Taylor's Tap & Grill takes 'Best Beef on Weck' (again!)

By Patrick J. Bradley
Senior Contributing Writer

It takes a lot for a restaurant to earn a regional reputation for excellence. Delicious menu offerings. Fast service. A family-friendly vibe.

Taylor’s Tap & Grill in Wheatfield offers that winning combination daily. Its signature dish, Justin Tyme’s Original Roast Beef, earned it the “Best Beef on Weck” award in this year’s “Savory Summer” contest. It’s the fourth consecutive year Taylor’s has captured the award.

“I’m very humbled by it,” co-owner Julie Taylor said. “I think it’s a credit to our customers, a loyal group of regular customers.”

Julie co-owns the Tap & Grill with her fiancé, food business veteran Jeff Taylor. The pair isn’t related – yet. Taylor is Julie’s maiden name.

Jeff Taylor has worked in the food business for 45 years, the past 30 as a restaurant owner. He learned the business from the bottom up, starting as a dishwasher at the old Alps Chalet on Military Road. After being promoted to cook – that’s how it works in the restaurant business, he said – Jeff studied the culinary arts at Niagara County Community College and later operated the Falcon Club at the Niagara Falls Air Reserve Base. When the airbase went on lockdown following the 9/11 attacks, “It put me out of business,” he said. But the years he spent there taught him a lot about operating a business.

An SBA loan gave Taylor the funds he needed to open his own restaurant on Buffalo Avenue at 62nd Street in the LaSalle section of Niagara Falls. He named it Justin Tyme after his son, Justin. It was a success, as was its successor, the larger Justin Tyme Café and Catering on the River, also in LaSalle.

By 2013, Taylor was ready for a change. Justin Tyme had closed and, rather than open another family-style restaurant, he wanted to go in a different direction.

“We needed a new identity with a new name,” he said. The result was Taylor’s Tap & Grill, which opened a year later with Julie Taylor on board to help run it.

“The rest is history,” Julie said. “Here we are 10 years later.”

In fact, The Tap & Grill is celebrating its 10th anniversary this month and has a lot to celebrate. Business is booming and, while it leans toward serving American pub food, the dinner menu offers such dishes as maple glazed salmon, pasta al fresco and slow-roasted pot roast – a perennial favorite. All of the restaurant’s appetizers are homemade, chicken tenders are cut and rolled by hand, and you won’t find a frozen french fry in the place. They cut the potatoes themselves and take pride in all their other homemade offerings.

“We are proud to say our food is made in-house with fresh ingredients,” the menu says.

The Tap & Grill’s full-service bar gives it a neighborhood feel. It’s a place where people meet and make new friends and a home away from home for people like Merrie Manganello of North Tonawanda. A retired social worker, she’s been meeting her friends there weekly for the past five years.

“It’s nice to find a place that is totally friendly,” she said on a recent Thursday afternoon. “The food is excellent and they make their customers and their help feel like part of their family.”

It’s what the Taylors have been aiming to offer their customers.

“The best part of being in this business is being a staple in the community,” Julie said. “We have customers who have become friends. We’ve been with customers through the good times and the bad times.”

“We’ve seen customers become employees, go from high school to college, get married and be out there on their own,” Jeff added.

Open six days a week, Taylor’s Tap & Grill is at 2279 Niagara Falls Blvd., just east of Walmore Road. To learn more, visit taylorstap.net or call 716-216-6078.