BEERS by Bacon Brothers — Restaurant in Christchurch

Edit: posted this review 3 years ago but it was taken down, presumably to boost the restaurant rating. Perhaps this edit will restore the review?

Visited on Friday 14th Jan. Was sent a followup email to provide feedback to happinessmanager@baconbrothers.co.nz Emailed on the 18th of Jan and a month has passed with no reply, so I'm posting my email here

Thanks for the opportunity to provide feedback.

The great; Ribs, fried chicken, truffle butter mash - all excellent. Ribs were tender and flavorful, chicken coating was crispy with the meat still moist, mash was delicious and a surprisingly fluffy texture.

Service - all staff were really friendly, especially the maitre de, who was notably brilliant.

The not great; We arrived just before our booked time of 7:30, ordered some drinks, sat down at our table and ordered food at approx 7:45. Food was ready for pickup at 8:30. A 45 minute wait for food, most of which is cooked in advance, is peculiar.

When we started to eat, we immediately noticed that the fries were cold. Not lukewarm but legit stone cold. Advised the maitre de and he was very apologetic and brought over a plate of fresh fries very quickly.

Our mac and cheese had obviously been prepped some time before the rest of our food as it was cold and the pasta was really overcooked and mushy.

The bbq beans tasted nice, however these were also cold. There were some corn chips embedded in the beans, but the corners that were poked into the beans were soggy. To me this indicated that the beans were also prepped some time before the rest of our food.

I assume the brisket had been carved before the rest of our food and was left to dry out. The brisket was rather tough and was visibly dry. We had a cut of brisket point and flat, the point had no visible fat and the flat was cut with the grain, so while it may have been moist when initially cut, it was not by the time we got the food.

The maitre de checked in on us towards the end of our meal and I had a chat to him about these issues. He saw the sizable piece of brisket that we left on the tray and that it was cut with the grain, rather than across. He was very kind and apologetic and offered us a round of drinks on the house, however it was nearly 9pm, there was only 1 other table of customers and we didn't want to stay longer. He did say he would pass our concerns along to the kitchen.

Overall, this was a really sad experience. We have had plenty of friends who have been to BEERS and raved about the food. I assume we had an unusual visit, as I doubt anybody would be happy to pay over $100 to wait 45 minutes for food, and have 4 of their 9 dishes cold...

I had a dinner booking at 6pm Saturday 12th April under Breanna. I’ve loved ordering beers off uber eats numerous times so I was very excited to come in and have some food with friends and family for my 30th birthday. To say I was disappointed was an understatement, I was embarrassed I had organised to eat there. We had ordered around 6.05pm at around 7pm we were notified ribs were not available anymore but when we ordered they were, we asked where our food was as it had not come and we had children with us who were very hungry, we got no time. We sat there while we watched numerous uber eats orders go out (which appeared to be a priority and not the costumers in the restaurant) and other people come in and go having ordered and eaten their food. We got a round of drinks which we also missed out on some. The lack of communication regarding this was disappointing and it was very obvious once they had made the realisation our food was not ready or I’m guessing wasn’t even put into the system they panicked. Our food should not have taken this long especially when others were coming in and left before us. I’m sorry but recommending this place would not be something I did at the moment. I tried emailing about the issue with...

Pry me out with a shoehorn!!!

Desperate for some quality nosh, after a hell of a morning at the Racecourse, I stumbled across Beers by Bacon Brothers. Ok, I thought, it's by a garage, but I'll give it a shot...

On entry, I was instantly salivating at the amazing smells and smoke (!) wafting throughout.

Summary

Service: quick and friendly. Banter began almost immediately. Head chef happy to chat....buzzing with locals who obviously know there is no better place to go in the Garden City!

Beer selection: ridiculously good...a double porter, APA, and one of the better lagers I've tasted in a decade went perfectly with my burger. Heaven.

Food: it is exactly what you want with top notch beer. Burgers and home cut fries .... it was perfection and such a decent portion I wondered if I could finish.

But I did......

In short, if I hadn't needed to return to work (and I considered staying!) I would have worked my way through the entire menu - food and liquid refreshments - and the only way you would have got me to leave would have been to pry me out...