Bar and Grill Restaurants part II

In Part II of my post about bar and grill restaurants, I thought I would share how I feel about a few more restaurants in my neighborhood.

Outback is probably my favorite out of all of the bar and grill restaurants. I love their pork chops. Yummmmmmmmy. They are seasoned so well and then grilled to perfection. They also have hot wings which are fried chicken drummettes in spicy flour. These are served with blue cheese dressing which has big chucks of blue cheese in it. For my side item, I like the hot sweet potato with cinnamon sugar and butter. That is like a desert in itself. For the salad, I like a departure from the normal boring iceberg lettuce and tomato wedges. They have a blue cheese pecan salad that is served with a vinaigrette that complements all the salad's flavors. The only word for it is "AWESOME". It is a little expensive to eat here and that is probably why I spend most of my time fantasizing about the food instead of actually eating it. To order pork chop (half portion) sweet potato (as a side) and blue cheese salad will cost $15. I get take out so that I do not have to leave a tip. I think that spending that close to $20 on one meal for one person is a bit much (especially since we are in a recession).

Fatz Café has calabash chicken (their version of chicken strips) and a great cobb salad. I do not have a lot to say about Fatz because I have not been there in a while. The reason is this. I love bread and they are the only restaurant that consistently served bread that is very greasy. They have these little poppy seed rolls that are apparently deep fried. It is not that I am against deep frying anything (I love it) but I think the people at the Fatz in my neighborhood do not understand when they are supposed to take the rolls out of the fryer. When the bread soaks up that much grease, it goes from yummy to yucky quicker than a Lamborghini at a drag race.

Appleby's used to be the place for me to go every weekend for a great salad. I suppose that new management of the restaurant chain decided that they needed to update Appleby's image and try a barrage of different ideas. That resulted in new menus that tossed out all that used to work and added food items that were blasé. For example, they introduced pasta bowls. Ummmm, no. Why pay $10 for a bowl spaghetti with teriyaki sauce when the local Chinese restaurant does it 10 times better? The good thing for me is that they did not lose the blackened chicken salad. It is a salad with tomatoes, boiled egg, cheese, and grilled chicken. The bad thing is that every time I go to Appleby's I have to search the updated menu to find the salad before I can order. I do not like the garlic bread that serve with the salad. They used to give plain bread and that was fine with me. But now...I suppose that is a plate enhancement. And as for the riblets, they still serve those but I do not think they are a good as they used to be. Once I did try the spinach-shrimp salad they have on the menu. The garlic from the salad stayed on my breath through numerous peppermints and a tooth brushing. I like to enjoy my food but I do not want it to stay with me for so long after I eat.