City Barbeque — Restaurant in Northfield Township

I deliberately waited a week after the official launch to try this place It's still a work in progress

I ordered the More Cowbell sandwich with mac & cheese and hush puppies. I ordered the sandwich because it was featured and I remembered an article saying something cool would happen if you ordered it (employees yelling "More Cowbell!" perhaps?)

There were a couple easily remedied misfires. The employee assembling my order let the Mac & Cheese sit on the counter sans heat lamp for 3 minutes while the sandwich was made. I was called and given a number to wait on my hush puppies.

Having worked fast food before, I have a solid notion of how long it takes a deep fryer to make my food extracalorific and 5 minutes beyond when I was given my tray with the now lukewarm Mac & Cheese is too long. Total time to receive my complete order was 14 minutes

Then we turn our attention to the dining room which was in bad shape after a dinner rush battering. Much of the blame rests on my fellow customers who couldn't be bothered to bus their tables despite the self-bussing stations. This left many tables covered with trays and trash.

To their credit, management deployed a SWAT team to tidy up while I was eating with direct sunlight burning my retinas. Suggestion box item - sun shades.

Drinks are Pepsi products and some bottled stuff that I honestly don't remember. The chocolate cake looked good, but I'm a sort of good Weight Watchers member, so I passed tonight.

There are a bazillion or so sauces to pick from I went with medium heat from a sauce who's name escapes me now (Brimstone?) There's something there to fit whatever your mood from sweet to extreme heat.

The sandwich was good. Not spectacular,, but good. The star was the hush puppies because, as I've noted elsewhere, you can almost never go wrong deep frying things. Plus, they were the freshest item as I waited until my order was complete to strap on the feedbag.

Bathroom was clean and well stocked; a sign that management has its priorities in line.

Like other Deerfield restaurants it'll be interesting to see what happens when school is back in session and they're forced to make do with a tight labor pool. Tonight, though, there were plenty of people working the store They just weren't as effective as they could have been. I'll chalk it up to still getting their sea legs under them.

ETA (2 weeks after initial review): Coupons arrived in the mail early this week. Friday night wait to order and get food was abysmal. Stella still hasn't...

I'm a BBQ connoisseur & a passionate BBQ cook.

I've been to City BBQ twice this week. I've had the brisket, ribs, pork, and sausage. Many of the sides. The skinny is this: This is by far the best fast casual BBQ I've had in Chicagoland. There are a couple of areas for improvement, but they're fairly minor. Here's the run-down:

True to Texas style, the brisket requires sauce because it's been smoked properly - that is, until the collagen breaks down. It's good, but not mind blowing. Then again, I haven't had good brisket in a restaurant outside Texas before. Down side: None of the sauces are great for brisket. Needs a smokier, less-sweet complement.

The pulled pork is some of the best I've had outside my own house. My wife even said, "This tastes a lot like yours." The Swine Wine sauce is a great, cider vinegar finishing sauce. Put it on about a third of your pork and eat the rest without sauce.

The ribs had good flavor, but tasted like they were finished on a grill, which is sad. They're "competition" style, so they don't fall off the bone. If I didn't make spareribs regularly at home, I'd be happy to get my fix here.

The sausage is good. Goes great with the brush fire sauce.

For the sides, try the collard greens. They're outstanding. Maybe my favorite thing at the restaurant (because I haven't had them in years). The hush puppies are great, too. My kid loved the mac & cheese.

The sauces need some work. Overall, they're way too sweet, with the Original, Sweet City, Bourbon, Habanero Peach, and Lowco Mustard sauces all overboard on the brown sugar. That leaves only the Brushfire, Montreal, and Swine Wine sauces for the rest of us. Of those three, only the Swine Wine is actually great, and honestly, you can make it at home with a bottle of cider vinegar, some paprika, and some red pepper flakes simmered in a sauce pan for a few minutes. The Montreal is interesting, but I'm not convinced it works on any of the meat.

For years, I've lamented that we don't have a restaurant like this one around here. This is the way a BBQ restaurant should be done. Fast casual, inexpensive, spotlight on the meat, friendly atmosphere. These guys know what they're doing, and this Texan is...

I was picking up from here today and I waited patiently in line for about 20 minutes for my order to be ready. I was never even acknowledged. I personally do not get in people's faces and demand attention and be that annoying customer but based on how we were all treated it seems like that's what you gotta do here.

There were several other people waiting as well. The entire time, the staff ignored all of the people waiting as if they didn't exist. They prioritized the dine in staff over the take out. The entire time I was there nobody acknowledged the take out orders.

One of the guys was on the phone taking a customers call, this was right in front of the many people waiting for orders. After the call ended, he ignored everybody and went to the back of the store almost like he was hiding. To me, it looked like that guy was pretending to be working.

I don't understand how you can just ignore all those people waiting for you. Like acknowledge them at least. See what they need give an estimate for how long. As someone who worked a window in trucking company, I know what it's like to have people waiting like that, and I can't comprehend how the staff can just ignore the people like they don't exist. There were several delivery drivers waiting too and picking up from here and it definitely costed them money by trying to serve your customers.

On top of that they were talking over the food. I mean come on now.

The only people who were working really hard was the staff in the kitchen. They were solid. Everyone else looked like they lacked leadership and we're waiting to be told what to do. There is definitely a management/prioritization issue going on here. I don't think that this staff has the empathy required to be in a service business. Sorry to post this negative review but it was definitely necessary. I felt so bad for those customers. One lady had an issue with her order and sat there for 10 min waiting for someone to acknowledge her. She was very respectful about it but I saw in her face when she left how angry she was. Her food was probably cold by the time she left.

I get that you were busy, but at least...