September 15, 2025 • 14 mins
From government contractor to burger specialist, James Wine and his wife Catie have created something special in Fredericksburg's food scene. Their passion project, Smashed Life, has grown from a food truck into a soon-to-open brick-and-mortar restaurant while maintaining the quality and community focus that made them local favorites.
What makes a great smash burger? According to the Wines, it's not just technique but heart. Despite neither having formal food industry backgrounds—James works in facilities management while Catie coaches travel soccer—they've built a reputation for exceptional burgers complemented by house-made sauces that have customers begging for bottled versions. Their signature "smash sauce" pairs perfectly with Catie's homemade ranch to create what regulars affectionately call "smanch."
The journey hasn't been smooth. From electrical failures that nearly derailed their first event to the challenges of balancing full-time careers with entrepreneurship, the Wines have persevered through determination and community support. They've given back by sponsoring youth sports, participating in fundraisers for causes like cystic fibrosis and autism, and creating special promotions that benefit local schools.
Now permanently located at Maltese Brewing Company's Bowman Center, Smashed Life is preparing to evolve into Smashed Life Grill by Christmas. The expansion will allow them to grow their menu beyond their famous bacon cheeseburgers and brown butter toffee chocolate chip cookies to include wings and other pub favorites that complement their partnership with Maltese.
Want to experience what makes Smashed Life special? Visit them at Maltese Brewing, follow them on social media for promotions like Ten Tuesdays and dollar fry Wednesdays, or check out smashed-life.com to learn more about the couple turning passion into delicious reality in Fredericksburg.
James and Catie Wine
Smashed Life
smashed-life.com
jamescatiellc@gmail.com
+1 540-645-2803
Partlow, VA, United States, Virginia
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
This is the Fredericksburg Neighbors Podcast
, the place where localbusinesses and neighbors come
together.
Here's your host, Dori Stewart.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome back to another episode of the FXBG
Neighbors Podcast, where weshare the stories of our
favorite local brands.
I'm excited to introduce you tomy guests.
Today we have James and CatieWine with Smashed Life.
Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (00:31):
Thanks.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Well, I'm excited to dive into this and learn more
about you and your business.
So let's start there.
Please share with the listenersa little bit about Smashed Life
.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
So Smashed Life is a Smashed Burger food truck.
Currently we are permanentlyparked in the Bowman Center at
Maltese Brewing, where we willsoon I say soon, but with
permits and construction ittakes time We'll be opening up
our permanent location at actualbrick and mortar restaurant,
which we intend to call SmashedLife Grill, hopefully by
(01:03):
Christmas.
That will be a great Christmaspresent, but yeah, that's kind
of who we are.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Well, that's really exciting.
Congratulations.
That's a really big step and Iknow a lot of work.
So tell me the backstory.
I'd love to hear a little bitabout your background and how
you got to this big milestone.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
So the crazy thing is is neither one of us are in the
food industry from the verybeginning.
We both still hold downfull-time jobs.
I do facilities, my wife is atravel soccer coach as well as
might as well manage the clubwith all the things she does,
but we both have a passion forfood.
But we both have a passion forfood.
We both have a passion forpeople.
Um, and I wanted to get into myown business.
(01:50):
I.
I've been a governmentcontractor for 29 years and I
wanted to find a way to putsomething that we enjoy into a
business that we can move on andand some I I really I can't
remember the first thing thatgrabbed me with the food truck,
but I'm pretty good at cookingand I love food obviously.
And so we found the food truck,my wife actually the truck we
(02:12):
found she's the one.
I looked at a dozen of them andfinally she said just buy this
darn truck and get done.
So that's, that's where thetruck started.
That was in November, inNovember of 2022, when we first
purchased the truck.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Excellent, excellent.
So I was doing my due diligenceand doing a little bit of
research and I saw that you do alot to give back to the
community.
Talk to me a little bit aboutthat.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
So, we well, actually , I guess, really the start of
it we my wife was.
