Get ribs if you go to Dinosaur BBQ
Dinosaur Bar-B-Que is probably the one thing that's an easy bet to be overrated. Since it's a transplant from Syracuse, there's lots of 'Cuse alumni in the city that love to talk about how awesome Dinosaur BBQ is. That's the thing, New York City is pretty big and we've got a few fairly serious 'cue joints. And it's not always the best to trust someone's opinion on what is the best food if that person also belongs on a meal plan. When I first got out of the ripoff that is college (don't ever go to that private university in the village that's not an Ivy), I started working at this weird ass education company doing HTML. There was this guy, Jeff, who went to Syracuse, who loved to talk about Dinosaur BBQ. And this was back in 2004 around when they first opened a branch in Harlem and this guy would not shut up about it. I tried it a long ass time ago and really only found the chicken wings appetizer to be memorable. It's now fairly close to where I live, and it was time to try Dinosaur BBQ again.
And before going on about Dinosaur BBQ, I have to confess that I grew up eating ribs from Outback Steakhouse (not a real Steakhouse), and Chili's babyback ribs (probably not authentic ribs either). This means I grew up eating ribs that aren't super porky, and usually covered in a jammy concoction. I think it's safe to say that for the average American, barbecue is about the sauce, and not about the smoke.
Steph and I got some sausage and crackers for the appetizer. The idea was a good one. Kreuz Market sausages are available at Hill Country, and that was my reference point for sausages at a BBQ restaurant. While the taste of these sausages at Dinosaur BBQ are inoffensive, they were drier than they needed to be. Seriously, don't cut the sausage for the customers. We know how to cut things, that's why you gave us knives on the table, right? I woudn't mind ordering these thing, if you're craving sausages, although saving room for the BBQ is probably a good idea.
The pulled pork and brisket from Dinosaur BBQ is fairly tasty. I wouldn't categorize the brisket as the best in the city, since that title still belongs to Hill Country. It's respectable and the pulled pork is moist and has a hint of smokey smell to it. What Dinosaur might lack in knockout flavor, they make up for in super generous portions. For the amount of food and the quality and the price, it's a pretty good deal.
Half a rack of ribs shouldn't be too much and yet I wasn't able to finish all of it and my sides. Seriously, some folks order an entire rack. Twice as much ribs?! Crazy. I like the ribs the most out of all the things we ordered that day. It was tender and delicious, with the meat coming off of the bone fairly easily. It's not like the whole, "falling off the bone" business, which is not what you want anyway. I like these ribs and you totally don't need any sauce with these. So much for growing up on generic chain restaurant ribs; I still like the real thing.
This morning I checked my web hosting account. Apparently there's only a few dollars left on it. This means if I want to keep doing this shit, I gotta re-up my account. I know some of you out there who read this have web hosts as well. How much do y'all spend on hosting? Right now my plan is hitting me up for $20 per month with extra bandwidth that I'll never use. But they're switching to $10 per month but each gigabyte of transfer costs $0.18. Which means every month I'll only spend $10.18, since my traffic is pretty minimal. I'll probably buy into it again just to give the blog another year to breathe and more time to play around with developing one or two features.
Dinosaur Barbecue
700 W. 125th St.
New York, NY 10027
212-694-1777
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Pictures look awesome...also, nice to hear that you're sticking with the blog for at least another year. I'm sure I'm not alone on that, either.
Sherm
August 29, 2011 7:59 pm
dude, I know everyone thinks their wings are pretty dope, but I had them for like 2 years straight... and they're pretty weaksauce.
I've only ever gotten their ribs once. At Big Apple BBQ, but yeah, totally agree - ignore the wing hype and go ribs.
Nicholas
August 30, 2011 6:46 pm
Dude, I'm from Syracuse and I didn't think this place had a chance in hell of making it in big ole bad Apple! I must say, I'm still kinda amazed by it....
I like the brisket sandwich the best....
FN
August 31, 2011 7:19 am
I visited the one in Troy, NY. It's good stuff, but I'm not sure it was worth the 2 hour wait.
Rodzilla
August 31, 2011 7:44 am
@Sherm,
Thanks! Yea I'll give it one more year. Play around with some new features and see if they stick.
@Nicholas,
Oh really? Damn.. maybe my memory serves me wrong then. Although I gotta say, most of the BBQ places have a good reputation for wings. RUB has some nice wings too.
@FN,
oh wow from Syracuse huh? You know I was surprised by the brisket. It wasn't like Hill Country, but certain better than I expected.
@Rodzilla,
We went in the middle of the afternoon at like 1? There were plenty of tables in Harlem. There's no way I'd wait though... there's way too many BBQ places in NYC to wait for a particular one.
Danny
August 31, 2011 4:37 pm