Jim n Nick’s Bar-B-Que – Aurora, CO

My cousin, X-Copper, asked me if I liked BBQ, so I had to tell her about the 2009 Twin City Rib Quest (which in not so many words means “yes, I do enjoy an occasional bbq rib”). So, we decided we’d give it a shot tonight, depending on how I was doing after the Grande Breakfast Burrito I had eaten that morning. When the time came, I was proud to step up to the plate and head 8 blocks to Nick and Eddie’s with my aunt PhotoLady and my cousin’s husband, Houston.

They had told me about these cheesy biscuits this place brought out to your table. The rest of the food they said was delicious, so I had high hopes for the ribs I was about to order. The rib quest would not be a comparison to the twin city one, but I like to gauge where the Twin Cities ribs are in the grand scheme of things.

I scoured the menu even though I knew I was going to be getting ribs. But if some of the sides jumped out at me, then I would need to know what I was going to end up with. They had a choice between spare ribs and baby back ribs, so I went with the baby back ribs (based on the fact that I looked at the table behind us and saw someone gorging themselves on a full slab), with Mac and cheese and also BBQ baked beans. Also, this place had coke products, so I went with lemonade. I’m glad I did – the lemonade was delicious and sweet, not tart at all.

The cheesy muffins came out (the lady forgot our honey butter) and they were really quite tasty. I like them even better than the cheesy biscuits people rave about a Red Lobster. I could eat a couple dozen of these babies watching a movie by myself sometime. Oh yeah, if someone else made them for me – I’m lazy. The dinners came out for us a short while later. Quickly actually. The ribs looked delicious – they were dry rubbed, not covered in sauce. I know some people feel this is blasphemy, but I think dry rubs have their place in the ribs world. I won’t complain about the pickle slices on top, since I am a grown up and can remove them without causing a scene (cough…Coach…cough). I cut a couple apart and jumped into the first rib. Actually, these ribs didn’t taste all that great and weren’t very tender at all (sometimes dry ribs are like that). When the rib tastes like ham on a bone, I tend to think they are either undercooked or poor quality ribs. I added some of the original sauce to them (in a squeeze bottle on the table) and this helped a lot.

The sauce had a great flavor and just a little bit of zing to it. I tried the habanero sauce next just to see how hot it was and it honestly wasn’t that spicy. It also had a weird aftertaste to it, so I went back to the original sauce. It helped a lot. The Mac and Cheese was decent. Not great, but better than cafeteria mac and cheese at the very least. The BBQ baked beans were actually pretty good. Not even close to the best I’ve had, but still pretty darn good. Before we headed out, the waitress offered a piece of pecan or chocolate pie. For some reason, it sounded right, so I got a piece of chocolate pie to go. She brought it out in a togo bag for me and we headed home. I’ll be honest, the pie didn’t seem home made at all and was kind of gummy instead of fluffy chocolate cake. It really wasn’t good.

If this were in the rib challenge in the Twin Cities, it would rank pretty close to the bottom if not AT the bottom. But out of all the rib places I’ve been to, it wasn’t even close to the worst. It’s decent, but the dry rub, in combination with the ham-taste, made for a pretty sub-par experience.

Top 5 things about Jim n Nick’s Bar-B-Que

1. Cheesy muffins
2. Lemonade
3. Baked beans
4. Original BBQ sauce
5. The fact that I was able to eat while still housing 3+ pounds of breakfast burrito in my gut

Bottom 5 things

1. Ribs were either poor quality or undercooked and tasted like ham on a bone
2. Habanero BBQ sauce was not very spicy nor very tasty
3. Mac and cheese could have been way better
4. No Dew
5. Super bummed about the chocolate pie, especially since I’m not usually a dessert guy

www.jimnnicks.com