Lucille's Smokehouse Bar-B-Que — Restaurant in Santa Clarita

So what in the world is a vegetarian doing reviewing Lucille's smokehouse barbecue, and how did it get such a good rating from me? These are the questions. I hope to answer in this unexpected review.

Lucille's has never been on my radar as a place to go but an organization I'm involved with was having a fundraiser here and I like to support. I saw there were some vegetarian options on the menu and thought at least I won't starve there.

First of all, they bring you a basket of biscuits I've written reviews of breakfast and biscuit restaurants all over the country and go through many phases where I'm pretty sure most of my body is made up of biscuit. These biscuits were fantastic, slightly sweet, but not overly so, delicious with the butter they provided, and perfectly flaky in the exact way that biscuits should be. I would literally come to Lucille's just to eat these biscuits. (Since they give them to you for free, I'm not sure that's allowed… But I'm sure going to try.)

I'm also a big fan of bourbon and whiskey, both neat as well as in cocktails. Their bar was well stocked with all kinds of different whiskeys and bourbons. You don't normally see at a bar. Plenty to try there, and I would definitely go back just to sit at the bar and drink whiskey. (Maybe that's enough to get me free biscuits. I had the Kentucky cooler cocktail kind of a lemony Swedish bourbon situation, which was truly delicious from first sip all the way through to the end. Alarmingly easy to drink and not sickly Sweet like some places to their cocktails.

I got a couple of sides for my main including hot honey. Cauliflower bites, they're served like little wings with a tasty bread, coating them and a super delicious hot honey to dip them in. It seems like every place is offering some kind of cauliflower situation to vegetarians… This was one of the best ones I've had. Truly a southern dish that fit right into the rest of the menu. The other side I got was country fair corn pudding topped with butter and, as a vegetarian, I'm not limited to sides either… though there are plenty more of those to choose from that suit, my diet. They've also got a "Callin' All Vegan's Back Porch Bowl." – not 100% my jam, but it's nice that they offer it.

As a fan of the food and vibe of Southern cuisine, I do wish there was a vegetarian version of their braised greens, and I would be over the moon if they found some way to do a plant-based meat barbecue situation of any kind… That would wildly seal the deal. But they've also got okra cheddar cornbread loaded, mashed potatoes, roasted Street, corn, garlic, mashed potatoes, mac & cheese, and a few more, so the idea that I might starve here is just not a possibility. I would definitely come back to Lucille's to drink, eat sides, and enjoy those fine, fine biscuits.

Well done Lucille's, you made this vegetarian pretty happy.

Well done Lucille's, you made this vegetarian...

I really liked the "atmosphere" of this restaurant. A real down-home feel. The staff was super friendly and the menu was comprehensive. I need to point out before I proceed, I am a native Texan and I L-O-V-E BBQ brisket. I absolutely love brisket and everything associated with the BBQ experience. I do love it here in California and love the people here but I have to say, when it comes to real Texas brisket sandwiches, well, it is always misleading to a native Texan when we see this on the menu. We HAVE to order it, it is like home. I love California cuisine but every once in awhile I get a hankering for real Texas BBQ brisket and it always seems to fall short.

I know, I know, I am NOT in Texas but still if you put Texas BBQ brisket sandwich on the menu, I get super excited but my expectations fall short. I ordered this from the menu at Lucille's and was let down with the sandwich. It was good but still not what I was expecting when you label it Texas BBQ brisket sandwich. No matter where you are in the country, if you label this product, it should stand true. A traditional Texas BBQ sandwich consists of moist, sliced or chopped brisket, onion slices, and sliced dill pickles (a tomato-based BBQ sauce on the side) on a sesame seed hamburger bun (no artisan bread here). This sandwich was more like pot roasty brisket with no pickles or onions and all three sauces fell short. But if you add a squirt of ketchup to the "hot" sauce it does begin to feel like a Texas BBQ sauce. Again as a Texan, this sandwich did not meet my expectations. Sorry....but the sides were amazing!!!

The staff was attentive and the experience was delightful but the BBQ brisket fell short. Sorry, I hate to write this but I feel that I have to state my opinion to make a better product for an already good place to eat. The sample appetizer was awesome. The fried okra was great and the fried green tomatoes were divine. I had the watermelon iced tea which was refreshing on a hot day and we loved the homemade biscuits.

I am sorry but I have to try some of the other dishes other than the brisket next time. I will return but again, the brisket just fell short of my...

Terrible experience at this establishment, at first everything was ok, hostess was welcoming and made us aware of the wait times, no big deal I understand because of Covid, we go to our table and we meet our server, very friendly as well, we order our drinks and appetizer and not long after we notice fruit flies lingering around the table, we asked our server if we could be seated at another table but due to us ordering our food already, they couldn’t move us, so we continued to eat our food and enjoy our drinks and we noticed more and more fruit flies were coming to our table, so we asked the waiter again if we could be seated somewhere else and thankfully we were after they spoke with a manager. We get seated at the new table and were told that the server that’s in charge of the area would be the one helping us out. So we’re sitting there for about 20 minutes and find out that the food we ordered was just sitting at the table where we originally were, the one with the fruit flies so they put another order in for us which was great. So we get our food and the entire time we were there NOBODY attended to us to see if we were ok or if we needed anything, nothing. We finish our food and still nobody is attending to us, until finally the waiter we were assigned to at 1st noticed us just sitting there and asked us if we needed anything and finally got our check, this is probably the worst customer service I’ve ever experienced at a restaurant, if it wasn’t for this server we would’ve just dine and dashed, awful experience at the restaurant today, probably wouldn't recommended anybody coming here to eat, you’re better off going to another restaurant in the area. The only reason I’m giving this 2 stars and not 1 is because of the hostess at the start of our interaction with the restaurant and our 1st waiter, the food was ok but the experience with the fruit flies lingering was awful and that combined with the bad customer service after...