Baumhower's Victory Grille — Restaurant in Foley

I haven't eaten at a Baumhower's since they had a location at the Wharf in OB years ago. I wasn't impressed back then and I'm only slightly more impressed now.

The good things up front: I liked the friendliness and pace of service, and thought the interior was nicely done up. It's much bigger on the inside than it looks from the exterior, and there's a decent sized bar along with many tables and booths for diners.

The food was a real mixed bag, however. The Bam Bam Chicken I ordered was a large, tender boneless fried chicken breast drizzled in a sweet and spicy Thai chili sauce. It was a good-sized portion! It came with broccoli (meh) and wild rice (nutty and tender).

One of my dining companions tried the grilled fish tacos and they were very standard. Neither bad nor good, they simply existed. The other diner tried one of the Naan bread series, the pot roast Philly. It got a thumbs up for tender beef and a pillowy warm naan bread.

Both the Naan and tacos were served with curly-q fries and they were universally panned by everyone. Soggy, limp, lacking in any kind of flavor other than fryer grease and sadness. Had they been warm and crispy and a little more salty they would have gone over a lot better. I got an extra side of sweet potato fries, and they weren't any better. They were also limp and soggy and lacking in any real seasoning. A good sweet potato fry, to me, needs to be salty, sugary and maybe with a nice dusting of cinnamon. This didn't have any of that! It did, however, come with a dipping cup of the sweet Thai chili sauce that was on my Bam Bam Chicken, and it went surprisingly not badly with the sweet potato fries.

Also disappointing was the sweet tea. Clearly Baumhower's wants you to get hammered on booze but they should at least still make an effort to make decent southern sweet tea. This might've had a single grain of sugar across the entire urn. Weak and pathetic.

Overall, I liked the main events a lot better than the sides. If the sides were better this would be an easy recommendation, because everything else was pretty good. Even the prices are competitive in this post-pandemic inflated world.

Since I don't drink, I can't comment on how it fares as an actual sports bar, but for food it's decidedly...

I went here about a week or two ago.

The portions on the appetizers were fantastic. Since the appetizers at the time were 2 for 1 we thought, "hell, why not?" Turns out you get an absolutely enormous basket that seriously took up like a third of the table LOL. I really liked the salsa that they have. It has little chopped up pieces of fresh tomatoes mixed in and it's a nice take on it.

The sauce selection was supreme. The white bbq and spicy Asian sauces (can't remember the names) were very enjoyable with our like curly fry nacho plate. A little weird that the sweet potato fries I had with my main meal came with even more of that Asian sauce which made me feel bad for asking for it since it was kinda wasteful bringing out a second cup of it.

It's usually a coin flip when a restaurant asks you how you want your meat cooked but that day I was feeling frisky so I asked for it how I like it, a solid medium. Normally places won't cook hamburger that low but they did and they did it well! Not as in well done but as in hot damn it was a hot juicy pink and I loved every second of it. Whoever was cooking that day struck a home run.

On another note, since most places will go with a brioche bun, I actually find it quite boring. So color me surprised when they came out with a different bun! Unfortunately I'm dumb and can't tell you the name just from eating it but I'll take anything good that's not brioche just to mix it up. Reminds me of a really good food truck in Utah called Burger Pioneer. Can't recommend it enough. Hopefully they're still open...

Anyways a solid 9.5/10 go eat here and hopefully you'll get the same...

The options for food were slim, but we saw the reviews for Baumhower's and figured we'd give it a try. The reviews were right! The service was exceptional from the moment you stepped through the door. Mr. Bertram was so kind and patient with my toddler who was in a mood, and he made me feel much better walking in (grumpy toddlers cause anxiety in public spaces). He made sure my dude was equipped with colors and fruit loops til he burst. His warmth was palpable and sincere. He never stopped smiling. Our server was Aaron, and I don't know that I've ever had such attentive service in a restaurant before. He checked on us multiple times and apologized for food being late, even though we had literally just ordered. He was on his game and so incredibly sweet. He didn't judge me for my pickiness and made sure the order came out just right.

The food came out insanely fast (for us and those around us), which you would think would make it mediocre, but it wasn't! Those fries were absolutely PERFECT. Like golden and crispy and just so good. It's hard to get a perfect fry like that. And the wings were just as well done. Throughout the whole visit I noticed a manager checking in on tables, and as soon as our food came out, he was right there to check on us, too. Overall it was an amazing experience, and I...