She was a soccer coach atSpotsy Vina High School and that
got her involved in the boosterclub where the booster club
they would serve food for thegames and things like that for
them to raise money for theteams.
So that got me involved in that.
Then I became the president ofthe booster club.
Speaker 4 (03:00):
And so he was.
He was voluntold.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, voluntold, I love it.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
We got to.
You know, we were slingingburgers for the football games,
the soccer games, the baseballgames, and I think that's really
where my my passion for justserving people, food turned into
an idea and that's where kindof where we went.
Now we also do, we do we loveto do, like we're going to do a
coming up soon, a car showthat's for cystic fibrosis.
(03:28):
We have a car show for autism.
We have a car show for toys fortots.
We have, we really anything wecan do to kind of give back, and
we've done plenty of schoolfundraisers for, like, we just
had to miss some of them becausewe're part permanent now, where
we do, you know, back to schoolnight, where we would give 10%
back to the schools as adonation and things like that.
We've done that in the past.
Speaker 4 (03:49):
We've also given donations out to like my soccer
club that I work for.
We actually sponsored theiracademy season, all their shirts
, so that the kids it was anoffset, the price for those kids
so they could play without youknow an expense amazing, amazing
.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
I love that.
I love that.
So if someone listening hasnever visited your food truck
before, what would you suggestthey order?
Speaker 4 (04:16):
a bacon cheeseburger and fries yeah, I think our
bacon cheeseburgers are numberone seller.
It's um, you know our foodisn't fancy but it is good.
You know we make a basicproduct but it is slightly
elevated.
My husband came up with anamazing sauce.
It's called our smash sauce.
We've got a lot of people thatlove to you.
We actually serve it as a sideas well.
(04:37):
So if you get onion rings orfries, we like to dip it.
You know, that's kind of one ofthe things that sets us apart
is we do make all of our saucesexcept for mayonnaise and
ketchup.
Obviously we're not doing that.
But you know, we make Dijonaioli, we make sriracha mayo, we
make a ton of our smash, ourhomemade ranch, all of those
things that kind of.
Just take that you know basicburger and not make it so basic
(05:01):
anymore.
The smashed technique is, Ithink, one of the best burgers
you'll have.
You know, my first time eatinga smash burger was my husband.
He went out.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
He went out to the grill and product development
and we were sold.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
That was we.
We were pretty amazed it was.
It was love at first bite,that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Nice, you'll have to eventually bottle up your sauce
and sell it.
We've been asked multiple times.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
It's getting to be that way.
With the ranch, my wife came upwith the recipe for the ranch,
so they're kind of going neckand neck between that smash
burger sauce and then the ranchas well.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Well, we, I like to mix them, I like to do the smash
sauce and the ranch and I callit smanch, and it's very, very
good.
It's delicious, very good, yes.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Awesome, awesome.
So do you find that there areany misconceptions, either about
your business or about theindustry?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So one, I think one people don't really have an
understanding of how much workgoes into this, how much passion
goes into this.
It would be so much easier tonot do this type of business.
This is a hard start.
We're being successful becausewe're passionate and we come
from a humble background wherewe work hard for everything we
have.
Hard work will always pay off.
(06:15):
And then also the misconception, I think, is that it's cheap
food.
You see my grocery bill.
There's nothing cheap about it,I mean ground beef is not
expensive.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
So yeah it's.
I think another misconceptionis we just show up and you know,
we just cook, there's a lot ofprep that goes behind the scenes
.
The other misconception is youknow the people behind the truck
that are here just to give youa burger.
We have a great staff, ourstaff most of us have been.
Our family has helped us alongthe way, but we have some.
(06:50):
We have a very good staff.
We're really blessed to havethem.
We have one that's two fulltime, our son is full time, and
then we have another, t, that'stwo full full-time.
Um, our son is full-time.
And then we have another, tisha, is also full-time.
