| rev:text
| - This is going to be a really weird review for two reasons. The first and most important is that I do not like seafood. The second is that they have some really good wines in bottle, to which a few of those have been finished as of just an hour ago. Basically, this is a review based on "turf" and not much "surf", and plenty of booze. So here we go!
When first arriving it had more of a pub feel to the restaurant than a Red Lobster feel, which made me feel more at home and in my proper element. We were a group of 16, but within 5 minutes of being seated we all had drinks in front of us and were being told the specials. After reading over the menu, I went with their "3-course prix fixe" option where I chose coconut-crusted chicken tenders as the appetizer, Big Daddy's BBQ pork back ribs as the entrée, and the red velvet sweet treat cupcake as the dessert. On top of that I added the cajun-fried alligator to be adventurous on the free appetizer from joining their mailing list.
The first thing that was put in front of me very quickly was the alligator. I was kind of worried about giving it a try, but when I got the courage to take the first bite I was amazed. When it came out it looked kind of like small nuggets of breaded chicken, and that gave me a little bit of a push to actually eat it. I am very picky when it comes to food (as you might have read in my previous reviews), but I have been trying to broaden my horizons and try new things, and alligator is definitely something new. It had a taste that seems like a mix of popcorn shrimp and chicken, but with the consistency of a medium rare cooked steak that was breaded and deep fried. It was really good, to the point that I shared it with others at the table. Those who know me know that I DO NOT share my food, but this was so random and good that I had to. I was impressed already.
The coconut-crusted chicken tenders were not quite as good. They were not horrible, but they were no where near as tasty as the alligator had been. I tried the first one without the jalapeño & orange dipping sauce that came with it, just to give it a proper try. Because of how thin the chicken was, I tasted more toasted coconut than anything else. Also because of how thing the chicken was, the chicken itself was kind of dry with the skewering and deep frying process. It was not horrible by any means, but it is not something I would order again if there was something else on the menu that I thought could compare (like the popcorn shrimp).
The ribs were fall off the bone for sure! They were cooked perfectly and the meat was very good and quite lean. Back ribs are usually lean, but these were meaty with steal being very lean which you don't find so often. The sauce that was on the ribs was a little sub-par though. When eating the ribs I definitely knew I was at a seafood restaurant. Whether that is good or bad I will let you decide as it IS a seafood restaurant, but I was not impressed by it. Usually I love sweet potato fries, but this was the rare occasion when I wish I had ordered regular fries as they were soggy and even if cooked a little longer they still would have suffered by being underneath the moist ribs. The entrée was not as impressing as the appetizer was.
I am a sucker for dessert and have come to love red velvet cake. They instead went with the smaller red velvet in cupcake form. While the red velvet part of it was quite good, the icing to cake ratio was a little low for my liking. Red velvet cake is really good, but it is the icing that gives it that extra zip into really good, but this just didn't have what it took to get to that level. It was still a very moist cupcake, but it was small and lacking in too many ways to think of as excellent.
A couple of those in the group got the 7oz beef tenderloin steak that was on the feature menu, and their opinion was even though the size was quite small, the steak itself was amazing and full of flavour. I took a small bite and know what I will be ordering the next time I am at Big Daddy's. One of them also got the fries which were a whole lot better than the mushy sweet potato fries that I got with my meal. I didn't taste the garlic roasted red skin potatoes, but that does sound quite nice. Everyone else (and that is 16 of us in total which is very hard to please) really enjoyed their meals and it was a good experience by everyone.
The two waitresses that we did have serving us were really great and courteous, and our main girl was also very knowledgeable about the food and what was good on the menu. Overall it was a great experience and the ambiance of the place was really nice. I recommend not just the restaurant (even to people who don't like seafood) and the alligator, but also the Dancing Bull wine which exceeded my expectations and was a great recommendation from out main waitress. Big Daddy's Crabshack & Oyster Bar is somewhere that I will be returning too, even if I am not into creatures of the sea.
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)