Woodpile BBQ — Restaurant in Madison Heights

Came here for the first time with my family after a friend of mine at work had let me taste their "burnt ends" and it was really good. We were excited to try something outside of the typical norm (pizza, chicken, burgers etc). However, was displeased with our experience and we drove about 20 minutes from home to try it. Spent $90 for a family of 4 to each have a meal and some sides. Our food was served with in 10 minutes, but with the expense of everything being cold or at best warm. I got the burnt ends, sweet mashed and Mac and cheese. The burnt ends were cold, the Mac and cheese and potatoes had spots of warm and cold which made me think they were just reheated. The burnt ends are good the first few bites and then became a little too much to finish like beef jerky. Also tasted like beef jerky. The sweet mash is missing some ingredients and needs some butter and brown sugar. My family all liked the Mac and cheese including the BBQ Mac which is probably their best dish. My fiance' got the pulled chicken sandwich which comes with coleslaw on it. Both the chicken and coleslaw was dry. He had to add BBQ sauce to it. The best things were the Mac and cheese, corn bread and banana pudding was really good. Which we added another $12 to our meal getting 2 banana puddings. For a meal over $100 plus tip...we expected more. Probably won't be back. The atmosphere is great with a nice vibe of logs and lights all around...seems perfect to come to for maybe a night out and a few drinks, but even on a Friday they close at 9pm. If their food isn't going to be great they sure are missing out on money closing so early for the adult crowd on the weekends. The guy that took our order and then served our food was really nice. This place has potential to be great if they upped the quality of food and utilized the nice space they have for later hours on weekends. Might swing by just for banana pudding and corn bread as that's really the only things good they have. We ate outside on the patio and it was nice. As soon as we entered the parking lot to get to our car...the parking lot was infested with gnats. They got all over us and our car. The whole way home we were swatting gnats off us that stuck to our clothes. Need to invest in some bug treatment for their...

It took me a minute to realize that Woodpile opened this second location. I thought they only had one, but I guess they now have two. So, good, because I was hungry for some barbeque!

It's set up like the other location but has what seems to be a lot more seating. I ordered the classic brisket sandwich because that's what I love the most. They chopped it for me, and since I was the only one in here, I got my food in no time.

The brisket was excellent and so was the service. But, the barbeque sauce wasn't good at all. I'm not a fan of vinegar BBQ sauce, so that one was out. Then, they had a smoky one and it tasted good, but not great. I couldn't place the taste, but it was familiar. Like Lawry's salt maybe? The other one was okay as well, but had more of a honey taste to it. They also had ketchup here too as well, which was surprising.

I ended up getting the tater tots as a side since I was kind of hungry. they were good. oh, another issue I had. No napkins on the table? for BBQ? Also, if you want a drink refill you have to go to the bar to get one, which I did.

The other thing. While the food and service here is fabulous, this place is crazy expensive. I don't know about the family platters, but the individual meals don't have any kind of combo incentive. Everything's ala carte here. Want a side? $3 to $4 at least. Plus, its a small upcharge for mac and cheese? For a drink, one side and a brisket sandwich I dropped $20 and change. That seems like a lot to me. While the BBQ is good, I also know that there's other places closer to home that charge less then these guys.

Overall a great experience and fabulous food. I would gladly return in the...

I could stay home and work less than I did for my dinner than I did eating at Woodpile.

We have ordered carryout from this location and the one in Clawson a few times and the food is always excellent. The ribs are so so good, as well as the Mac and cheese. We decided to dine in a few days ago and the experience was not great. Don’t get me wrong, the food was delicious. But they are clearly very short staffed. We arrived around 5:00 on a Saturday. The place wasn’t terribly busy but it seemed like the staff was very overwhelmed. We didn’t know that they don’t have table service, you need to order at the counter. That’s ok but we sat around trying to find someone to explain that to us for a while. Eventually we figured it out, got a table and I ordered. We ordered the feast for 4, a few lemonades for the kids and a sweet tea. My partner got the kids waters but he had to search the side stands for cups. Our food arrived fast and it looked great. However we couldn’t get plates, silverware, napkins, straws or our drinks. I hunted it all down myself with the help of the single bus person/ server I could find. The individual was lovely but there was one of them and a restaurant half full of patrons. On a Saturday.

This might be small and silly but I don’t love dining in at a place and finding they don’t offer fountain pop refills. My sweet tea ended up being a bottled variety and they didn’t offer me ice. I could have gotten some at the bar but that was another trip after I had already been all over the restaurant several times.

I will probably not be dining here again. It’s a lot to spend to get my...