Um, just hoping to, you know,elevate them, to give them, you
know, the uh, what is the word?
I'm looking for the ability todo it on their own, I mean, and
(07:10):
for us to get off the truck alittle bit and we're getting to
that transition moment now wherewe're getting off the truck per
se challenging when you're acontrol freak and you don't want
to.
But misconception that it'seasy.
It's not.
It is definitely.
You have to have a love forwhat you're doing, and we do.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense, and so
what advice would you givesomeone who is thinking about
starting a food truck?
Speaker 3 (07:39):
It's going to be more expensive than you think, it's
going to take longer than youthink.
The process with a permanent inthe health department is tough,
but it's worth it.
Don't be one of the guys orgirls that goes in and just does
it and gets away with not doingthe right thing, and there's
never a perfect time to start.
I don't care if it's a foodtruck or anything.
When it comes to small business, sometimes you just got to say
(08:00):
go for it and just jump right inboth feet.
Speaker 4 (08:02):
We've had some hard starts to our first, our first
ever event that we booked and wewere prepped for.
We had a major electrical issuewith the truck and fried all of
the electrical in our truck.
So just to say that was a toughday.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Yeah, I was sitting in the truck with my head on the
steering wheel, almost in tearsthinking is this After two
years later, though, two yearslater here we are.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So he persevered Correct.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Yes, I think that is definitely the key is just don't
give up, keep going.
There are going to be dayswhere you don't make the money.
There are going to be days thatyou do really well.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Great advice, great advice.
So you two both have you knowanother, another career.
You're doing this.
You're starting a restaurant.
You have children.
Clearly you are so busy.
So tell me, when you're notworking, what are you doing for
fun?
I need to know.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
That was a funny question, because when I brought
it up.
I asked we were looking overthe questions and he goes Don't
even ask, don't even talk to me.
We do.
I mean it is listen.
It is a bit of a sacrificeright now.
We do find the time we are offMondays.
We do choose to still work onsome of the stuff, like some
behind the scenes on Mondays.
But we are right, we are we aregetting to the point where, like
(09:23):
I said, we're empowering ouremployees so that we are getting
off the truck a bit more, but alittle bit about ourselves.
When we can, we love tovacation.
We've been on a couple cruisesrecently.
I think we have a Europe or aHawaii trip, hopefully in the
future, like I think those arethe things that keep us going.
We also have a kid one more,left in high school and she's
getting ready to go to collegenext year.
(09:44):
So I think enjoying the timethat we have with her while
she's still with us is importantto us.
Although she's a grumpyteenager, we still try to force
those moments with her.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
So nice, nice, it's nice to get out of town.
I hear from a lot of businessowners that that is.
The only way to really unplugis to actually leave down and
not bring your laptop with you.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
I think, right with you.
You are, yes, you're tempted to, just why I'm just sitting here
.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
I might as well do the work.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Yeah yeah, you really want to disconnect.
You got to leave it behind.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
About getting out of town Absolutely.
It's amazing when you're in theservice industry how many
people that well, hey how areyou and?
You don't even, not that youdon't remember them, but you
know it's a yeah.
Getting out of town is nice.
You know a thousand strangers,it's kind of nice.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Sounds lovely and we and we're getting served not
being right.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Yes, exactly, I love it.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
I love it, please, yeah so what is something that
you wish the listeners knewabout?
Speaker 4 (11:02):
smashed life oh boy, there's a ton of things.
Um, I don't well.
So I think the biggest thing isthat I said we're not
reinventing the hamburger or thesmash burger.
We're just doing, we're just.
You know it's, it's good food,it's not, it's not a gourmet
burger, but it is a good burger.
And so I think that peopledon't know about us is that we
(11:23):
really do want to do this tomake a good experience for them.
We're partnered with MalteseBrewing Company.
They, you know, have their ownmission and that is to you know
they have a whole.
All of them are retired orworking firemen, so their cause
is kind of neat.
