To me, the Pig and the Butcher sounds like it should be the title of a very old German folktale about a pubescent porker on the verge of a gruesome fate that possibly includes grinding porcine flesh and bones into a delicious blood sausage of some sort.
Thankfully, to others, it’s the name of Oklahoma City’s latest downhome BBQ joint.
Located at 2925 W. Britton Rd. near Uptown Market, the new owners have done a good job transforming the place into an ever-popular commercial-roadhouse for the whole family, complete with plenty of corrugated tin, rusted advertisements and those metal trays that are so popular to serve food on these days.
While their menu offers many of the usual meats that many BBQ restaurants do like chopped brisket, pulled pork and smoked chicken—and, I’m sure, they’re all alright—what The Pig and the Butcher does that piqued my interest are these edible oddities that make it worth the gas traveling to the oft-ignored Village, like I did last Saturday afternoon.
My ladyfriend and I ordered from the said menu and found our seats in a booth next to the window. After a mix-up or two with our food—I guess they ran out of pork—I eventually got my “sharable” Beef Tacos ($7.00). Using a hardened wonton wrapper as the mighty triangular shell, these BBQ beef tacos were a monumental achievement in both smoked meats and Mexican knowhow; don’t forget to try the BBQ salsa on them.
As I hungrily consumed those inventive comestibles, my ladyfriend dined on a comically large Loaded Baked Potato with Two Meats ($11.00), those meats being the aforementioned chopped brisket and cubed hot links. Topped with so much butter, sour cream, shredded cheddar cheese, candied bacon and green onions, even though I found it to be kind of dry, she let me know that I was wrong, declaring it “as moist as it needed to be.”
For my own main course, I inquisitively sampled the One Meat Dinner featuring the promising Candy Bacon and Two Sides ($13.00). While the mac ‘n cheese was a flurry of yellow flavor and the fresh fried okra was a summertime delight, it was the candy bacon I fell in love with; five or six thick-cut strips were on my tray, with an intoxicatingly sweet and drunkenly salty flavor that has possibly ruined non-candy bacon varieties for me for, at least, the next month.
Though startlingly full from the wide variety of meats, on the specials board upfront it said the dessert of the day was Peach Cobbler ($6.00), served a la mode for three more bills. Thought this bit of sweet treats was primarily fine, the portion was far too small for a couple to share at the table, especially considering the gastronomic $9 price tag.
As I packed up the leftovers and cleaned my hands with sanitizer, I looked over at the wall behind me and spied a cartoon pig with a cleaver pointed at his own throat, smiling as he was about to cut himself up for my digestible enjoyment. “The pig is the butcher!” I gasped to myself, an ominous tinge of sadness and fear coming over me as I bit into the remaining strip of my candy bacon. Cómpralo ya!
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Follow Louis on Twitter at @LouisFowler and Instagram at @louisfowler78.
Wait, after a thing of three tacos plus two entire entrees that look like 4 meals worth of food per plate, the peach cobbler was too small (small?) of a portion for 2 people to share? Was that a typo? It looks enormous in the pic. Jesus, how much can you people eat?!
To be fair, $9 is pretty ridiculous for most desserts regardless of size.
I was thinking “oh this is just another review of a gross meat-based / everything is fried place” until I got to the part about a portion being too small. That’s just baffling. I’m convinced it was a typo. Maybe you should have someone start editing your stuff again. There were some other typos too.
He’s on a special diet due to his previous medical issues 🙄
To be fair, if you don’t like meat, you probably shouldn’t give your opinion on that. People eat meat, regardless of whether you like it or not. You calling it gross along with the 10,000 other vegetarian/vegan eaters that have to complain about it every ten minutes isn’t going to force people to change their mind.
Instead of complaining about carnivorous cuisine, perhaps you could ask Mr. Fowler to review some vegetarian restaurants and give some recommendations. After all, I think most people are willing to try new things…..as long as they don’t taste like crap.
The main point was about saying the cobbler portion was small when clearly it was huge in context with the rest of the meal.
The thing about gross meat and everything fried was an aside. He has reviewed plenty of vegetarian-friendly places, just not recently. Hell, the avocado toast at Jones Assembly made his “best of” list for 2019. Also I personally eat meat and am not vegetarian or vegan. Interesting you assumed I was. It’s the “all meat all the time” thing that grosses me out. You also assumed I haven’t recommended vegetarian/vegan-friendly places to Mr. Fowler. I have; just not in comments sections.
It was a close up picture, but it actually looked ridiculously small, at least for 9 bucks, which I think was his point. If it was a buck or two, then maybe it would be big for that small a price.
I really am hungry now.
Love the M. Night Shyamalan twist at the end …
-he always puts like some awesome twist at the end of his movies to trick the audience.
That’s what they did to Kim Wah? Jesus.