Culinary G.
Yelp
So I have been driving by this place for a while and it was getting late one evening and I was literally tiered of everyplace I usually go so I said I will try this spot. Being that both myself and my husband are both West Indian we said ok we will try it. We pull up and there are two ladies sitting out front with "Short D*&^ Man" blaring from some speakers but inside the place looks dead. Rolled down the window and ask are they open. "yeah" they say so we park and go in. At first I was impressed as I saw a full bar (which I was not expecting). I say to my husband "okay they go the bar thing going on" just as a small male child races past us saying hello. I spoke back to the kid and then he starts asking have you ate here before? the kid couldn't be any older that 6, so I say no we haven't. A lady that was sitting outside when we pulled up comes in and another older lady comes from the back. We said we haven't been here before so give us a minute. While we scan the menu the lady who had just come in goes behind the counter and over the register to look at something. She then walks away. My husband inquires about the soup that they have (Red Pea Soup) and the lady says they have but they only have one size. We ask to se the size and I lie to you not she pulls out a cup that is about the size of a Giant Big Gulp from 7-11. My husband says okay I will do the soup. I (knew better) but decided that I would do the oxtail with white rice and mac & cheese. I then said I would like extra gravy as well. I then say I really like butter beans if you can put some extra in there. the chick tells me we no have that... ::blink blink......huh:: At this point I should have cancelled my order but in an effort to try new things I said okay, no worries. While all this is going on that little boy that I was telling you about earlier has decided that he wants a beef patty so he walks over to the container, opens it up and goes in for a patty. Did this child wash his hands, NOPE. Was this child handling RTE food with no gloves on YES. Did a piece of me die inside...yes. The kids mom (who works there) is now yelling at him that she already gave him a patty it was on the table go sit down. She then tells my husband he cant have soup because they have nothing to put it in, mind you the older woman just brought out a huge cup. She explains that there are no lids and they cant sell it without a lid. Well duh, okay do you have another size maybe. They riffle around and she finds some smaller Styrofoam cups and my husband says that is fine. At the last minute I decide, I want to try the potato salad and my husband wants a beef patty an coco bread. The older woman goes in the back (we assumed to get the coco bread and she comes back like 3 minutes later and hands my husband a bag with bread in it. He looks and is like umm "but where is the patty?" These folks strait up just left the patty out. We pay and get to the car. I start looking at the food (which should have been another indicator this was gonna be bad, the fact that they didn't show me my food before the closed the box and bagged it up. I think this it the FIRST West Indian spot that this has EVER happened to me at and I've been to yard places, trini places, Guyanese places in multiple place in the US and Overseas and they all have shown me my food before bagging it up) I first open the potato salad because it was in a bag full of hot food and just common sense (And SERVSAFE) teaches us you don't mix cold foods (with mayo) with hot food. When I opened the container I noticed the potato salad was sitting in a puddle of fluid. Needless to say, that didn't get eaten. next I looked at the mac and cheese. It at least looked safe (sort of) for human consumption unlike the Potato Salad. I then opened the oxtail and a few things hit me right away. I have never in my whole life seen oxtail gravy that was light brown (except for when in southern style oxtail stew..that they make in the south...not the West Indies) I told my husband, ohh I am not gonna eat this. He asked why not, I said well besides the fact that there appear to be peppers in it, it has light skinned gravy and I am not sure what that is. I also noted that I was confused and asked him if I ordered pepper steak because besides scotch bonnet peppers (which I don't see) I have never had so many peppers in oxtail. He said well try it, it might not be bad.....All I am going to say is I tasted a small piece of meat and it had enough salt in it for like eight meals. It was just plain salty. No other flavor....just salt with a side of salt and an extra scoop of salt. I did not taste all spice, pimento, onion, garlic, nothing. JUST SALT. At that point it was established in the car that I had just spent $27 dollars to make myself drive to another sandwich place and get a sandwich and soup (which was awesome). Speaking of soup. When we finally got home my husband opened his soup and was like yeah we are never going back there.