We're partnering with them, webring them customers, they bring
(11:44):
us customers and it definitely,you know, know, that combo is
really really cool and anawesome partnership with them.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Um, yeah, it's just.
Uh, we truly have.
Like my wife said is we're notjust trying to serve you food,
we want you to have experience.
Every customer that comes tothe window, we want to walk away
with a smile.
If they had a bad day, I wantto put a smile on their face.
I and I.
I don't shut up, I can't stoptalking, even if I'm cooking on
a grill I'm yelling.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I'm yelling over my shoulders, nice I love that.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
So if the listeners want to connect with you, they
can come visit you by maltese orshare with us uh your contact
information so we're on facebook, instagram, instagram, tiktok
obviously all the big socialsand also we have our website,
which is smashed hyphen orsmashed dash life.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I'll put the URL in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
I just had a brain.
Speaker 4 (12:36):
You know again, you know being business owners.
There's little things like thatthat you feel like that's in
your memory but it's not smasheddash, life.
com.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
There you go.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Perfect, perfect, yeah yeah, email it to us.
Sorry, but it's notsmashed-lifecom.
There you go, perfect, I knowthe urls.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
Go daddy, yeah, yeah email address sorry no worries,
no worries yeah, and we also doa lot on social media, like
tuesdays, we do 10 tuesdays.
Come on on tuesday you get 10off.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
Uh, we try to do specials um we do like dollar
fries french on wednesdays youbuy a burger, you get a french
fry for free, or a dollar wealso highlight a burger.
Speaker 4 (13:09):
Like our highlighted burger for the summer was a
hawaiian smash and that's been abig hit.
We're looking to do a pretzelburger soon and partner with
some beer cheese from maltese.
So we're excited to do thatlike we just want to, you know,
bring something kind of uniqueand special.
We also do some, some greatdesserts we have.
Our special dessert is ourbrown butter toffee chocolate
(13:30):
chip cookies and they are.
I can't keep them, I can't makeenough of them.
So people are and we're goingto put some new ones on the menu
as well.
But we can't wait to get in therestaurant where we can expand
our menu.
Wings are definitely, becausethat's one of my favorite foods.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
Give me some hot wings.
Hot wings, I'm a burger.
Speaker 4 (13:47):
Yeah, we're looking to expand our menu.
Definitely do more bar foods.
That would complement Maltese.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Amazing, amazing.
Well, thank you both forjoining me on the podcast today.
When the restaurant opens up,I'd love to invite you back so
we can talk all about that, butI appreciate you sharing Smashed
Life with us.
Speaker 4 (14:07):
Thank, you so?
Speaker 1 (14:07):
much Thank you for listening to the Fredericksburg
Neighbors Podcast.
To nominate your favorite localbusinesses to be featured on
the show, go tofxbgneighborspodcast.
com.
This is the Fredericksburg Neighbors Podcast
, the place where localbusinesses and neighbors come
together.
Here's your host, Dori Stewart.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome back to another episode of the FXBG
Neighbors Podcast, where weshare the stories of our
favorite local brands.
I'm excited to introduce you tomy guests.
Today we have James and CatieWine with Smashed Life.
Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (00:31):
Thanks.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Well, I'm excited to dive into this and learn more
about you and your business.
So let's start there.
Please share with the listenersa little bit about Smashed Life
.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
So Smashed Life is a Smashed Burger food truck.
Currently we are permanentlyparked in the Bowman Center at
Maltese Brewing, where we willsoon I say soon, but with
permits and construction ittakes time We'll be opening up
our permanent location at actualbrick and mortar restaurant,
which we intend to call SmashedLife Grill, hopefully by
(01:03):
Christmas.
That will be a great Christmaspresent, but yeah, that's kind
of who we are.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Well, that's really exciting.
Congratulations.
That's a really big step and Iknow a lot of work.
So tell me the backstory.
