{"id":86790,"date":"2026-01-14T19:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T19:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/86790\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T19:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T19:32:09","slug":"wiz-kidz-bethlehem-and-allentown-bayou-boys-close-restaurants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/86790\/","title":{"rendered":"Wiz Kidz Bethlehem and Allentown: Bayou Boys close restaurants"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Bayou Boys<\/a> have closed their popular cheesesteak and pierogi brand at two locations as the business partners mull whether to keep at least one of the sites in operation.<\/p>\n

Wiz Kidz<\/a> locations at 65 E. Elizabeth Ave. in Bethlehem and 751 Union Blvd. in Allentown are both currently shuttered.<\/p>\n

The Allentown site permanently closed in late December, while the Bethlehem site remains \u201ctemporarily closed,\u201d co-owner Mo Taylor told lehighvalleylive.com Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Taylor of Bethlehem;<\/a> Cristian Duarte, of Bethlehem; Jerry Straub, of Coopersburg; and Matt Weaver, of Hellertown<\/a>, launched Wiz Kidz originally in fall 2018 on the first floor of the Pinnacle@65 building at the Bethlehem location. <\/p>\n

Taylor said the foursome over the past six months has been discussing whether or not to sell the Wiz Kidz brand to a new owner. The sale would include the business recipes and the Bethlehem building.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt remains up in the air a little bit,\u201d Taylor said of the Bethlehem site. \u201cBut we should have an answer within the next few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for their popular pierogies, the Bayou Boys have passed the recipes onto their production team to keep that business ongoing, Taylor said. That change of hands happened earlier this month.<\/p>\n

The Bayou Boys met over a decade ago when they worked together at the now-shuttered Starter\u2019s Riverport Restaurant<\/a> in Bethlehem. They decided to break out on their own once that restaurant closed in 2013.<\/p>\n

The venture includes the Wiz Kids and Bayou restaurants in the Lehigh Valley.<\/p>\n

Wiz Kidz is known for its nostalgic decor inspired by the 1980s and \u201990s, while the \u201cBayou Boys style\u201d sandwiches include a signature cheese blend. <\/p>\n

The Allentown site became the second Wiz Kidz location to shutter within less than a year. The Madison Farms shopping center location in Bethlehem Township closed in April 2025<\/a> and moved operations to the Allentown site, where the Bayou Boys Pierogies were then and will continue to be crafted.<\/p>\n

The Madison Farms location now houses Tikka Shack, which opened last month.<\/a><\/p>\n

At the time, Taylor stressed business was booming at Madison Farms. The closure had more to do with an overlap in delivery services for Bethlehem and Bethlehem Township. Both sites are just five miles apart.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the owners in August 2025 shuttered their downtown Easton location of The Bayou Southern Kitchen & Bar<\/a>. Taylor said the Easton closure was due to a consolidation of all their full-service operations.<\/p>\n

That site now houses Rios Brazilian Steakhouse<\/a>, which relocated from Nazareth.<\/p>\n

The foursome continue to operate The Bayou Bethlehem: Southern Kitchen & Bar<\/a>,702 Hawthorne Road, in Bethlehem.<\/a> That restaurant was launched by Duarte and Taylor in 2014.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Bayou Boys have closed their popular cheesesteak and pierogi brand at two locations as the business partners…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":86791,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":{"0":"post-86790","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86790\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}