My wife and I are always looking for restaurants that are reasonably priced and have good food. As 2006 winds down and 2007 begins I figured I would share some of the results we found while dining out in 2006. If you like this article, keep an eye out for other categories of restaurants we summarize. Overall, barbacue can be tricky to judge. These days if you want ribs you are look at somewhere between $15 and $20 for a full rack, and that is more than we wish to spend. Usually our entree choices range from sandwiches to small platters, and that is how we judged the restaurants we dined at in 2006.
#5: Red Hot And Blue (Annapolis, take Bay Dale Drive Exit off Route 50)- This restaurant does have a decent selection of platters between $8 and $14, but the best selections for price and taste are the sandwich platters. These come with fries which give you a chance to taste their variety of sauces (that is always a good idea to try sauces at a bbq restaurant). The sandwiches have plenty of meat, but I would also suggest trying the sausage and cheese appetizer plate.
#4: Hard Times (this is actually an honorary ranking , because the one location in the area in Columbia closed in late 2006): This would have been very close to #1 if it had still been in business. They had very good barbacue sandwiches and incredible chili (which is another qualifier for a good bbq restaurant in my book). They even had a dish where they would serve chili over cornbread which was a great lunch or dinner. While the Columbia location did close, anyone in the DC or Virginia areas there are some locations still in business in those areas in College Park and Northern VA.
#3: Texas Roadhouse (Pasadena off Mountain Road): It seems for BBQ the chain restaurants in the area don’t have a hard time entering the top 5. For those of you that have never been to Texas Roadhouse, one of the first things you’ll notice is the place is a mess, there are peanut shells all over the floor, and that’s how they like it! While eating your peanuts from the complimentary bucket on your table feel free to throw the shells on the floor. The other thing you will notice are their incredible rolls with the sweet butter that are free with your mean. A final thing you will notice here is the bargain prices. Other than the steaks themselves, pretty much everything is below $12. They have some decent bbq meat platters and sandwiches, as well as very good bbq chicken.
#2: Famous Dave’s(Annapolis, across from Annapolis Mall): Yes, another chain restaurant, but once again a chain restaurant with great prices for what you get. Each meal comes with corn bread, 2 large sides, and plenty of meat. The delicious sandwiches each come with one side. I encourage you to try the chili here at it’s very tasty and while not overly spicy, does have a bit of a kick as it builds up. Entrees generally will be below $10 and you can choose 2 different meats with some selections. If you are going as a group of 4 or more people check out their All American Feast.
#1: Adam’s Ribs (Edgewater, Eastport, and Severna Park): Actually this may sound odd, but for my #1 restaurant I encourage that you don’t even worry about dining in. The reason I rank them #1 is their pork BBQ. It is the best in the area (only better version I had was at Andy Nelson’s in Towson), very tender pieces of pork with a nice sweet sauce. You can also get sides of their sauce to top it off which is vinegar based in the carolina bbq tradition. Along with your BBQ (which comes by the pint or quart), go ahead and get their onion loaf, I’m sure you’ve had this at many chain restaurants before but they had it even before it became popular at the chains and do a nice job without it being overly greasy. A Quart of pork BBQ will run you $20, but that will easily get you 8-12 reasonably sized sandwiches out of it.
I hope this list will help the fellow bbq lovers in the area, people from out of town, or someone just looking to try a new restaurant. Keep an eye out for my review of Italian restaurants in the area that I will complete next!