I'd love to hear a little bitabout your background and how
you got to this big milestone.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
So the crazy thing is is neither one of us are in the
food industry from the verybeginning.
We both still hold downfull-time jobs.
I do facilities, my wife is atravel soccer coach as well as
might as well manage the clubwith all the things she does,
but we both have a passion forfood.
But we both have a passion forfood.
We both have a passion forpeople.
Um, and I wanted to get into myown business.
(01:50):
I.
I've been a governmentcontractor for 29 years and I
wanted to find a way to putsomething that we enjoy into a
business that we can move on andand some I I really I can't
remember the first thing thatgrabbed me with the food truck,
but I'm pretty good at cookingand I love food obviously.
And so we found the food truck,my wife actually the truck we
(02:12):
found she's the one.
I looked at a dozen of them andfinally she said just buy this
darn truck and get done.
So that's, that's where thetruck started.
That was in November, inNovember of 2022, when we first
purchased the truck.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Excellent, excellent.
So I was doing my due diligenceand doing a little bit of
research and I saw that you do alot to give back to the
community.
Talk to me a little bit aboutthat.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
So, we well, actually , I guess, really the start of
it we my wife was.
She was a soccer coach atSpotsy Vina High School and that
got her involved in the boosterclub where the booster club
they would serve food for thegames and things like that for
them to raise money for theteams.
So that got me involved in that.
Then I became the president ofthe booster club.
Speaker 4 (03:00):
And so he was.
He was voluntold.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, voluntold, I love it.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
We got to.
You know, we were slingingburgers for the football games,
the soccer games, the baseballgames, and I think that's really
where my my passion for justserving people, food turned into
an idea and that's where kindof where we went.
Now we also do, we do we loveto do, like we're going to do a
coming up soon, a car showthat's for cystic fibrosis.
(03:28):
We have a car show for autism.
We have a car show for toys fortots.
We have, we really anything wecan do to kind of give back, and
we've done plenty of schoolfundraisers for, like, we just
had to miss some of them becausewe're part permanent now, where
we do, you know, back to schoolnight, where we would give 10%
back to the schools as adonation and things like that.
We've done that in the past.
Speaker 4 (03:49):
We've also given donations out to like my soccer
club that I work for.
We actually sponsored theiracademy season, all their shirts
, so that the kids it was anoffset, the price for those kids
so they could play without youknow an expense amazing, amazing
.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
I love that.
I love that.
So if someone listening hasnever visited your food truck
before, what would you suggestthey order?
Speaker 4 (04:16):
a bacon cheeseburger and fries yeah, I think our
bacon cheeseburgers are numberone seller.
It's um, you know our foodisn't fancy but it is good.
You know we make a basicproduct but it is slightly
elevated.
My husband came up with anamazing sauce.
It's called our smash sauce.
We've got a lot of people thatlove to you.
We actually serve it as a sideas well.
(04:37):
So if you get onion rings orfries, we like to dip it.
You know, that's kind of one ofthe things that sets us apart
is we do make all of our saucesexcept for mayonnaise and
ketchup.
Obviously we're not doing that.
But you know, we make Dijonaioli, we make sriracha mayo, we
make a ton of our smash, ourhomemade ranch, all of those
things that kind of.
Just take that you know basicburger and not make it so basic
(05:01):
anymore.
The smashed technique is, Ithink, one of the best burgers
you'll have.
You know, my first time eatinga smash burger was my husband.
He went out.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
He went out to the grill and product development
and we were sold.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
That was we.
We were pretty amazed it was.
It was love at first bite,that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Nice, you'll have to eventually bottle up your sauce
and sell it.
We've been asked multiple times.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
It's getting to be that way.
With the ranch, my wife came upwith the recipe for the ranch,
so they're kind of going neckand neck between that smash
burger sauce and then the ranchas well.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
Well, we, I like to mix them, I like to do the smash
sauce and the ranch and I callit smanch, and it's very, very
good.
