Central Track Contributor
Dallas Beer Kitchen's Beer Is OK. Its Kitchen? Not So Much.
Dallas Beer Kitchen Ambiance:
1802 Greenville Ave.
Lower Greenville
Food: 0 out of 4 fish tacos.
Service: 3 out of 4 fish tacos.
Like most people, we had very high hopes when we first heard back in June that the folks behind the Best Damn Things blog were opening up a restaurant in Lower Greenville. In fact, for a while there, it seemed like DBK was all anybody could talk about.
So it came as a huge surprise to us, when we finally got around to checking the place out, that the food we ordered did not live up to our expectations. Like, at all.
For instance? Ammelle's Fish Tacos — billed as “two pitas stuffed with beer battered fish, jalapeno slaw, slices of avocado and tomato and served with a side of creamy Sriracha sauce” for $5 –sounded like a great deal right up until it was finally served before us.
Instead of a stuffed pita, two cut pieces of pita bread were thrown onto the dish and topped with tasteless coleslaw. Meanwhile, two massive pieces of battered fish were tossed onto the plate rather willy nilly, too, along with a bit of tomato and some avocado that appeared on the verge of going bad. Fish tacos are not meant to be eaten with a fork and knife and yet it's the only option with this dish, which stands as an insult to fish tacos everywhere. Worse, when you finally cut into the massive fish pieces themselves, you'll notice a very important thing missing: the fish. The two pieces may look massive at first, but, mostly, they're just mounds of flavorless beer batter. Oh, and that creamy Sriracha sauce? It's basically a side of mayo with a few drops of rooster sauce mixed in for color.
The whole thing was pretty bad.
Aside from the beer options — which, we admit, are rather impressive, if paling in comparison to the nearby Bottle Shop — perhaps the only saving grace at DBK is the gluten-free “puffcorn” snack food appetizer, which isn't even made in house. The light and flavorful snack made by the Fort Worth-based company behind More Puffcorn Please is a perfect compliment to the brews on hand. Seriously: These tiny snacks offered the perfectly salted and airy caramel flavor to balance out the flavor of the the Oskar Blues Old Chub Nitro we downed while we picked away at the bowl.
By that time, however, we were starving. And though the puffcorn did its best to help flush out the taste of grease that coated the inside of our mouths and the emptiness in our bellies, it wasn't enough. It probably doesn't help matters that the place itself is a bit dreary with its red walls and its cold, industrial lines.
On, the other hand, the massive garage door that opens up to face Lower Greenville is kind of nice.
Listen: I don't mean to be so negative about this place. There could be a number of possible reasons as to why our experiences here have been so lackluster.
But, three months into its operation now, DBK shouldn't be relying on excuses. It should be finally living up to its hype.
It's a shame that it doesn't.
