Ben Milano
TVWBB Member
I live on Long Island and the Emeril's 2004 BBQ Sauce Winner opened a restaurant - kinda.
It is not a restaurant per se, it is more of, what you real Southerner's would call a BBQ joint except he serves more than ribs and the winner actually doesn't own the place.
Jessie's Lip Smackin' Roadhouse opened a few months ago to great fanfare with write-ups in the local paper as well as Newsday; both very good reviews. The place is a bar with about 10-12 tables in back and several booths in front. Oh yeah, they have live music (blues, Soul, R & B) 7 nights per week.
Jessie made the sauce and a few other guys had the cash to open the place. Jesse actually lives in Florida and has nothing to do with the place except in name.
Since I will be eating pounds of pork this weekend I decided on the famous, winning chicken and sauce dish. In a nutshell, it is NOT BBQ by any definition. It is baked chicken with BBQ sauce on top. Any home cook can work this stuff up in about 10 minutes. The sauce was nothing special at all, I have made much better. It tasted like the sauce at a local chain called The Spare Rib. The only truly unique part of the meal was the cornbread whcih had a touch of sauce on top but had garlic in the batter - unusal and not half bad at that. The service was very friendly, albeit it took awhile to get our food. The owner stopped by to say hello and chat things up a bit; seemed like a nice guy.
Total for two meals, two glasses of wine and two sodas came to $47.00. Now here in NY we consider that moderate. But from now on if I want to go out to get real BBQ I'll go out to my deck
It is not a restaurant per se, it is more of, what you real Southerner's would call a BBQ joint except he serves more than ribs and the winner actually doesn't own the place.
Jessie's Lip Smackin' Roadhouse opened a few months ago to great fanfare with write-ups in the local paper as well as Newsday; both very good reviews. The place is a bar with about 10-12 tables in back and several booths in front. Oh yeah, they have live music (blues, Soul, R & B) 7 nights per week.
Jessie made the sauce and a few other guys had the cash to open the place. Jesse actually lives in Florida and has nothing to do with the place except in name.
Since I will be eating pounds of pork this weekend I decided on the famous, winning chicken and sauce dish. In a nutshell, it is NOT BBQ by any definition. It is baked chicken with BBQ sauce on top. Any home cook can work this stuff up in about 10 minutes. The sauce was nothing special at all, I have made much better. It tasted like the sauce at a local chain called The Spare Rib. The only truly unique part of the meal was the cornbread whcih had a touch of sauce on top but had garlic in the batter - unusal and not half bad at that. The service was very friendly, albeit it took awhile to get our food. The owner stopped by to say hello and chat things up a bit; seemed like a nice guy.
Total for two meals, two glasses of wine and two sodas came to $47.00. Now here in NY we consider that moderate. But from now on if I want to go out to get real BBQ I'll go out to my deck