Pappas lifts barbecue up, up, upscale
Crab-and-smoked-brisket cakes sounded so preposterous, lurking at the tail end of the appetizers section of the menu at Pappas Delta Blues Smokehouse, that I knew I had to order them. Would they turn out to be surf-and-turf gone off the rails? Would I regret forking over $18.95 for three of them?
Well, no. A trio of crisply crumbed orbs appeared on my table, somewhere between the size of a golf ball and
a tennis ball. Each wore a cap of remoulade on top and vivid, rusty-red ribbons of “Carolina butter sauce” unfurling on all sides.
Inside lay dewy lump crab meat meshed ever so lightly with shreds of smoked beef. Land and sea didn’t cancel each other out; they sang a subtle, unexpected song together. My friend and I ended up fighting over the last cake.
That was just one of the pleasant surprises at the Pappas family’s fancy new Southern smokehouse operation on the Gulf Freeway in Webster. After only two and a half months, the Bay Area has embraced the full-service, upscale barbecue idea. I’ve never visited when it wasn’t full or beyond bursting, and one recent frigid winter night, with an hour wait, people had filtered out of the thronged foyer to the well-appointed porch.
Out there, clouds of meat-fatty wood smoke signaled to the Texas barbecue receptors in my head. But inside, an enormous full-service dining room and a bustling cocktail, wine and beer bar flouted my notions of the barbecue experience. Sitting at the bar — the liveliest seats in the house, and the easiest to grab — with classic blues chugging on the sound system, I couldn’t even tell where the barbecue was coming from.
That’s the disorienting part of upscale barbecue. Full service takes away the slow, anticipatory view of the meat and the people who cook it and weigh it and slice it. You trade those sensory, hands-on experiences for the creature comforts of broad cushy booths, sophisticated cocktails, even a wine list fine-tuned to smoked meats.
Though I never want to forswear the up-close, participatory joys of going through the self-serve line at my favorite barbecue joints, I really enjoyed what the Pappas family has achieved with its latest project.
The place looks great, in a neon-clad, new-OldSchool fashion, where even the reclaimed wood and the carefully lettered blackboard menus appear improbably burnished. The restaurant is very well run, with attentive and intelligent service, another family hallmark. The bar is more ambitious than it has to be, whether you choose an expertly balanced cocktail designed by Matt Tanner, a local beer on tap or a sturdy red Rhone. There’s even a serious selection of whiskeys.
And the food is remarkably consistent. When the Pappas family announced the initiative to up its barbecue game, at its modest self-serve restaurants all around town and at the upstart Delta Blues Smokehouse concept, I was a little skeptical. The barbecue spots had always been serviceable but unthrilling, and I wondered if the Pappas group’s executive chef, Michael Velardi, could work with the veteran ’cue guys to lift the product to the standards of the city’s recent barbecue renaissance, from rubs to smoking techniques to meat quality to sides to sauces and beyond.
Well, guess what? I can already taste the difference at my local Pappas Bar-B-Q in Gulfgate. And the offerings at Delta Blues Smokehouse can be first-rate. I admired the tenderness and softly delicious bark of the hefty St. Louis-style ribs, neatly trimmed and not too sweet. The rubbley, aggressively salted and peppered bark of the USDA Prime (!) brisket made my preferred fatty-end slices superior stuff, although I found the leaner slices a whisper too dry.
Pulled pork on a wildly festive heap of nachos burst with mellow smoke flavor. And every element of the dish clicked, from molten queso to pickled jalapeño, sweet/ smoky barbecue sauce to marinated red onion. The chips at the base were made from flour tortillas, and they were a graceful, crackly expression of this tricky genre.
Want to snack and watch football in the bar, with its many big screens? Order the so-called Sunday’s Deviled Eggs, crowned with crispy nuggets of pork belly and served with some tart Crystal hot sauce to add at will.
If you’d rather eat less and spend less than on the pricey barbecue-tray and major entree side of the menu, there are some excellent sandwich options. I loved the juicy smoked-chicken Hen House sandwich hiding a cache of pimento cheese, right down to its exhilarating mustard barbecue sauce (a fine new addi- tion to the stable) and its poufy, butter-grilled buns. (They are made inhouse, and they taste it.)
I might have liked the pulled-pork and pork belly sandwich just as much, had the meats not been served nearly cold — a rare and puzzling misstep. As it was, the tower of meats, slaw and onions lost its impact. Not so for the Prime Burger, a double-meat, double-cheese stack of house-ground brisket and chuck, all crowned with zippy Alabama-style white barbecue sauce, which has a mayonnaise base.
You can order a burger here with various barbecue add-ons, but the basic model is a soul-satisfying attraction in and of itself. The Pappas’s trademark fresh-cut fries, cut thick and sturdy, come with it for $14.95. It’s so good I didn’t blink at the price tag.
So are many of the sides, although they are served in tureen like mini boats that never seem to hold quite enough. Super creamy corn pudding; lively potato salad; a very fresh-tasting poppy-seeded slaw; and magnificent braised collards with buttery turnips folded in … Please, sir, may I have some more?
I will admit to being taken aback that I had to order a side of mashed potatoes with my $27.95 chicken-fried rib-eye and that I was underwhelmed by the low-key peppercorn cream gravy. More of a thrill was a gangly long-bone pork chop from Snake River Farms, full of flavor and soft pink inside from its turn on the grill. It’s a lovely piece of meat, but the handful of crunchy grilled onions lifting the chop from its sizzling iron platter seem more like an afterthought than a vital touch.
For the non carnivorous, there’s a trio of fish dishes, including a spicy, meticulously cooked Mississippi catfish fillet that puts the “black” back in “blackened.” I was puzzled initially by the Delta theme, when a Texas orientation would seem more specific, but I ended up enjoying the distinctive Deep Southern touches, right down to the herbaceous Fennel Gimlet that seems made for sipping on a screened back porch.
Or, for that matter, inside a jam-packed urban barbecue restaurant in the company of patently happy Bay Area diners who can’t seem to stop exclaiming about the food and drink. “Best burger ever!” “Can you believe the size of that beef rib?” “You’ve got to try this pecan cobbler, it’s like a piece of pecan pie squashed into a glass with chocolate syrup and the best vanilla ice cream!”
Those were just a few of the unsolicited testimonials I heard from my fellow diners. That’s the sound of a hit.