It's delicious, very good, yes.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Awesome, awesome.
So do you find that there areany misconceptions, either about
your business or about theindustry?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So one, I think one people don't really have an
understanding of how much workgoes into this, how much passion
goes into this.
It would be so much easier tonot do this type of business.
This is a hard start.
We're being successful becausewe're passionate and we come
from a humble background wherewe work hard for everything we
have.
Hard work will always pay off.
(06:15):
And then also the misconception, I think, is that it's cheap
food.
You see my grocery bill.
There's nothing cheap about it,I mean ground beef is not
expensive.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
So yeah it's.
I think another misconceptionis we just show up and you know,
we just cook, there's a lot ofprep that goes behind the scenes
.
The other misconception is youknow the people behind the truck
that are here just to give youa burger.
We have a great staff, ourstaff most of us have been.
Our family has helped us alongthe way, but we have some.
(06:50):
We have a very good staff.
We're really blessed to havethem.
We have one that's two fulltime, our son is full time, and
then we have another, t, that'stwo full full-time.
Um, our son is full-time.
And then we have another, tisha, is also full-time.
Um, just hoping to, you know,elevate them, to give them, you
know, the uh, what is the word?
I'm looking for the ability todo it on their own, I mean, and
(07:10):
for us to get off the truck alittle bit and we're getting to
that transition moment now wherewe're getting off the truck per
se challenging when you're acontrol freak and you don't want
to.
But misconception that it'seasy.
It's not.
It is definitely.
You have to have a love forwhat you're doing, and we do.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense, and so
what advice would you givesomeone who is thinking about
starting a food truck?
Speaker 3 (07:39):
It's going to be more expensive than you think, it's
going to take longer than youthink.
The process with a permanent inthe health department is tough,
but it's worth it.
Don't be one of the guys orgirls that goes in and just does
it and gets away with not doingthe right thing, and there's
never a perfect time to start.
I don't care if it's a foodtruck or anything.
When it comes to small business, sometimes you just got to say
(08:00):
go for it and just jump right inboth feet.
Speaker 4 (08:02):
We've had some hard starts to our first, our first
ever event that we booked and wewere prepped for.
We had a major electrical issuewith the truck and fried all of
the electrical in our truck.
So just to say that was a toughday.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Yeah, I was sitting in the truck with my head on the
steering wheel, almost in tearsthinking is this After two
years later, though, two yearslater here we are.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So he persevered Correct.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Yes, I think that is definitely the key is just don't
give up, keep going.
There are going to be dayswhere you don't make the money.
There are going to be days thatyou do really well.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Great advice, great advice.
So you two both have you knowanother, another career.
You're doing this.
You're starting a restaurant.
You have children.
Clearly you are so busy.
So tell me, when you're notworking, what are you doing for
fun?
I need to know.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
That was a funny question, because when I brought
it up.
I asked we were looking overthe questions and he goes Don't
even ask, don't even talk to me.
We do.
I mean it is listen.
It is a bit of a sacrificeright now.
We do find the time we are offMondays.
We do choose to still work onsome of the stuff, like some
behind the scenes on Mondays.
But we are right, we are we aregetting to the point where, like
(09:23):
I said, we're empowering ouremployees so that we are getting
off the truck a bit more, but alittle bit about ourselves.
When we can, we love tovacation.
We've been on a couple cruisesrecently.
I think we have a Europe or aHawaii trip, hopefully in the
future, like I think those arethe things that keep us going.
We also have a kid one more,left in high school and she's
getting ready to go to collegenext year.
(09:44):
So I think enjoying the timethat we have with her while
she's still with us is importantto us.
Although she's a grumpyteenager, we still try to force
those moments with her.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
So nice, nice, it's nice to get out of town.
I hear from a lot of businessowners that that is.
The only way to really unplugis to actually leave down and
not bring your laptop with you.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
I think, right with you.
