The Charleyhorse Restaurant in Munster is open this weekend to capitalize on growing its customer base with Super Bowl XLIV on Sunday.

Operating manager Bryan Sord said he has finished hiring about 130 people for the restaurant, and he is excited about the Munster location's first weekend. Sord already operates Charleyhorse restaurants in New Lenox and Tinley Park, Ill., and steak and seafood restaurant 94 West in Orland Park, Ill.

Mark Corey, the town of Munster's chief building inspector, said the establishment passed inspections done earlier this week by the city's building and fire departments.

Sord said he entered into a six-year lease on the property after the prior tenant vacated the site in December. Tim Rasmussen of Chicago Restaurant Corp. operated Charlie's Ale House at that location from spring 2004 until it closed late last year.

Charleyhorse features sandwiches, steak, seafood, chicken and pasta entrees and a bar. More equipment and furnishings will be added to the establishment over the next few weeks, but Sord said the restaurant will feature a Sunday brunch and can soon host banquets and parties.

Sord said on Sunday there will be a buffet during half-time of the football game and former Chicago Blackhawks player Bobby Hull will sign autographs at the restaurant Feb. 21.

Sord declined to discuss the former business partnership announced with former Blackhawks player and coach Denis Savard but said they remain friends. The restaurant was originally planned to be Savard's Hall of Fame, but Savard pulled out of the deal.

Sord's son Nicholas was also supposed to have a management role with the establishment, but he was involved in a Dec. 31 car crash in unincorporated Cook County that left a passenger of his SUV dead.