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Jim Keet Cooks Up New Plans for Cock of the WalkLock Icon

2 min read

The Cock of the Walk property in North Little Rock will get new life as an event center, says veteran restaurateur Jim Keet.

The 8,536-SF building, at 7103 Cock of the Walk Drive off Maumelle Boulevard, will also house offices and a catering kitchen.

JTJ Restaurants LLC, led by Keet, last month paid $400,000 for the property, owned by the Tri-Star Corp., led by Rebecca Hogg.

Keet’s family business — which includes sons Tommy and Jake — owns several Taziki’s Mediterranean Café restaurants in Arkansas and Panini & Co. in Little Rock. Keet is also the Keet behind Petit & Keet Bar & Grill in Little Rock.

Keet said they’ve got a multiphase plan for the building. The first phase entails moving their construction company offices into the former bar and office area.

Next, they’ll be testing the kitchen equipment there and putting it into proper working order. This will allow them to use the kitchen for JTJ Restaurants’ catering business when it has to shut down its Watercolor in the Park, the restaurant it operates in the Arkansas Arts Center in Little Rock, when that section closes for the major reconstruction the Arts Center will be undergoing.

And ultimately they plan an event center in the space that housed the restaurant area of the Cock of the Walk building.

“We don’t envision opening a restaurant there unless we do something just on Friday and Saturday nights, that kind of a thing,” Jim Keet said. “The real plan is to use it for our catering kitchen, for our catering operations, and an event center.”

JTJ Restaurants is in the midst of doing repairs to the building. “We don’t want to change the overall ambience very much,” he said. “We think there’s a lot of potential there for customizing the way the place looks depending on what the event is.”

JTJ Restaurants also plans to do some landscaping on the 4-acre property, which includes a small manmade lake and waterfall.

“A year from now it will be a completely different looking place,” Keet said.

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