At the Halfway Inn Bar and Grill, many patrons come for a specific reason. For only at this lake hot spot can one earn the right of having said they, “shot the minnow.”
Halfway between Bagnell and Truman dams at the 47 mile-marker, one of Lake of the Ozarks’ most popular and talked-about bar and grill serves up cocktails, food — and minnows.
The Halfway Inn Bar and Grill has an international reputation as a place where you can “Shoot the Minnow.”
From a TV show in Canada to a radio station in New Zealand, co-owner B.J. Coleman says his establishment has drawn attention for a tradition that started out as a joke.
What’s that tradition? Putting a live minnow in a drink and swallowing it whole.
It started innocently enough 20 years ago when the bar was also a bait shop called the Cracker Box. A beer drinker’s girlfriend thought it was time to go home. In an effort to move the guy toward the door, she tossed a minnow in his beer. He kept drinking and a legend was born.
These days thousands of Lakers belly up to drinks, alcoholic and otherwise, down the swimming minnow and earn the right to say they “shot the minnow.” It is a testimony to the unique culture of Lake of the Ozarks that swallowing small fish has become something of a rite of passage on the upper end of the Lake.
“That’s part of the mystique; it’s that we’re out here in the middle of nowhere,” says Coleman. “We also get to turn our music louder than most places.”
Joe Coleman, B.J.’s dad and Inn co-owner, said they order about 2,000 minnows a week starting on Memorial Day.
B.J., 34, started working at Halfway Inn as a cook when he was 19 and became a bartender at 21.
Now at 34, he’s the owner but he still works behind the bar. B.J. and Joe bought the restaurant in 2000 and expanded it by adding a couple of docks, an upstairs bar and dining room and a tiki bar.
About the restaurant
What Halfway Inn Bar and Grill
Where 1038 Cuptree Road, Gravois Mills
Cuisine American
Hours Mon-Sat, from 11 a.m.-1:30 a.m. and 11 a.m.-midnight on Sunday
Contact 573-374-1919
Online www.bigdickshalfwayinn.com
Prices Burgers and sandwiches from $8-$10; Steaks and seafood from $14-$24
Owners Joe and B.J. Coleman
Minnow Shot Starts at $4;
“I shot the minnow shirt” from $17.99 and up
