Kat McCay and Jessica Pilout. (Photos courtesy The Salty Siren)
The owners of a Petersburg eatery are taking over a riverfront brewery near Hopewell and bringing in an entirely new concept.
Kat McCay and Jessica Pilout, who run Old Towne’s Alibi restaurant, have purchased Holy Mackerel Small Batch Beers at 700 Jordan Point Road in Prince George County.
While Holy Mackerel remains open for now, the duo are planning to scrap the brewery label and on-site beer making, remodel the space and reinvent the property as a new restaurant called The Salty Siren.
Holy Mackerel opened in 2021 in the former longtime Dockside Restaurant building as a satellite taproom for a South Florida-based brewery of the same name. The building spans two floors with multiple bars and a patio, and sits on a 2-acre site along the James River.
A Suffolk native, McCay has been in the Tri-Cities area for over 35 years and has owned Old Towne’s Alibi for four years. She said she checked out the Jordan Point property after hearing Holy Mackerel was exploring a sale and jumped on it.
“A lot of it has to do with the property and its potential,” McCay said. “When my parents moved us up here from the 757, we moved into Prince George, so part of it is coming back and doing business in Prince George.”
McCay and Pilout finalized their purchase of Holy Mackerel’s lease and hardware last month for an undisclosed amount. The Holy Mackerel brewery in Florida is listed online as temporarily closed. Its co-owner, Ehab Atallah, couldn’t be reached for comment.
The property’s patio houses a stage right along the James River.
McCay said she and Pilout are planning to use the building’s two levels to effectively have two different concepts within The Salty Siren.
“We are going for a really funky, quirky mix. The upstairs main dining room will have a seafood menu that’s a little bit more of an elevated menu in a casual setting,” McCay said. “Then downstairs, the lower deck and the outside area will be more of a bar vibe/party portion of the building.”
McCay said the pair have secured a fresh fish supplier and plan to have The Salty Siren open for lunch and dinner, with plans to eventually add brunch service.
The patio area includes a small stage that McCay said will be used for a variety of live music and entertainment, some of which will have a nautical theme.
“We’ve already decided that in the spring we’ll have our first annual mermaid pageant for charity,” she said. “We’re super excited to crown the first Miss Salty Siren in 2025.”
The Salty Siren is aiming to open in about two months. McCay said the owners are planning to retain many of the Holy Mackerel’s employees and complete the cosmetic renovations on the building over only a few days in the fall to avoid a lengthy lapse in service.
“We’re overly excited to bring our love of food and service to the Prince George area and be on the riverfront,” McCay said. “It’s just an incredible property that we literally just couldn’t say no to.”
Once Holy Mackerel closes and converts to Salty Siren, Prince George County will be left without a craft brewery. Another brewery, Good Ship Brewing Co., previously had been planned for nearby downtown Hopewell, but never materialized.
I cannot wait! Holy Mackerel’s service and food was spotty but the location is lovely so we continued to go. Looking forward to the change-over!!
Please please please add a dock + boat slips so that those of us cruising the James have another food option other than Lily Pad!
Even adding just a few floating dock sections temporarily so a boat can pull up would be great. We take our boat over to Lilly Pad almost once a week and would love more on-the-water dining options.
Did Holy Mackeral EVER actually brew anything in that location? This really was in no sense a local craft brewery. They sold other brands — and wine & cocktails — from day one. My understanding is that even the South Florida location used a collaborative brewery to do all (or at least most) of its brewing.
I wondered the same when I read this article. I thought that was one of their plans but did not think they were brewing anything at this point.
That whole area has so much potential!
Really saw that when the boathouse opened their location there, but when I was first really exploring the area and brought my father down to join me, to check out Petersburg as well as Richmond, he pointed to the map and insisted we needed to check out Hopewell —- just looking at the geography he said it was likely to be a great place —- well, we came and saw….. but all it would take is some more vision to make this confluence something that brings people there.