Smokin' J's Rib and Brewhouse — Restaurant in West Virginia

This was our 2nd visit, its been maybe a year since last time? This visit we had a hankering for some BBQ. I'd like to speak to the added charges and the food. We both got the 3 meat BBQ sampler dinners for $20, my husband caught the fine print for the $3 upcharge for brisket which I missed. I had the hickory smoked sausage, the brisket and pulled pork. Husband got ribs, brisket and sausage. We both liked the baked beans, although I had a couple pieces of soft fat bits in mine (its a texture thing for me). I saw there was a sausage sampler appetizer that included a golden nc sauce and horseradish sauce. Because I got the sausage in the 3 meat BBQ sampler dinner I asked if I could have some of the NC sauce and horseradish sauce to try. The NC sauce was indeed tasty but had I known the horseradish was just plain horseradish I would NOT have gotten it, I was expecting something like horseradish sauce you would have with prime rib mixed with mayo. What I did NOT expect was to be charged .50 cents each for both small cups of the sauce and plain horseradish. Now 50 cents x2 isn't a big deal but we were not told we would be charged for condiments and only noticed after paying. Also the meal came with 2 "Signature sides" and garlic toast. We were asked if we wanted garlic toast or corn bread we both asked for the cornbread. A regular muffin sized roll. Honestly tasted like boxed Jiffy cornbread mix nothing special. BUT then I see we got charged an extra $1.00 for cornbread? I see cornbread as interchangeable with a garlic toast not as a sidedish like a salad or vegetable seriously? Looking at the menu online, which mind you was not the menu in hand when we were ordering, it says next to the Beer battered dinners they offer 2 signature sides & garlic toast, then in parentheses "sub cornbread for $1 more". It doesnt say that under the BBQ dinners caption or the sampler description and I wasn't looking to get a beer battered dinner so how should I know about cornbread being an extra $1 upgrade? The coleslaw while fine tastes and looks exactly like KFC cole slaw. Our brisket slices were on the fatty side and mine did not even have any seared crust/bark. The portion of pulled bbq was already disappointingly small but smaller still when I pulled off a thick layer of fat underneath when I packed the rest to go. There wasn't a good smoked flavor to the meat and made me think of a boiled corned beef rather than brisket. We paid the bill took what we had for leftovers but I stopped to look at the menu/prices at the hostess stand where my husband pointed out to me the $3 brisket upcharge I missed. That much upcharge for 3 small-3 1/2 inch slices of fatty brisket? (see pic). I had a polite conversation with the hostess to inquire about the cornbread upcharges but saying that "it's been that way ever since I started working here" did not seem to be a great reason for me. I would suggest first off just offer the corn bread or the garlic bread no need to upcharge for corn bread and it cuts the confusion. Cracker barrel doesn't charge more whether you get corn bread or biscuits. Second if you're gonna upcharge on so many different things like sauces, cornbread and the meat, you really need to have the servers saying or pointing that out aggressively. Servers deal with enough thankless, rude, impatient customers, I'm not one of those. I would rather be aware of the upcharges from my server than feel like I'm getting swindled with extra charges that are not clearly written out in the menu. Oh and the fact that I have this amount of leftovers doesn't mean the proportions aren't small as I said, I can't eat very much at all in a sitting due to surgery. Other restaurants I can come home with 75% of...

First time I visited was so so. Decided to give it another try and was very disappointed with the food and especially the service. Had surf and turf, my wife had filet mignon . By the time we got our food it was cold. Wait staff was very inattentive at 7:45pm they were very interested in cleaning up but left the food unattended. Cook came out with plates. Multiple times All Wait Staff left dinning room for several minutes at a time and were heard laughing in back room but did not come out to check on tables. No one was on hand to refill drinks when it was really needed. The table looked dirty and was sticky to the touch, I asked for additional napkins which we used as table cloth. Waitress brought out the salads with the edge of her hands inside the salad bowl touching the salad. When she finally brought the main course her fingers were inappropriately too far inside plate edge. Worse was she had very long nails, totally unacceptable. Table cleaning procedures on display were unhygienic. After customers at two large adjacent tables left, staff placed table condiments, salt, pepper, sugar on chair and scrapped table food scrap pieces to the floor, then sprayed the table with a liquid from a bottle after which they wiped the table with circling motions going over the same spot without rinsing the cloth, so essentially just spreading what could have been in one spot all over the table. Then the condiments resting on the chair were simply placed in the center of the table again. Talk about cross contamination. Also the reason why my jacket sleeves were sticking to our table. The floor was wiped with a broom, must be why carpet looks dirty. Common procedures for Food service personnel require that one must wash hands between handling dirty dishes and serving food to customers, our plates were first brought by a service person that came out of cleaning a dirty table, our waitress who was also cleaning a dirty table at the time intercepted and took the plates from the hands of the first handler and returned to the kitchen because the side was not what I had asked for. A few minutes later the plates were returned to our table, the steak and scallops had cooled off, but worse was all the cross contamination in the process. No one is sick ( at least for now). We ate and left after the main course, did not stiff the waitress, but will not return. This is first a...

I’ll start off with the good parts. Nice atmosphere and well designed restaurant. Based on past reviews, it looks like they improved their service or at least our server was very nice but it seemed like he had one or two too many tables. Bottomless salad was probably the best dish due to the delicious bacon that they generously add to it. Caesar salad was decent but a little in the tart side. Baked potato side (not the loaded premium side) was also very good and cooked perfectly.

This is where management needs to read all the other reviews. I was hoping they would have improved in this area but nothing has changed. Do not come here if you want a correctly cooked piece of steak. Most of us ordered the surf n turf dishes with either scallops, shrimp, or salmon and it comes with two 4oz filet medallions. Two orders were rare and they came out medium well. Two orders were medium and they came out super well done, tough, and not pleasant to eat (see picture). Salmon was also overcooked. I’m not sure if they just don’t have the freshest cut of meat and fish and that’s why everything is so overcooked. Even though most of the items were overcooked, everything else in the plates came out cold. Cold steaks probably due to their tiny size but salmon and fries were cold too. But it was disappointing to pay $20+ dollars for a meal where the best part was just the salad.

We also got there at 7pm, didn’t order any appetizers but didn’t get served our meals until 8:15pm. That’s a long time to wait. We all finished two salad servings because we were so hungry. We could have probably all eaten three salads but our server was so busy and didn’t make it back to the table that often.

This could be a good place but they need to work on improving the back...