Restaurant Road Trip: Sweet P’s in Mannington

MANNINGTON, W.Va. (WBOY) — There’s a new barbecue place in Mannington that opens early for lunch and stays open to cater to late-night diners. It’s called Sweet P’s.

Co-owner John Craw is at the restaurant each morning to fire up the smoker out back.

“We like to get it good and hot, get it going in the mornings,” said Craw. “What we’re smoking today will be eaten tomorrow because it’s such a long process.”

Craw has been tinkering with barbecue recipes and techniques since his days in the United States Marine Corps. “A lot of trial and error,” Craw said. “I burned up a lot of meat.”

You might have seen the “Sweet P’s Meat Division” food truck at events around north central West Virginia, but in late summer/early fall, Craw and his wife decided to expand their offerings to include a brick-and-mortar restaurant.

“I always thought it would be a dream and it’s pretty cool to see it coming true right now,” said Craw.

In the kitchen, Mack Clawson quickly moved between the countertop and stovetop as he prepared the restaurant’s specialties for a visiting 12 News crew to sample.

“Right now I am sautéing some onions for steak hoagies and then I am going to have for you guys, some BBQ platter, consisting of brisket, pulled pork, ribs steak hoagie, smoked mac and cheese smoked beans and some fresh-cut French fries for you to have,” said Clawson.

Craw said that Clawson plays “a key role” in the restaurant and described how he took Craw’s barbecue truck menu and expanded it into the restaurant.

“(John) had a good customer base with barbecue,” said Clawson. “I did tell him I wanted to branch out from barbecue into some other things. Now we’ve got pizza, the hoagies the burgers and the wings. We try to give a little bit of variety to Mannington.”

As for the name of the restaurant, Craw said that it comes from his kid’s middle names—Patrick and Pearl. “So they’re the Sweet P’s, which is kind of cool. Hopefully, something we can build up and pass on to them one day,” Craw said.

You can find Sweet P’s at 205 Market Street in Mannington. The restaurant is open Tuesday through Saturday from 11:00 a.m. until 9:00 p.m. On Sundays, they’re open from 11:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m.

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