Critic's Review
This place closed a few months ago
Review 7/16/15
I've been meaning to try this location; for some reason I thought it was closer to Coral Springs, but it's not really that far. Just "around the corner" from the Broward Mall.
The place was pretty much dead empty at 2:30. This place is a full-scale restaurant, unlike their other location which is a Tom Jenkins like shack.
There's an awkward outside patio where I wouldn't want to eat when it was empty or packed. Just outside for the sake of being outside.
Inside it's dark and very Cowboyish, with heavy decorations and down-home music. I guess those things hanging are snow flakes? Or braille patterns?
Lots of booths and high tops; a full bar with TVs in another room.
The servers here a bunch of teenagers straight out of high school who don't quite fit the atmosphere. They also don't wear uniforms or big hats, which they probably appreciate. But it does kill the ambiance to some extent.
They have a big menu, much of which has little to do with BBQ. Their online menu is junk; do I really have to navigate to 12 different pages? In the computer biz, we call this "designed by an idiot", or more likely, designed by someone who doesn't eat out much.
In addition to the regular lunch menu, they have a few extra specials.
The reuben sounded interesting, but I wanted to try some of the straight BBQ. I ordered 2 lunches; 4 "St Louis" ribs and cole slaw to eat in, and brisket and baked beans to take home.
Music here is hard-core country: Thomas Rhett, "Night Train", Randy Houser. I wondered how the teenagers could stand it. I don't mind it at all.
It took 10 minutes for the food to come out, which seemed like a long time considering that everything is pre-cooked and there was only 1 other table.
Small ribs; I guess this is worth $7.49? The ribs had a nice color; I wasn't quite sure how I was supposed to get the sauce on the ribs. Was I supposed to pour it on? Dip the rib in the cup? They had a more practical squeeze bottle on the table, but the sauce was too sweet; I didn't want Karo syrup on the ribs.
On their own, the ribs lacked smoke and flavor. They had the right consistency, but more from water than fat, like when you boil or steam meat.
Not bad, but not really good either. The sauce in the cup was the way to go; good ribs don't need sauce.
The bread was just thick cut white bread with a brush of garlic butter; not worth the calories or the gluten.
The cole slaw was the best part of the plate; too much liquid but just the right sweetness and crunch.
It doesn't take long to eat 4 ribs. I expected bigger ribs; The ribs you get at BBQ King are like 3x this size.
I got my check and hit the road 35 minutes after my arrival.
When I got home, I opened up the take home. The beans come in a sturdy container.
Wow, these had to be the worst baked beans I ever had. The beans were too hard and it tasted like chili; loaded with cumin and not sweet at all. I wondered if they gave me the wrong side, but they don't have chili beans. It was like someone mistook the cumin for the brown sugar. How could this happen? Don't they TASTE the food before serving it?
The brisket was equally awful. Dry and tasteless, it was just gray meat.
Another slice of white bread. I tried to revive the meat by adding some moisture, but there was no taste in the meat at all. The meat was just too lean. Brisket without fat is just a lump of gray meat.
I'm glad as hell that I didn't get the brisket reuben.
Conclusion
I was utterly disappointed in this place. The first time I went to their other location I got terrible ribs; they were so salty that they were inedible. But the second time everything was good. Today, just about everything was bad.
My guess at what's happened here is that in their zeal to have a big restaurant with a bar they've lost their way in terms of making good BBQ. Their menu is unnecessarily large; do they really need Ropa Vieja or Po boys on a BBQ menu? The ideas are interesting, but if the meat doesn't taste good, then you just go somewhere else.
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