Red's True Barbecue

A late Sunday night and Monday off called for a top quality meat intake. Red's True Barbecue was the restaurant of choice. Having visited a couple of times before it's often required a long wait on arrival as it's always busy. So we hoped a mid-Monday afternoon may be a different story. 

Luckily we were correct as even our reasonably sized group were seated straight away without a booking. 

Red's True Barbecue continues to open in new locations and can now be found in Headingley, Leeds, Nottingham and of course Manchester. 

Red's True Barbecue

The Manchester restaurant can be found right on the corner of Albert Square. It's therefore surrounded by other popular bars and restaurants, so Red's were obviously confident of their product by selecting this location. They were right to do so though as Red's is almost always full, meaning you can have a couple of hours to wait for a table sometimes. 

Over the door on the corner of the building is the neon sign of "Red's True Barbecue," and on the walls within the porch are hands praying for meat. 

Pray for meat

As soon as you walk in the door, before noticing anything else, the smell of barbecue will hit you! I'm not sure if they vent the extract fans from the kitchen over the door or something but the smoky, barbecue smell is fantastic. I can't remember any restaurant where the smell has such a positive effect as this. 

As the waitress leads you to your table she'll likely lead you past the open kitchen where you can see the barbecuing in progress. Chefs pulling apart racks of ribs which have been cooked and smoked for hours, while another will be mopping other meats with barbecue sauce. 

The rest of the restaurant is a mix of brushed steels, colourful neon signs and church like symbols. Under the kitchen partition logs are stacked for the grills and smokers. 

Fuel for the fires and the open kitchens

"The Good Book"

"I believe"

The bar is a colourful display covered in chicken wire. 

Bar

As we sat at our table the waiter left us with the "good book" (menu) to look over. You may need some time to make your choice in Red's as the menu is very extensive (You can read their "good book" HERE). 

"The Good Book"

The Ten Commandments

If you decide before the rest of your party then it gives you chance to try the 5 different barbecue sauces in the middle of the table. 

1. Triple 6 hot sauce - from 5 types of chilli
2. South Carolina BBQ - a mustard based sauce with spicy kick
3. North Carolina BBQ - a vinegar based sauce
4. Judas Ketchup - their own made tomato like BBQ sauce
5. Kansas City BBQ - a sweet & smokey barbecue sauce

Barbecue Sauces

As the names of the sauces suggest, their barbecue is based on some of the most famous barbecue towns in the USA. This is why almost every American style barbecue item can be found on the menu, from pulled pork, barbecue ribs of various varieties, burgers, chicken, you consider it barbecue and it's probably on the menu. 

You can sample quite a lot of the menu with their wide selection of starters. Ribs tasters, burnt ends, BBQ chicken wings etc. Or there are other great American favourites such as macaroni and cheese. 

On this visit I decided to try their "swine fries." Sweet potato fries, topped with pulled pork, cheese, sour cream, onions, jalapeños, and salsa. 

Having not tried these before I was apprehensive about having fries as a starter, but I wasn't having fries as a side with my main so figured why not. The fries were excellent, nice and crispy but I had to dig to find them. They were lost under mounds of sour cream, and huge chunks of pulled pork! 

Swine Fries - £6.95

The pulled pork was easy to pull apart and combined with the fries, salsa and sour cream tasted incredible. Toppings you'd normally find on nachos were even better on sweet potato fries! 

Then it was on to the mains. 

Red's True Barbecue burger creations are famous for including extra barbecue in the form of steak, or replacing the traditional bread buns with doughnuts or waffles. 

My partner ordered their "Sleepy James," a southern fried chicken breast, topped with bacon, lettuce, burger cheese, and ranch dressing all between a couple of waffles. 

The Sleepy James - £14.40

As you can imagine they also offer pulled pork sandwiches, steaks of all varieties, barbecue sandwiches, brisket etc. 

The Meat Memoirs were here for some proper barbecue on this particular day and needed to try their ribs. In previous visits there had always been one of the 3 types of ribs sold out. Luckily as it was quieter this time they were all in stock so I jumped at the chance to try them all. 

Red's offer up 3 types of barbecue ribs. You can try a small sample of their pork ribs as a starter but we wanted a proper portion. There's the choice of Kansas City wet style pork ribs, Memphis dry rub pork ribs, and huge beef long beef ribs. To try them all, they offer a "bucket o' bones," and seen as they were all available on this visit I opted to try take that down alone. 

All the mains in Red's True Barbecue are offered with either 2 "humble" sides (e.g, fries, onion rings etc.) or 1 "divine" side, such as mac & cheese, grilled cheese on toast, bbq beans, bbq corn on the cob, or sweet potato fries. 

To side my bucket of ribs I choose the grilled cheese on toast. 

Grilled Cheese on Toast side - £2.95 or included with a main

Not long after the starters had been cleared the mains arrived. The bucket of ribs didn't look too overwhelming to begin with. A combination of small racks of ribs could be seen from the top of the bucket which didn't look too much to finish. I therefore took a bite of the side of grilled cheese on toast first. Huge, doorstop thick sized slices of fresh bread were topped with a thick layer of melted cheddar and finished with garlic and herb butter. For simple cheese on toast these were very good. I figured I best make a start on the ribs though before I got full! 

Taking off the first small rack of ribs the meat was full of smoke flavour! 

The barbecue flavours are some of the best I've tasted. 

After the first little rack I pulled out a bone sticking vertically up one side of the bucket. It was then I realised how much I'd underestimated the challenge of finishing this bucket alone. This beef rib was one of the biggest ribs I'd ever seen. The rest of my party agreed! Taking this down was challenge enough. 

Bucket o' Bones - £23.95

Beef Long - the largest rib I've ever eaten

Throughout the bucket of ribs the barbecue flavours were outstanding. The meat was a little dry though and the ribs were perhaps a little overdone for my personal liking. The selection of barbecue sauces in the middle of the table helped to soften some of the drier ribs but I'd have preferred some of the ribs to be cooked a little less. 

The bucket of bones could easily have served 2 people, if not 3! I managed to complete it alone though, but feel sorry to say I have to take the grilled cheese side home (I finished it later, I'm not one for letting food go to waste!).

Conclusion

Red's True Barbecue brings a larger American menu to Manchester than anywhere else I'm yet to discover. The traditional tastes are fantastic and all the senses are involved when you eat at Red's. The small is better than any restaurant I've yet visited and the barbecue methods are brought through from the states to the tastes.

The portion sizes are very generous, even if you opt for a more traditional sized meal unlike me who ate what was probably a meal for 2 or 3 people! 

My criticism is that the ribs were too dry, and the barbecued exteriors too tough. The great selection of barbecue sauces helped alleviate this issue a bit but it couldn't over power some of the charcoaled edges. 

I did finish the ribs though which I wouldn't have done had they been that bad. Had they been a little softer and more moist they'd have been perfect! 

@RedsTrueBBQ

Red's True Barbecue Facebook 


Meat Rating: 7/10

Money for Meat: Paid in Full