Sunday, April 22, 2012

Soul Fire (Allston, MA) - Review of the Pitboss Sampler

Barbecue is one of those things that is best eaten at a restaurant or ordered take-out because it takes a long time to make it well at home. If you live in Boston, Red Bones in Somerville is probably one of the more well-known places to get tasty barbecue. However, if you live in Boston (and not in Cambridge or Somerville) and don't want to haul your butt over there, Soul Fire (in the Allston area) is a pretty good place too. I had a Living Social deal that was about to run out and finally got some take-out there. For a more thorough review of everything they serve, check out the pigtrip blog (it has pictures of most dishes).

SoulFire on Urbanspoon

Since I didn't know what to order, I got the Pit Boss Sampler, which includes a bit of a lot of different things for about $43 with tax. I thought it would be enough food for about 2 days. It's a lot of food and supposedly feeds only 2 or 3 people - umm, yeah, if the people are big football players! I think it feeds at least 4 or 5 people (who are not football players). There was plenty of food for at least 5 meals and I'm not a skinny person. There are 7 different meat dishes in the Pitboss Sampler: pulled pork, spare ribs, baby back ribs, brisket, a hot link (sausage on a stick), fried chicken, and spicy hot wings (with sauce on them). All of the meats were cooked very well and the brisket was especially good. That explains why the 2 guys who ordered after me both chose the brisket. There was enough seasoning to not need any sauce but dipping is part of the fun of eating barbecue, right?
7 different meat dishes in Pit boss sampler

hot link (top), pulled pork, spare ribs (left), and baby back ribs (bottom)

yummy brisket chunks (on top of a slice of bread) hiding under the rack of baby back ribs!
As if the big pile of meat were not enough, the Pitboss sampler comes with 6 different sides, cornbread, and all the sauce you need. The guy said I could "load up" on sauces but I took only a small container of each of the 3 sauces in the pumps because I expected that the meats would be well seasoned already. Ok, so the sides were: collard greens, beans, rice and beans, mac & cheese, potato & egg salad, coleslaw, and cornbread (with butter). I liked the potato & egg salad very much. The mac & cheese was good too. The collards, slaw, and beans were actually on the sweet side. However, I'm not sure if I might be a little more sensitive to sweet than other people because I've been cutting my sugar consumption. Personally, I like collards to be a little on the salty side. The cornbread was pretty good and the rice and beans were quite good with a bit of a spicy kick. All of the sides were in the 8 oz deli containers, which made me think that this would be way too much food for 2 or even 3 people (who are not football players). In rank order, I liked the mac & cheese, potato egg salad, rice & beans, and then the other 3 (because they were all just a bit too sweet for my taste).
Sides included in the Pit boss sampler (and all the sauce you need)
going clockwise: Collards (top), beans, rice & beans, corn bread, mac & cheese, potato egg salad, 3 sauces

potato egg salad
coleslaw
The Pitboss Sampler is a great thing to order if you're having a Superbowl party with a bunch of dudes who like to eat a lot. I would love to go back and order a brisket meal because that was done very well. The spare ribs were good too. For sides, I'd probably get the mac & cheese and/or the potato salad. If you have a LevelUp card (this link gets you a $5 credit, by the way), they take that too.

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