized probably what seven, eight years ago.

- Yeah.

- Nothing was downtown before then. We came in that pretty much the part time. Like I said, we were blessed to get this place.

- [Ed] That place is part of the restaurant's charm. You can feel the history in it's antique floors and fixtures and get a sense of McMinnville story through the artifacts adorning the brick walls.

- This building was a drugstore, it was Magnus Drugstore when it first started. Over the years, it was department stores, you know, different things throughout the years.

- Grocery store, they say it's City Hall upstairs for a little while.

- It's been a variety of things throughout the years. It just started growing slowly, getting busier, start adding more stuff to our menus, had to add more, you know, employees and then here we are today. We have probably 10 to 12 different sides. We're known for our ribs.

- Barbecue wrap.

- We're known for our briskets.

- Fried chicken wrap.

- Pulled pork.

- The loaded nachos.

- Smoked prime rib.

- Catfish? Chicken tenders.

- The wings.

- [Ed] Ah yes, the wings.

- These are our smoked wings, we smoke these for about an hour and a half, two hours. Then we portion them and then we finished them off in the fryers so you get a little bit of smoke on the inside, but still crunchy on the outside. We make a homemade ranch for 'em. We do a homemade mild buff and a homemade hot buff. We'll do a homemade bourbon glaze for 'em. We've got a sweet chili dry rub we do for 'em that's homemade. And then we also have just traditional, which is just throw them in the fryer then throw some seasoned salt on them. Ooh, they're hot.

- [Ed] And by hot, he means, well, in this case, he literally means hot, but they're also quite popular.

- [Chris] We are known for our wings. We'll probably sell a thousand wings a week.

- And like these chickens who gave their all, Chris and Joe, to a lesser extent, give a lot back to their hometown.

- We try to buy as much local as we can just to help the community out a little bit. You know, and plus, you know, people want to eat healthier. People want to buy local food now and so if we could help the farmers out, that's helping, they're helping us out, which is in return, we're helping the whole town out, basically.

- Yeah, we do a lot of farm to table. If you don't want barbecue, we have a bunch of other items that will fit your needs. I mean, we got veggie wraps. We've got all our salads are like it's local salad mix. We've got really good salads, really good, healthy sides. Pretty much anything you want, even if you're a vegetarian, we can take care of you here.

- [Ed] They can take care of your sweet tooth as well. With taste tempting treats. Fried moon pie, a la mode, anyone?

- Collins River BBQ is special because a good home cooking family atmosphere and some of the best barbecue you could ever taste.

- So it's a good place to kind of come in, you know, get a feel for some of your local beers, good food. People come in to hang out, it's very family oriented here. This restaurant is kind of like family. We're not really a, it's a business first, but I tell everybody, you just like my family. There you go, ma'am. And a lot of nachos, hope you guys are hungry. You're welcome. We've double checked it. There's all that plus your drink. You need help getting out?

- No I'm good.

- You sure?

- Yep.

- All right, you have a good rest of the day.

- You too.

- And we've got tons of locals on the weekends. We get people from Nashville. I mean all over the place come in here just to eat, check out our state parks, a lot of them come in through. People come to Tennessee for vacation. They want to see what it's like to be in a Southern town, the Southern feel, the Southern charm. I think people really like that about us and that's why I think people come to the Collins River just to get that actual Southern feel.

- [Ed] And don't forget the Southern food. Chris, Joe and the Collins River crew have turned this old drugstore into a top notch restaurant. Is there anything they can't do?

- Come on back now, ya here?

- [Ed] You can leave the TV to us.

- Many Tennesseans claim Scottish heritage, including our own Susan Watson. Now a while back, she braved the summer heat to attend an event where people come together to learn, appreciate and preserve Scottish and Celtic cultures. It's all at a place called the Middle Tennessee Highland Games.

- [Susan] Unmistakable and iconic sound of Scottish bagpipes fills the air and stirs the senses and if you hadn't already guessed, the Highland Games are as much a celebration of culture as they are sporting event. For many and attendance, the Middle Tennessee Highland Games are like one big family reunion.

- One of the reasons Highland Games are so popular in the Southeast and all over the United States is that you have a lot of immigrants that were Scot Irish, and they carried a lot of these traditions with them. The clan gatherings were an event so people could get together. It was a time of social interaction and stuff so they came from all over the Glens and came together. So it's no different here. It's a time for us to be together and celebrate our heritage and welcome people into new family connections.

