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Joey’s keeps on cookin’

From left, Jamie Tipton, Alex Pollifrone, Megan Garner, Brittany Milling, Aaron Milling, Gary Moose and Kercy Ayers are readying for Joey’s Pancake House’s 60th anniversary celebration. Kyle Perrotti photo

After 60 years and just one ownership change eight years ago, Joey’s Pancake House is still thriving, with a healthy reputation that extends far beyond the mountains of Western North Carolina.

Next week, the restaurant will celebrate its diamond anniversary with a special day of live music, food and events, including a pancake-eating contest.

It will even stay open until 6 p.m., serving up its pancakes and fan-favorite hashbrown casserole four hours later than usual.

As the Maggie Valley breakfast institution approaches its anniversary, managers Brittany and Aaron Milling are reflecting on the restaurant’s legacy and how they want to protect that legacy while also building something of their own. The restaurant was founded in 1966 by Joey O’Keefe and his wife, Brenda, who moved up to the area after meeting in Miami, Florida. Back in those days, Joey’s Pancake House inhabited a smaller building just up the valley near a chairlift going up to the wildly popular Ghost Town in the Sky amusement park that served up plenty of hungry customers. In the early days, it was open late enough to serve dinner.

Joey and Brenda O’Keefe, founders of the restaurant. File photoJoey and Brenda O’Keefe, founders of the restaurant. File photo

In 2001, Joey O’Keefe, a native Philadelphian, died, and Brenda continued to run the restaurant for 16 more years before selling it to Roy and Sandra Milling, Aaron’s parents.

Since 2018, when the Millings bought the business, it hascontinued to thrive. Even amid a sea of breakfast joints dotting the landscape, Joey’s stands out. In 2023, it was named the No. 6 restaurant in the Carolinas by Yelp. At the beginning of this year, it was the subject of a feature in Southern Living Magazine highlighting the “most legendary pancake houses in the south.” Perhaps most notably, it was featured in a November 2024 Fox & Friends segment.

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When the Millings took over operations, they knew they wanted to stay true to the reputation the O’Keefe’s had cultivated over five decades. While they originally planned to rename the restaurant to Sandra’s Pancake House, after they worked out an arrangement with Brenda O’Keefe, they kept the original name. Since then, they’ve kept most things the same, happy to maintain the reputation they’d inherited. While there have been some small menu changes, one thing, of course, remained the same.

Commercial kitchens are always busy, but during peak hours Joey’s can turn out an impressive amount of food. Kyle Perrotti photo

“There's something special about our pancake mix that Joey created that nobody else does,” Brittany Milling said. “I mean, even the manufacturers that we've used before will tell you, Yyour pancake mix is so hard to make because it requires certain ingredients that give it that special taste that makes it hard to clean our equipment.’ Everybody knows the taste of Joey's, no matter what. So we try to keep that in mind in everything that we make and everything that we do.”

Like for any restaurant worth frequenting, consistency is key.

“That’s not just the way things taste, but the way things look, down to how we lay our bacon on the plate. If we get a weird-looking piece of bacon, we'll use it for crumbles instead of a nice beautiful piece,” Brittany said.

Largely responsible for maintaining that consistency is Aaron. Aaron can often be found manning the griddle amid the constant hum of a commercial kitchen tasked with serving one of the largest dining rooms in the area. It’s a tall task, but restaurants are in Aaron’s blood. His father has owned restaurants his whole life, and Aaron is no stranger to the griddle.

“I would not say there was a huge learning curve there,” he said. “I have cooked a lot of breakfast food.”

Aaron Milling can often be found in the kitchen manning one of a few griddles. Kyle Perrotti photo

Nonetheless, moving into an operation run as well as Joey’s did take work. Aaron admitted that as tight of ships as he and his family had run in the past, they weren’t anything like the standards set by Brenda O’Keefe.

“What Brenda did … the guidelines she gave us were so extensive,” he recalled. “But I mixed that with what I know and it was successful.”

Perhaps the most important thing to Brenda O’Keefe has been maintaining the cleanliness of the operation, which the former owner still speaks of with pride. The restaurant now boasts a perfect score from the health department, a rare feat among restaurants. O’Keefe has mixed feelings about seeing the restaurant under the new owners, not because she doesn’t have faith in them, but because for so long the restaurant was a part of her life and a main link to the community she holds so dear.

It was also a connection to so many hundreds of customers who would return from all over the country to get some of Joey’s pancakes, as O’Keefe so fondly recalled.

“The most important part of the business was our guests,” she said. “Right when [the Millings] first opened, so many customers and people from all over the country who had come for 50 or 60 years now came in.”

Of course, those who’ve donned the apron in Joey’s also hold a special place in O’Keefe’s heart.

“It’s a gift to know everyone who ever worked in here,” she said, “I can’t remember where my keys or glasses are, but I remember them.”

Aaron and Brittany Milling have been running Joey’s Pancake House for almost a decade. Kyle Perrotti photo

The legacy and reputation are indeed tough to match, but the Millings feel like they’re keeping pace — or at least the customers who come through their doors day in and day out tend to think so.

“Our servers hear it, our cashier hears it, Miss Lanell out front hears about how proud Joey would have been. So that's always something amazing to hear,” Brittany said. “It always makes my heart smile, because that's the one thing that we want.”

Joey’s pancake house serves up 60th anniversary celebration

Celebrate Joey’s Pancake House’s 60th anniversary. On Wednesday, June 24, the restaurant will extend its hours, serving breakfast from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.

There will be live music much of the day from the Rich Manz trio. In addition, there will be a raffle held every hour, as well as a pancake eating contest at 2 p.m. To enter the contest, send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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