Sampled 10/21/17
A band I enjoy was supposed to be playing this place tonight so I took the 40 minute trip down to Mansfield to check out the Q and hear some tunes. This place opened May 6 and is set up like a central Texas BBQ joint or similar to Hard 8 which has several locations in North Texas. You enter through the pit room and order off a warming pit.
The pits that do the real work are off to the side in the same open air building.
They have a large selection of meats to choose from, but I stuck with brisket, sausage, and pork ribs.
I also added some big armadillo eggs (peppers stuffed with cheese and wrapped in bacon) and some Texas fries.
I got through the line pretty quickly and moved out to the bar area which is where the live music was taking place. My fries and armadillo eggs were delivered hot and crispy to my table and I grabbed some of their complimentary pinto beans by the drink counter. Unfortunately, my food photo was a bit messed up as I dumped half my cup of beans on the ribs while trying to set up for a photo.
I won't say this was the worst BBQ meal I have ever had, but it was right up there. If you look at that brisket it looks great. However it failed the pull apart test in a major way. I literally could not pull the brisket slice apart with my bare hands. I sort of had to gnaw on it like a stick of beef jerky. There was zero smoke flavor and the fat was un-rendered chewy rubber. Yikes. Next I tried the ribs and they were a little more tender, but only just so. Again I had to gnaw the meat off the bone. There was no smoke flavor but there was a bit of bitterness which might have been from some slightly green mesquite smoke or maybe from some spice combination I could not recognize. They were also very dry, even though I had dumped bean juice on them. The sausage was very average fine ground with tough casing that needed removal before swallowing.
The highlights of the meal were the french fries and the pinto beans.
Despite the shortcomings of my meal they were doing a great business and there were more people in the bar than in the main dining room. The band I drove down to see never showed up and I did not wait around for them. Maybe they had stopped to eat some dinner elsewhere before the gig.
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