Chicago Rib Shack
Knightsbridge
London
This has to be the most difficult review I will do. I am one of the 80’s kids that spent every opportunity in the Chicago Rib Shack, Pizza Pie Factory or Chicago windy city. They were the ultimate in American Dining until the death of the owner Bob Payton, as with most businesses once the driving force is removed the dream often follows.
I went to the pre-launch a week before it opened in 2008 and was very disappointed with the food. The décor was very similar and the menus and bibs identical but it was lacking experience in the kitchen.
Since the re-launch there has been a change of management and kitchen staff with a new head chef, the staff were very courteous giving me a tour of the kitchen. Seeing the bank of Yieldkings looked promising, as most know these are commercial smoke and hold cookers made simple, some would say foolproof.
We ordered half rack of St Louis Ribs, a mixed platter which consisted of half rack of Babybacks, ¼ Chicken, very small pot of brisket & pulled pork, and of course an onion loaf.
The food was fairly well presented, and I immediately dug into the onion loaf, this was very disappointing at the pre-launch and they have improved it dramatically, there was not any grease evident when cutting into or eating it.
The St Louis ribs were a bit confusing, they were more like spares than St Louis and had been over cooked and lacked flavour. The chicken suffered from the same problem and was very dry.
The babybacks were good, succulent with a decent flavour. We noticed that all of the food lacked smoke in flavour and colour this was particularly noticeable on the brisket where you would expect to see a smoke ring, there was no evidence of this and to be honest the brisket should have been cooked for much longer, even the thinness of slices couldn’t hide the toughness of the meat. The BBQ sauce has a distinct oriental feel to it.
Once the lack of smoke was pointed out to the manager a call was made immediately to the engineer to find out what the problem was. The food was being cooked but without smoke unless this is a strange characteristic of the Yieldking, I have contacted them to find out.
I really love this restaurant, stick to the babybacks and onion loaf and you will have a good meal, I think they should drop the St Louis ribs from the menu especially if they cant improve on them. I will call them in a week or so and find out if the problem with the smokers has been fixed, knowing what to eat I want to go back………………………………...Toby