One & Only BBQ — Restaurant in Memphis

Fabulous bbq alert! Possibly a new favorite for me and the family, especially in terms of just the meat.

We wanted to get a bbq fix before we left Memphis. On our last few visits, our usual spot really let us down in terms of quality. So I decided we'd try somewhere new. One & Only was open on Sunday, had great reviews, and wasn't too far, so off we went!

We found it in the same area as Milk, which is a nearby dessert bar I'd visited the day before. As such, parking is a little limited, but we found a spot easily enough. The inside of the restaurant is pretty cramped -- mostly to go orders -- but there are a few small two and four-tops so we settled in.

Service was lovely! All the staff was very friendly and sweet. Our food came out quickly enough too.

My parents split a pulled pork sandwich and loaded potato salad. Hubs got the ribs (dry rub, but added a dab of sauce at the table) with baked beans and fries. I got the pulled pork dinner with fries and mac and cheese. The dinners come with a piece of garlic toast, too. The sweet tea I had to drink was yummy!

On to the food --

Barbeque, across the board, was excellent. Best I've had in a long time! Hubs gave his ribs a 4.5/5 and said they were some of the best he'd had. My parents and I were both wowed and overjoyed at the flavor and texture of the pork. It was tender but not mushy/falling apart, and was remarkably tasty for how lean it was. This is maybe my perfect bbq pork -- I don't like a lot of gristle / fat, but it can be hard to get a lot of flavor without it. One & Only delivered. I liked all three of their bbq sauces but the spicy was my favorite -- great balance of sweet with a little twinge of heat.

The sides are the only reason this isn't quite a 5 star for me. The fries, while hot and crispy, needed salt or seasoning. And the macaroni and cheese was super ordinary.

WHEN I come again, I'll get something else on the side. Like....the twice baked potato salad! Not usually a potato salad fan but holy cow this one was amazing. My parents definitely out bought me there. Hubs agreed with me about the fries but said the baked beans were pretty good! There's pork in them, so be aware.

Oh, and the garlic toast was delicious! Super buttery and garlicky.

They have a dessert cooler with pies and banana pudding which was sorely tempting but we were too stuffed to go there.

Overall, a 4.5 out of 5 for me. We'll be back next time...

We were driving home to MN passing thru Memphis and we really wanted to try a good local BBQ joint. After googling we wanted to give One & Only a try. Only prob is GPS has us getting there at 945 and they closed at 10. I work at a restaurant and know how annoying it can be if you're slow, ready to go and a big family of 8 walks in at closing time. I didn't want to be those people, so I called ahead of time and they were very kind and said as long as we're there and ordering by 10 we'd be just fine. When we got there, it definitely wasn't what I was expecting, it was a small, cozy little establishment. Eric was our server, and he took excellent care of us! Super nice guy, chatted with us, joked with our boys, never made us feel hurried or rushed, and gave great recommendations. We ended up with the half rack of ribs with 3 meat combo (pulled pork, brisket, and smoked turkey) with sides of BBQ baked beans, loaded potato salad and FF. My boys all got the pulled pork sandwich kids meals. They said it was the best dinner they'd had all vacation! I couldn't believe how delicious EVERYTHING was. The dry rub ribs were so flavorful, tender. The brisket was my fav....the flavor was outta this world. Only think I would have changed would be how it was sliced....they had it sliced super thin. I just prefer a thicker slice.....seems more meaty that way. I normally am not a huge pork fan, usually just don't care for the flavor of it. But this pulled pork was really so delicious! I ended up eating the rest of the pieces that fell off the kids's sandwiches. The turkey was probably my least favorite, but it was still really good, just didn't even compared to the brisket. The sides were also fabulous! The BBQ baked beans were just as good if not better than the meat, and I'm not a big baked bean fan. The loaded potato salad was a perfect complement. I thought for sure we had ordered way too much food, but everything was pretty much licked clean! Thank you Eric for the Fantastic service and wonderful dinner in Memphis! Side note.....we ended up trying Central BBQ the next day, and afterwards wished we had just gone back...

I waited about 40 min total for my order from the time I placed it, which is inconvenient, but I get it. Then once I got home and unpacked everything, I realized I was missing a piece of cake and side order. One of the sandwiches was also made wrong. No big deal, I'll just let them know and drop by to get the two missing items.

However, once I drove back to the restaurant and told them what I was missing, the white lady in the kitchen yelled out front that I should've 'checked under the wax paper' for the potato salad. I said I did. When she brought the food to the counter, she said again (condescendingly, in my opinion) that the potato salad was 'definitely' under the wax paper. I asked if the cake was under the paper too, and she said she hadn't said anything about the cake. Yeah, that's true. No "sorry" or "my bad" of any sort. Just focused on pushing the blame off on me as if I wanted to have to drive back up there.

The best part was that once I finally had everything (minus the corrections to the sandwich, which I didn't even bother mentioning), I got halfway through the $6 slice of WHITE cake before finding a blob of something green in the middle of the cake. For the sake of my sanity, I'm pretending it was somehow unmixed green food coloring (in a white cake) that I ate, but I know what mold looks like. 🤮

I wouldn't have even cared about any of this if this lady hadn't been rude. The food is good, but not good enough to spend money on this kind of experience. I should note that out of 3 orders I've placed here, 2 of them had missing food. The first time it happened the man at the counter was extremely nice and it didn't...