Full Moon Bar-B-Que has reopened in Tuscaloosa as a carryout, call-in and catering restaurant after being destroyed in the tornado that raged through the city this past April.

“It didn’t really hit me that the tornado had caused so much destruction until I came back and realized that some of my favorite things were gone,” sophomore Andrew Wash said.

He said he finds it encouraging that Full Moon is reopening and hopes that other restaurants and businesses will follow suit.

“It gives a lot of hope to a lot of people,” said Brian Ahmed, owner of Tuscaloosa’s Full Moon Bar-B-Que.

Full Moon has reopened at a temporary location on Veterans Memorial Parkway and they are very thankful to have the support of the community as they endeavor to serve their southern-style barbeque.

Ahmed said it was very difficult to reopen in the wake of the tornado.

“There were not a lot of options because the city just does not seem to know what to do,” he said. “It was not very easy to get anything done as far as paperwork.”

Ahmed said they have had a lot of setbacks and are still trying to find a new location to rebuild a full service restaurant.

“We hope to be a full service restaurant again, but in the mean time, we are open seven days a week, full catering, carryout and call in,” he said. “We want the community to know we are a full force.”

Full Moon kept 20 employees on the payroll and brought them all back to work when the restaurant reopened at its temporary location.

“We felt it was our responsibility to take care of them,” said Matt Hawkins, manager of Full Moon.

Business will be hurting some, because dine-in and drive through made up about 50 percent of the business, but the carryout and catering is doing really well, Ahmed and Hawkins said.

“We are fortunate to open in time for school to start back, and we are very excited to be back working and be involved in the community again,” Ahmed said.

The restaurant opened at its new temporary location on Aug. 1, in plenty of time to prepare for the new school year and upcoming football season.

“We look forward to the support of our community,” Ahmed said. “We don’t want to lose the support of our customers.”

Full Moon will have a kitchen trailer on the Quad on game days and will be catering for a lot of tents. For more information on menu and location, visit fullmoonbbq.com, or for catering, call (205) 886-9447.

“We are excited to be back, have some fun… and Roll Tide!”