The last thing I want to do is become a full time food critic and take on having to eat things I don’t like, just to be able to tell you, I don’t like them. As far as food goes though, Mexican food is second on my list, right behind BBQ, so I promise if I do expand my restaurant reviews two categories will be the limit, and you know what they are.
Normally, I don’t bring you a review of a BBQ joint that I haven’t eaten previously numerous times, no need in telling you where to stay away from when I can just tell where to go for the best. This review is a different story, this place we are dining at this evening I had never stepped foot into before this visit.
When I travel I have a certain chain of hotels I stay at, and Hurricane Harvey wreaked havoc with most of them along the Gulf Coast near and in Corpus Christi so room availability isn’t that great right now, throw in a special music event on top of that has something to do with Celina, the singer who was murdered by her fan club president, and the room situation just got a whole lot worse.
As most of you know, I am a gambler, so I decided to give this BBQ place a try and get my review done for this month. I had an appetite for chicken that had been with me all day. I got checked into my hotel and then headed across Park RD.22 to the Texas Mesquite BBQ & Grille. It was just past 7:30 PM, maybe just a little closer to 7:45 as I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the clock. I snapped a couple photos of the outside and proceeded inside, I knew it would be pretty well dark by the time I got out and I needed the building shot to share in the review.
She proceeded to head to the back and about a half a minute later was back to let me know that the only chicken left was two pieces of white meat, the breasts. When you show up right before closing time, you have to expect that some things may not be available, but chicken is chicken, “I’ll take them.”, I replied. “with fries and a glass of water.”
Their credit card machine wasn’t working, all the AT&T service for the island was down, which I was aware from when I checked in at the hotel. Luckily for Debbie the business next to her was allowing her to run credit cards on their machine since they had a different carrier for phone / data service. I saved her the trip next door and just paid in cash.
I proceeded to get a booth and wait for my food, it was only a couple minutes and my food was delivered to the table. The chicken was delivered on a wood cutting board, with butcher paper to keep it off the wood. These were two really nice size chicken breasts, and had a wonderful color and aroma. The basket of fries could have been just a little more full, but all in all, my hunger was satisfied by the time I finished my meal.
The chicken was absolutely perfect, I thought it might be a little on the dry side being so late in the day, but to my surprise it was pretty moist and loaded with smoked flavor. I picked those chicken bones plum clean, as evidenced by the before and after pictures of my plate.
When I finished eating I was the last customer in the place. I went and washed my hands in the restroom and then as I headed back to the table I stopped and introduced myself to Debbie. It turns out that Debbie and her husband Orlando are the owners of this establishment, they took it over about four years ago from a previous owner.
The BBQ pit they use is a regular smoker from what Orlando told me and it is outside in the back of the building. Mesquite is the main wood they use for smoking, but Orlando did say that for the chicken and pork he adds just a little pecan or hickory to give some extra smoke to the chamber since it doesn’t take as long to cook those meats. You need to really fill the smoke chamber to get it to draw into the meat, because time is of the essence when you cook those meats. A lot of places will over cook and dry the meat out trying to get the smoked flavor, this was not the case with my chickens that were served to me. Orlando really knows what he is doing with the yard birds.
They were gracious enough to allow me to photograph them and the restaurant and during our visiting I learned that they BBQ a bunch of fresh sea food as well. Another thing that was of interest is that once a month they make their own sausage, about 25 to 30 pounds of it, and when it is gone it is gone. They won’t serve store bought sausage; only their own that they make, if I had known that I would have maybe tried some, I didn’t think to ask if they had any right then but I was pretty full from the meal I just ate. I will remember it though next time, and will be back to their place to eat again.
I can honestly tell you that this is the best BBQ restaurant on Padre Island. Yes, it is the only one,( I knew someone would ask that), but I can say that if someone else decides that there is room for another BBQ joint on this island they had better know how to smoke meat like a professional because their competition does.
The Texas Mesquite BBQ & Grill does offer a full menu of the BBQ meats and fixins, they also have limited seafood and even alligator. They also will cook you up a burger if you want to go that route. Speaking of going, normally I take you around the town where I do the reviews and give you a flavor for the area. This time I was so late getting to my destination I had to hold that off until the morning.
Padre Island is a natural barrier island that protects the main land from the Gulf of Mexico, it is pretty much all sand and sand dunes. There is at the southern end of island the Padre Island National Sea Shore Park; it is a part of US Federal Parks system. Ten dollars is the entrance fee for the park, that is for a carload of people not per person, and that will get you a week long pass from what the park ranger told me at the information center.
The park is a destination spot for bird watchers and bikini watchers in the summer time. The weather really sucked the morning I was there and I didn’t have much time to venture off deep into the place. The beach is pretty large from the water to the vegetation line.
This day the waves were up pretty good, as I was leaving the park I did see a couple SUV’s coming in that had surf boards on the top of them, I might also mention that one of them was pulled over by the Park Ranger Service, the ranger was handing the female driver her license and what looked like a ticket back as I passed by them. So if you make the trip down here, pay attention to the speed limit, which is 45 MPH in most stretches of Park RD.22.
The visitor center has a wealth of information about the park and the Gulf, the endangered Kemp Ridley sea turtle is one of the main concerns at this place, don’t even think about disturbing one of these turtles when they are nesting or going from or to the water. Doing something along those lines could find you facing federal prison time.
The park folks did tell me that they do harvest the turtle eggs and hatch them out, and when the young turtles are ready they release them back into the water of the Gulf. That normally takes place from mid May through July and the public is welcome to watch the releases, but it doesn’t happen every day. From what they said it is about 50 days from when the turtle lays the eggs until they are hatched and released and you can follow along on the park’s website or FaceBook to get an idea of when some might be ready for release.
I have more to share but I’m calling this a good spot to end this edition of the “Will Eat BBQ 4 U” review for this month of April, we kind of broke our normal routine and the bottom line is the BBQ and folks at Texas Mesquite BBQ & Grill are worthy of a visit, so drop by if you are in the area and tell them I sent you. It won’t do anything for me but it will for you.