You are, yes, you're tempted to, just why I'm just sitting here
.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
I might as well do the work.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Yeah yeah, you really want to disconnect.
You got to leave it behind.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
About getting out of town Absolutely.
It's amazing when you're in theservice industry how many
people that well, hey how areyou and?
You don't even, not that youdon't remember them, but you
know it's a yeah.
Getting out of town is nice.
You know a thousand strangers,it's kind of nice.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Sounds lovely and we and we're getting served not
being right.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Yes, exactly, I love it.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
I love it, please, yeah so what is something that
you wish the listeners knewabout?
Speaker 4 (11:02):
smashed life oh boy, there's a ton of things.
Um, I don't well.
So I think the biggest thing isthat I said we're not
reinventing the hamburger or thesmash burger.
We're just doing, we're just.
You know it's, it's good food,it's not, it's not a gourmet
burger, but it is a good burger.
And so I think that peopledon't know about us is that we
(11:23):
really do want to do this tomake a good experience for them.
We're partnered with MalteseBrewing Company.
They, you know, have their ownmission and that is to you know
they have a whole.
All of them are retired orworking firemen, so their cause
is kind of neat.
We're partnering with them, webring them customers, they bring
(11:44):
us customers and it definitely,you know, know, that combo is
really really cool and anawesome partnership with them.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Um, yeah, it's just.
Uh, we truly have.
Like my wife said is we're notjust trying to serve you food,
we want you to have experience.
Every customer that comes tothe window, we want to walk away
with a smile.
If they had a bad day, I wantto put a smile on their face.
I and I.
I don't shut up, I can't stoptalking, even if I'm cooking on
a grill I'm yelling.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I'm yelling over my shoulders, nice I love that.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
So if the listeners want to connect with you, they
can come visit you by maltese orshare with us uh your contact
information so we're on facebook, instagram, instagram, tiktok
obviously all the big socialsand also we have our website,
which is smashed hyphen orsmashed dash life.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I'll put the URL in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
I just had a brain.
Speaker 4 (12:36):
You know again, you know being business owners.
There's little things like thatthat you feel like that's in
your memory but it's not smasheddash, life.
com.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
There you go.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Perfect, perfect, yeah yeah, email it to us.
Sorry, but it's notsmashed-lifecom.
There you go, perfect, I knowthe urls.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
Go daddy, yeah, yeah email address sorry no worries,
no worries yeah, and we also doa lot on social media, like
tuesdays, we do 10 tuesdays.
Come on on tuesday you get 10off.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
Uh, we try to do specials um we do like dollar
fries french on wednesdays youbuy a burger, you get a french
fry for free, or a dollar wealso highlight a burger.
Speaker 4 (13:09):
Like our highlighted burger for the summer was a
hawaiian smash and that's been abig hit.
We're looking to do a pretzelburger soon and partner with
some beer cheese from maltese.
So we're excited to do thatlike we just want to, you know,
bring something kind of uniqueand special.
We also do some, some greatdesserts we have.
Our special dessert is ourbrown butter toffee chocolate
(13:30):
chip cookies and they are.
I can't keep them, I can't makeenough of them.
So people are and we're goingto put some new ones on the menu
as well.
But we can't wait to get in therestaurant where we can expand
our menu.
Wings are definitely, becausethat's one of my favorite foods.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
Give me some hot wings.
Hot wings, I'm a burger.
Speaker 4 (13:47):
Yeah, we're looking to expand our menu.
Definitely do more bar foods.
That would complement Maltese.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Amazing, amazing.
Well, thank you both forjoining me on the podcast today.
When the restaurant opens up,I'd love to invite you back so
we can talk all about that, butI appreciate you sharing Smashed
Life with us.
Speaker 4 (14:07):
Thank, you so?
Speaker 1 (14:07):
much Thank you for listening to the Fredericksburg
Neighbors Podcast.
To nominate your favorite localbusinesses to be featured on
the show, go tofxbgneighborspodcast.
com.
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