• Corkysbbq.com

His son, Barry Pelts, said his father died suddenly of a heart attack Wednesday night.

Corky's locations are found in Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas. The Nashville area has one Corky's outpost, at 100 Franklin Road near Old Hickory Boulevard in Brentwood.

Pelts had already been in the Memphis barbecue business for 13 years when he opened the first Corky's in 1984, the company website recounts. In addition to the bricks-and-mortar restaurants, Corky's does catering and sells products online.

Corky's doesn't get tons of critical notice in Nashville (locally born places get most of the attention), but Corky's Brentwood location shows up frequently in the Best of Nashville Readers' Poll.

In February, Corky's in Memphis topped a National Geographic list of the 10 best barbecue joints in America.

Although the store has already opened, the official ribbon-cutting will be this Saturday, May 18, with free samples and giveaways scheduled all day long. You can even get your picture taken with the Goo Goo girls. (I mean they're very cute and all, but they're no Hardees maids ... )

Fontanel has become even more of a destination of late with the addition of the Woods Amphitheater, The Studio Gallery performance venue, zip lines, a disc golf course and the soon-to-be opened Prichard's Distillery. If you haven't made your way up north of town yet for a visit, now might be a perfect time. You won't even have to pack a lunch!

• Photo: Sinclair Kelly

Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams is proud to announce plans to open their second full-size scoop shop in Nashville since 2011. Located at 2314 12th Avenue South in the heart of the historic 12 South neighborhood, the shop will be part of 12 South Flats, which has been developed by H.G. Hill Realty and Southeast Venture.

The shop, featuring all of the grass-grazed ice creams Time called “the best in America,” will open later this year next to Josephine, the new cafe by Miranda Whitcomb, who serves Jeni’s ice creams in her Burger Up restaurants.

“We're super excited to open another shop in Nashville and bring what we do to 12 South," Britton Bauer goes on to say. "I’m really proud to be joining a do-it-yourself part of town that includes Miranda (Whitcomb) and Carrie and Matt (Eddmenson) at Imogene + Willie and all the other entrepreneurs there who build everything from the ground up and provide so much for their customers.”

To read the full release, including all your options for getting some JSIC into your system in the meantime, follow the jump below:

If you'd like to sample some of his food and make your own deliberation, there's an event coming up this Wednesday, May 15, at 7 p.m. where you can do just that while enjoying some great wine and benefiting a good cause. Frankie's Friends helps families in Middle Tennessee who cannot provide critical and emergency medical care for their pets. “The Spirit of Frankie’s Friends” is a wine tasting benefit featuring unusual wines paired with culinary accompaniments from Chef Lackey. Tickets are $50 per person and are available online.

In addition to dinner, attendees will enjoy art from John Cannon and music from Nashville’s own Wineauxs. Tennessee’s first “Frankie’s Best Friend Award” will be presented to Heather Dowdy, founder and publisher of Nashville Paw magazine. Great food and you're helping out the animals? How can you miss out on that?

As part of the presentation, a new video was produced to introduce the assembled industry professionals to the delciously excruciating phenomenon that is hot chicken. I spoke to several people who were in attendance at the awards, and they said that there were a lot of knowing nods around the audience from chefs who had made the pilgrimage to Prince's for the fiery fowl. Those in the know were seen leaning over to whisper stories in the ears of the uninitiated who were either horrified or who checked Google Maps to figure out how to get from the Nashville airport to Dickerson Road.

The short introductory video is pretty similar to Joe York's SFA mini-doc that featured Miss André, but close viewing will reveal at least one new detail important to those of us who seek to replicate — or at least create a close approximation of — the piquant poultry. André's daughter says "It's not just dousing some spicy stuff on the top at the last. It's down to the bone." At about the :50 point of the video you can see that the chicken is being basted with something that I assume is thinned volcanic magma. It's not nearly as thick as the lardypaste that I've used in my home kitchen to torque up the bird, so I'm not sure if this is an additional step I've been missing. Any video CSI technicians out there who can help with the deciphering?

The video also shares the first photographs I've seen of the man behind the rascally behavior that led to the creation of the hot chicken, Thornton Prince. He was definitely a handsome dude, and I can see how he might have aroused such passion in his scorned lady friend. Bless him for that!

Roker also got a lesson on making sausage gravy from Jesse Goldstein of the Loveless Cafe. Check out the video above.

See more about Roker's visit here on the Today show website.

• alroker on instagram

• Beard winner Joseph Lenn works the grill as part of the Martin's BBQ team

And raise a glass to all the winners and nominees!

Middle Tennessee did contribute to some of the hardware that was taken home from last night's ceremony at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. Joseph Lenn, the chef at Blackberry Farm who did win Best Chef-Southeast last night, spent three years in Nashville helping to open the new restaurant at the Hermitage Hotel working under, ironically enough, Sean Brock. Did I mention how tightly knit and incestuous this culinary family tree is?

Last weekend, the James Beard Foundation announced the media awards, and why no Bites commenters won the blog awards (I was rooting for y'all), the CBS Sunday Morning "Eat, Drink and Be Merry" episode did take home the gold for Best Television Program, In Studio or Fixed Location. If you remember, that was the episode that featured a very entertaining segment recounting the history and demonstrating the production process of Nashville's own Goo Goo Cluster.

A big winner from the area was the King of Fermentation himself, Sandor Katz, who's based in Cannon County. His book The Art of Fermentation: An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World won kudos as the best cookbook of the year in the Reference and Scholarship category. That's a big-time recognition, and we should offer hearty congratulations to Katz.

If you'd like to learn about fermentation from the Beard-winning master himself, you've got a great opportunity coming up.

In addition to the app, NFTA members are celebrating with Nashville Street Food Month food specials and events. Every truck will offer a one-time $1 discount on a purchase of $10 or more to all customers who download the app and mention it at time of purchase. Events start off this weekend with the Food Truck Fiesta this Saturday, May 4, in Centennial Park in conjunction with Musicians Corner [UPDATE: This event has been cancelled due to the weather advisory], and continue with the Eat the Street food truck competition in downtown Franklin, May 10; the 36th Annual Bellevue Community Picnic, May 18; and Brew at the Zoo at Nashville Zoo, May 31.

You can also find multiple trucks at these ongoing food truck courts/events: Elmington Park, Saturdays and Sundays; Food Truck Tuesday at Nashville Farmers’ Market, Tuesdays; Grubbin’ in the Gulch, Wednesdays; Lunch in the Park at Centennial Park, Thursdays; and East Side Hootenanny in East Nashville, Saturdays.

One plus I did discover at Old Chicago was their long menu of craft beers, which isn't that surprising when you realize that they are owned by Craftworks, the company behind Big River and Rock Bottom. With 110 different brew options, they encourage regulars to take a World Beer Tour, which they will track and reward you with a spot in The Famous Wall of Foam once you've completed the circuit.

If you just want to dip your toe in the beer and not commit to the entire global sojourn, Old Chicago is offering a mini tour of Mexico between now and Cinco de Mayo. The tour actually started on April 10, so apologies for the late notice, but I imagine that Bitesters have always been better at cramming for exams anyway. Here are the pertinent details: