Barn Burner Texas BBQ

Barn Burner Texas BBQ
1000 S Fair Oaks Ave

Pasadena, CA 91105

-

Almost all of my friends whose opinions on barbecue I respect dislike Barn Burner. They claim the food is below-average and overpriced and the service is lousy. The first time I went there, I wondered what restaurant they were talking about. The waiter was really nice and my pulled pork sandwich was incredibly good. The slaw was great and the sauce, while much too sweet, was pretty good when mixed with some mustard. And the whole thing cost about ten bucks. I really liked the place, with the exception of the over-the-top Texas decor. (But at least there weren't flies buzzing around, unlike another Texas BBQ joint.)

-

So I went back a couple months later. Now I see what my friends were talking about. I waited about twenty minutes to see a waiter, even though I was constantly told by three people it would be "just one minute." I got a full order of ribs, the order cost about 30 bucks, and not one of the ribs was edible. They were full of fat and yet very dry. Not a good combination for ribs.

-

Barn Burner is owned by the same people who own the Pasadena El Cholo, which explains a lot. I used to live a couple blocks from the El Cholo on Western and I really liked it. (Of course, that probably had something to do with the fact that my friends and I used to watch Lakers games there back when the Lakers were the best team in basketball and didn't blow 21 point leads at home in the NBA Finals.) I never liked the Pasadena location very much. It never seemed very friendly. After my last visit to Barn Burner I see a lot of similiarites.

Alex Bar-B-Q (Shell Beach)

Alex Bar-B-Q
853 Shell Beach Road
Shell Beach California

I first ate at Alex about a dozen years ago, but I didn't have barbecue. Those were my teenage years when I mostly ate chicken fingers and fried cheese (and still only carried 150 pounds on my 6'2" frame, dammit) and barbecue was far too fancy a cuisine for me.

But not long ago I was on my way up to Monterey and I figured why not stop in and try their barbecue. The smell of oak smoke in the parking lot was amazing, although when I walked in there were only about three tables occupied, all with much older people. Of course, this was about 2 PM, so they might have been eating dinner.

I had the pulled pork sandwich with fries and slaw. I prefer shoestring fries to steak fries, because usually steak fries aren't cooked long enough. But these were done perfectly and were some of the best I've ever had. The slaw tasted like it came out of a Smart & Final container, but that's never a big deal. The pulled pork was very good. I had been suspicious when the menu claimed it came with a chipotle barbecue sauce. I love chipotle, but seriously? If you're so proud of your "oak smoked" meat, why would you put a flavored sauce on it? But... it was damn good. I actually got a side of it for my fries.

I used to frequently stop at a seafood restaurant in Pismo Beach whenever I drove up or down the coast, but over the years I have watched the prices at this particular restaurant go way up and the portions go way down (anyone who knows Pismo Beach knows exactly where I am talking about.) From now on I think I will make Alex Bar-B-Q my lunch stop.

Frank & Joe's Southern Smokehouse

Frank & Joe's Southern Smokehouse (Closed)
110 E Colorado Blvd
Monrovia, CA 91016

Frank & Joe's has been closed for some time now, and that's too bad... but not necessarily for culinary reasons. The place was attractive - full of Southern memorabilia. The owners were extremely nice, always shaking hands and asking how you were doing. And they always had plenty of ice cold bottles of Turbodog.

However, the food was very inconsistent. Sometimes the crawfish corn chowder was as good as any chowder I have ever had; sometimes it tasted like old corn in spoiled milk. Sometimes the fried catfish was reminiscent of the food stands at JazzFest; sometimes it tasted like the original KFC popcorn chicken (i.e. fried chicken skin.) And sometimes - usually, in fact - the pulled pork sandwich was like the one here: not much pork, too much lettuce, and all of it swimming in one of two barbecue sauces: either the much-too-sweet sauce or the "smoky" version that tasted like straight liquid smoke.

Still, sometimes the food could be pretty good, and as I said, it was a nice place to spend a hot summer afternoon watching baseball and drinking beer. There was a rumor they were trying to reopen somewhere, and if they do I will go back. But I doubt I will ever get the pulled pork sandwich again.

Dallas BBQ (New York City)

Dallas BBQ
1265 3rd Avenue
New York, NY 10021

Several years ago my friend lived by a liquor store in Venice Beach. One night we ran out of beer and headed over there just before closing. The only other customer in the place was an obviously homeless, deranged man who was lecturing about God to a bag of Funyuns. My friend and I were trying to decide what to buy (as if it made a difference at that point) and my friend made a comment about Steel Reserve, something along the lines of "that's supposed to be terrible."

At that point the bum interrupted his sermon and turned to us and said "Oh man, don't get Steel Reserve. That shit make you crazy!"

So we bought a can, and, indeed, it was the most foul thing I have ever tasted.

I thought of this story after eating at Dallas BBQ. I had wanted to eat at Blue Smoke, but the wait was about two hours and I was hungry. So my friend and I got in a cab and asked the driver to take us to a barbecue place. This is where he took us, and, after I paid him, he added (not too helpfully) "But you probably don't want to eat here, it'll make you sick to your stomach." And indeed it did.

To be fair, as soon as we saw the food we should have left. My pulled pork was a disgusting looking mess, served on a bun about four inches thick. My friend's ribs were drowning in a nasty sauce. I don't know how anyone can serve food like this to customers.

So from now on, I will always listen to deranged men on matters of malt liquor and cab drivers on barbecue.

Rogue Distillery & Public House (Portland)

Rogue Distillery & Public House

1339 NW Flanders

Portland, OR 97209
-

After the amazing sandwich I had at the Deschutes restaurant, I figured I should try Rogue. (I have never liked Rogue beers as much as Dechutes, but it is still beer.) This pulled pork sandwich was more like what I'm used to getting at brewpubs. It was pork already mixed with sugary barbecue sauce, taken out of a container, microwaved and served to me. (I have heard this referred to as "crockpot barbecue.") It was terrible.

-

I still enjoyed the place, though, because 1) my friend and I started with an appetizer of popcorn shrimp that was fantastic, and 2) the waiter gave us free beer. That's really all it takes for me.

-

They also have an appetizer called "Kobe Blue Balls" - balls of kobe beef with blue cheese. It sounded great and my friend assured me it was delicious, but there was just no way in hell I could bring myself to ask for an order of Kobe blue balls.