- [Susan] The President of this year's games, Andy Ward has some simple, but sage advice for visitors.

- Bring suntan lotion, bring your walking shoes and come prepared just to enjoy all that's here.

- You can marvel at the agility of young lads and lasses that they deftly perform intricate dances that are centuries old. Or tap your feet to the stringed melodies of young musicians forming a Celtic wall of sound. There's also a marketplace where you just may find the perfect scarf or kilt, and then quench your thirst and grab a bite to eat. One thing you'll find at the games here that you won't find in Scotland are clan tents. It's a place for American McDougals, MacDuffs, Gordons and Stuarts to connect and celebrate their shared family name and history. Strolling along the tents, I spot my maiden name on a long list under the umbrella of Klan Mackay and stop in with a few questions for Lord John Morrison Allen. So I noticed my maiden name out there. Does that mean I'm part of your clan?

- That is correct, you are definitely part of my clan. Scottish people will just use that as a broad term for the family. Clan Mackay is one of the most Northern clans in Scotland. So when everything started going crazy and everything, everybody ran to us for protection. So we ended up adopting multiple families and names and protecting them and giving them shelter food. We pretty much took every family in. That's what we we're known for. We're known to fight and protect everybody.

- [Susan] Once you've found your clan, you may want to show your colors. Lord Alan was kitted out properly head to toe in clan attire.

- When I was being raised, my grandfather made sure that I was dressed properly to represent my family. Don't disrespect the family by not showing your true colors or your true family spirit. So that's the way I was raised. No t-shirt for me, all formal dress, always.

- [Susan] A parade of clans each proudly wearing their family tartan officially opens the games on the field. These contests of strength and stamina had been taking place for hundreds of years, having a ball from competitions to find the best warriors in the land. Well today's contestants all have day jobs, but they are definitely warriors. Perhaps the most iconic event is the Caber toss. It's a test of balance control technique, and sheer strength. The aim is to toss the caber end over end and have it land directly in front of the athlete and a 12 o'clock position. Now, while height and distance may look impressive, it's the position the caber falls in that dictates the winner.

- [Man] There you go, there you go, there you go, yes.

- [Susan] Amateur athlete, Alison Foostair made a strong showing on the field despite the fact.

- This is my first time today. And actually just yesterday they held a clinic here at the park and that was legitimately my first time touching some of the equipment out here.

- [Susan] Alison was inspired by last year's games to give it a go this year.

- I thought it was just like really cool and looked like a lot of fun and I think everybody in the bleachers is kind of sitting there going, like, I wonder how I would do. There were seven events today, I did all of them. So there was weight over the bar. Literally just throw a weight over the bar. A sheep toss, stone throw and I hope someone will forgive me if I'm not saying the actual correct names, Caber toss, hammer throw, and then two weights for distance. A lightweight for distance and a heavyweight for distance. I've had a really good time and I think it helps, you know, it's over and so all of all of the jitters are out and I can kind of just relax. The caber toss is really fun to watch. I think that's probably the most fun to watch 'cause there's just like strength and agility and balance and I don't know, but right now I think I'm most excited to have a beer. Sit down and hopefully like get connected with the community that will get together and do this sort of thing again next year.

- [Susan] Whether like Alison you try your luck on the field, or like most, cheer from the sidelines have a wee bit of Scottish DNA or none at all, you'll still most certainly feel part of the clan and enjoy the gathering. And don't be surprised if suddenly your favorite color is plaid or the sound of Celtic music puts a lump in your throat. Getting connected and having a fun day out with family is what the Middle Tennessee Highland Games is all about.

- We have so many people. When they leave, they're smiling, they've had a good day, they made a family connection, then that's good so that's what we're hoping for.

- Thanks Susan and thank you for joining us the past half hour. Now don't forget our website, TennesseeCrossroads.org. You can follow us on Facebook, of course, and by all means, join us here next week, see you then.

- [Announcer] Tennessee Crossroads is made possible in part by.

- [Woman] True is as committed to the communities and people it serves across Tennessee, offering in-person and online banking, investment, and other financial services for individuals and businesses. More at truist.com.