Player's Bar and Grill

Today’s adventure takes us a bit further down the road than usual.  We dined at the Players Club in Augusta.  First impressions were average.  The décor was very similar to that of any other bar, dive, or grille we have eaten at.  To be honest it reminded me of Moonraker east with the video games and .25 cent machines that your kids drive you crazy because the MUST HAVE the toy out of it only to lose or break it before you leave the restaurant.

Service was good.  I was more than impressed with the waitress and her timeliness and refills.  She did a wonderful job of taking orders and got everything correct.  Too often people forget the importance of wait staff and the impression they can leave on a customer.  SERVICE 3.5 stars

For an appetizer I shared an order of wings with “FOT.”  We shared the 12 wings because that was the minimum order that could be made in order to get two different sauces.  Although the wings were a breaded, frozen wing they were good.  Upon asking we discovered that all the wing sauces were made at the establishment.  I tried the Kentucky Bourbon sauce.  It was good, but sweet for my taste.  I will give them some credit though they did inspire me to tinker with a bourbon baked bean recipe, and also a bourbon barbeque sauce over the next several days.  (Which was good, but needs some tweaking of it own)

For my entrée I had a Spicy bacon burger with hot pepper bacon and pepper jack cheese.  It came with a pile of fresh made curly fries.  The food was average though.  The burger was a hand made patty that was made fresh and would have been good, but tasted like the cook dumped a container of garlic powder on it.  There was definitely something wrong with it as the flavor followed me for several hours after leaving the establishment.  The hot pepper bacon was good, and did not over-power the rest of the burger (although I wished it would have).  The bun was excellent!!!  It was fresh and you could tell it was made either on-site or at a local bakery.  The hand cut curly fries were a good touch, but in my opinion the only was to cook fresh fries is to double fry them.  These were not and got a little soggy or rubbery which is what happens if you only cook them once. FOOD 2 stars

Overall, I wanted to like this place a lot.  It had a lot of positives with both the waiting staff and the food especially since they were taking the extra effort to make things themselves instead of buying the premade frozen substitutes.  There are several negatives, but they could be corrected relatively easy.  The Players’ Club Grille is headed in the right direction, but still needs some tweaking.  OVERALL 2.5 stars

~TFM~

The Players Grill in Augusta is a sports bar that I had been to once prior several years ago.  I don't remember what I ate or how the experience was so I thought it would be good for our weekly foray.

The menu has lots of interesting choices.  I ended up going with the Whiskey River Chicken Sandwich and ordered a side of Teriyaki chicken wings.  The wings were good, not stupendous, but were not your typical breaded and dipped variety.  They were what I consider to be real wings, no batter, just good meat and flavor.  The sandwich wasn't bad but not exactly impressive.  Made with a homemade Whiskey River Bar-B-Q sauce, it was good but I wouldn't order it again.  Fries were good, not the typical frozen type.  Food gets 3 out of 5 stars from me.

Service was great.  The waitress was courteous, prompt and competent.  She seemed familiar with the menu and answered any questions we had regarding ingredients. She even laughed at the lame jokes the midget and fat Mexican were dishing out.  Service gets 3.75 stars from me

Overall a 3.5 rating from me and I would go back again for sure.

TFOT