Category Archives: BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home

$$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill

Meat or no meat: The Smokery has you covered

By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com

A vegan walked into a barbecue joint. What’s the punchline?

Actually, there’s no punchline. I’m not a vegan myself. But I can see the ethos: The commercial agriculture that’s necessary to have everyone eating tasty animals is bad for the environment. It’s bad for our health. And it’s pretty obviously bad for the animals who have to be killed for our gustatory enjoyment.

For reasons such as these, growing numbers of people have gone vegan, vegetarian, or flexitarian recently, and that’s why I always try to include at least one meat-free dish in each review.

This can be a challenge, though, when I visit a new barbecue joint. Like this week, when I followed the delicious scent of hickory smoke to The Smokery, a new eatery in a small building on Frankfort Avenue in Clifton. Continue reading Meat or no meat: The Smokery has you covered →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Germantown

Hauck’s Corner returns, dainty and all

By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com

Last summer, 110 years after Hauck’s Handy Store opened as a neighborhood grocery on a Schnitzelburg street corner – and three years after it closed following the death at 100 of owner and patriarch George Hauck – this local landmark returned as a restaurant and bar.

In 1912 you could buy a baloney sandwich on white bread at Hauck’s and get change from a dime. Today, a century and $1 million in renovations later, you can still get something like that, but they spell it “bologna” now, and it will cost you $14.95 for a thick-cut, smoked slice perched on a brioche bun with stone-ground mustard, pimento cheese, pickles, and an over-easy egg. Continue reading Hauck’s Corner returns, dainty and all →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Breakfast and lunch spots, sandwich spots, Germantown

Big Bad Breakfast brings another morning option

By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com

After Lynn’s Paradise Cafe closed abruptly in 2013, it left a vacant building and a crowd of nearby merchants crying over the loss of a neighborhood commercial anchor.

Martin’s Bar-B-Que Joint filled the space for a couple of years, but soon became a victim of the pandemic.

It took another year for the latest occupant to fill the space again. Bad Breakfast looks like a good fit, though. Like Lynn’s, the new entry – first Kentucky franchise of a small but growing chain based in Oxford, Mississippi – offers hearty breakfast and lunch dishes in a down-home setting. Continue reading Big Bad Breakfast brings another morning option →

$ Budget (under $30), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Breakfast and lunch spots, sandwich spots, Commentary, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

Burger vs Burger: It’s a win-win at Shady Lane Cafe

By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com

Ahh, Shady Lane Cafe! This lovable little East End diner-style cafe has been a popular lunch (and weekend dinner) spot since Bill Smith and Susi Wood opened it around 2004. It earned deserved popularity for its iconic Brownsboro burger and much more.

All good things eventually move on, though, and in August 2019 Bill, short-order chef and poet, and his wife Susi, amiable host and professional singer, turned the business over to another couple – Carol Reeves and Satbir “Shan” Singh – in August 2019.

The new owners have maintained the same high level of quality and popularity. When I dropped in to pick up a takeout lunch on a recent Saturday, every table in the little space was filled with apparently happy diners, and the line to the counter extended all the way back to the door. Continue reading Burger vs Burger: It’s a win-win at Shady Lane Cafe →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Downtown, NuLu and Butchertown, Hurstbourne, Middletown, Jeffersontown, Seafood & Water's Edge

Mussel & Burger Bar’s wacky concept seems normal now

Early in 2013 when Mussel & Burger Bar opened its first shop in Jeffersontown, I couldn’t help but make fun of this previously unimagined combination. “‘Let’s go get some burgers and mussels,’ said no person ever,” I wrote, chortling.

Now, 8 1/2 years later, Mussel & Burger Bar’s founders have moved on to other ventures, but Mussel & Burger Bar appears to be going strong under new ownership. My recent visit to the J’town operation for lunch with a group of friends satisfied me that it remains just as good as ever. Continue reading Mussel & Burger Bar’s wacky concept seems normal now →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Commentary, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill

No ghosties, no ghoulies: Hillcrest Tavern offers pure comfort

Halloween has come and gone, taking with it another piece of collateral damage from the pandemic: There was no Hillcrest Avenue halloween decoration extravaganza this year.

But there is still a doggone good reason to go to Hillcrest – or to be more exact, to cross the railroad tracks, turn left onto Frankfort Avenue, and drive a few blocks past Louisville Water Co. to Hillcrest Tavern.

You won’t be sorry. Continue reading No ghosties, no ghoulies: Hillcrest Tavern offers pure comfort →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Commentary, LEO's Eats, Vegetarian/Vegan

Morels smokes serious ‘que … without meat

Following on his success with vegan takes on popular fast-food dishes like the Farby, an Arby’s knockoff made without a molecule of meat, Morels Cafe’s proprietor Stanley Chase has now turned his attention to a seemingly even more impossible task.

Behold, Morels Vegan BBQ Smokehouse, where Chase is creating vegetarian barbecued pulled “pork” and meat-free sausages that one could easily mistake for the real thing. Chase says vegetarian barbecue is a new concept, with similar restaurants in only two other places in the U.S. that he knows of, both very popular on their home ground: Homegrown Smoker in Portland, Oregon, and Monk’s Vegan Smokehouse in Brooklyn. Continue reading Morels smokes serious ‘que … without meat →

$ Budget (under $30), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Commentary, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill, Hot Chicken

Pollo chicken food truck lands in Clifton storefront

“From food truck to brick and mortar. A dream has come true!” With palpable joy, Troy King and Selena Johnson, the owners of the Pollo food truck and Shelby Park’s popular Six Forks Burger Co., announced on social media last month that Pollo has landed in a Clifton storefront.

Pollo – or “Pollo – a gourmet chicken joint” if you want to be formal about it – has been a familiar sight around town with its rolling quarters in an old, short school bus painted dark gray. It’s been operating since 2014, but King and Johnson were eager to add a land-based location just as Six Forks marked its first anniversary this month. Continue reading Pollo chicken food truck lands in Clifton storefront →

$ Budget (under $30), $$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Camp Taylor/Zoo, World Food

Let’s take Oskar’s out for a picnic!

I’ve been doing a lot of takeout dining in the past couple of months, and I’m content with that.

But I have one big problem with takeout: Unless I choose from a handful of restaurants within a five-minute drive from my house, my takeout dinner is likely to be lukewarm or worse by the time I get it on the table.

?The solution is obvious, especially in summer time: Let’s have a picnic! Select a restaurant with a park nearby Grab your meal and hustle it to the nearest shady glen. Breakfast, lunch, or dinner is served! Continue reading Let’s take Oskar’s out for a picnic! →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

BurgerIM fights off challenges to bring the burgers

If you’ve been wondering about the odd name of that new gourmet-style hamburger joint in the Vogue Center, wonder no longer: The Hebrew plural ending “-im” on the English word “Burger,” yields “BurgerIM,” a crafty way to make a common word a trademark.

We brought home a bunch of burgerim, er, burgers, the other day and found them estimable, particularly considering the double whammy that the franchise owners have had to face during their first months in business. Continue reading BurgerIM fights off challenges to bring the burgers →