JimDantin wrote:Just a reminder - we're looking for restaurants with CONSISTENT QUALITY ribs. I want to hear about actual experiences, not just a list of what SHOULD BE a good source.
All of the restaurants named are certainly CAPABLE of excellent product. I have actually had ribs from almost all of them. (OK, I have a rib problem. Let's not go there!
). The issue is the high number of times that I get BAD ribs.
This isn't KCBS contest judging where I pretty much expect to get a mix of quality. These are restaurants - I should be able to get very consistent product each time I visit -- not very good ribs one time and over-salted jerky the next time.
Actually Jim, this is where I feel you're incorrect. It's actually much more challenging to put out consistent quality BBQ for the entire span of time that a restaurant is open during the day (without running out) than to cook a product once to a time that is previously specified.
We (restaurants) walk a tight rope every day between making too much and too little product and if something doesn't sell by the end of the day we're basically looking at a total loss (just for reference an entire rack of ribs wholesale, not including time/rub/brines/wood for the smoker/water/employee labor cost/energy costs storing the product prior to cooking/etc is costing us about $5-6. So if we have to throw away 10 racks at the end of the night we're out a solid $50, not including all of those other costs, and heaven help us if we run out of ribs before the end of the night as we've now ruined the nights of X number of patrons. It's a lose lose situation realistically for us, but we do it because we enjoy providing quality food to people at a fair price.
Now we're making X number of ribs a night (don't forget this isn't something that we can make in 30 mins; we brine our ribs for 24 hours, and rub them before they ever see the smoker) that are going to be ready at 5pm so that we can hopefully sell them until close (unless some guy calls in an order for XX racks in which case everyone else is screwed). But if you happen to be the last guy in getting your ribs at 9pm, they've been sitting hot for four hours waiting to be sold and they're definitely not going to be as good as the ribs that were coming out earlier.
Then of course there is user error, smoker was running too hot, ribs were held too hot, ribs were ordered for take out and waited for 30-45 minutes for the person to come pick them up, etc etc. We try to control this on our end as much as possible, but there are still working within the confines of what we have available and when people want to come in and order food from us.
Now if you've had inconsistent ribs from us I apologize and I would love to have you back in to give us another shot, on me.
Derrick Dones wrote:Give Feast a try...they are doing good stuff there. One recommendation for Feast, since I know Ryan Rogers posts here, please get a high-chair / child seat...the whole family likes Q, even our 17 month old son. DD
Hi Derrick, thank you for the kind words, unfortunately we don't have the space to keep a high-chair/booster seat as we're bursting at the seams already, but if you have one feel free to bring it in with you.