Chef Lance's on Phillips

Chef Lance's on Phillips is a restaurant that has been on my hit-list for a while now and my wife and I finally got the opportunity to try it the other night. It comes highly recommended and it continues to win all sorts of awards every year. Most recently, it just won the second annual Downtown Pork Showdown which means they have won it both years the competition has taken place. That is all you need to know when you are wanting to try a new restaurant out. To start, the location is great as it is downtown. So you have the ability to go shopping or get drinks somewhere else before or after you have dinner. I would recommend you book a reservation at minimum a week in advance if you are wanting a prime dinner time on a weekend, they are that booked up! We arrived for our reservation at 7:00 and walking into the restaurant you can just feel the authenticity of the place. It's that feeling you get when you walk in and just know, you are about to have a fantastic meal. After sitting down and ordering a local beer for myself and glass of wine for my wife, I began to look through the menue. Lots of different options but my eyes kept coming back to the dish that recently won them the Downtown Pork Showdown: Bourbon-braised baby back pork ribs with smoked cherry BBQ sauce on a bed of white cheddar and fresh herb grits. That sentence alone makes me want go back and eat it again. I put my order in and before long the food showed up. It looked as good as I hoped it would and I did not hesitate to dig in. The rib meat feel off the bone but still had a little bit of pull on it which is a sign of ribs being cooked perfectly. The sauce had a nice smokey flavor to them which was a very smart decision by the chef as the ribs were not cooked in a smoker. The cherry flavor came through in the sauce but was not overpowering in sweetness, it was just perfect. Having it sit on a better of white cheddar and herb grits is the knockout punch. Great salty pairing to go with the sweetness of the ribs. As full as we were, of course my wife still wanted to see a dessert menue which I am usually not interested in. But after having that good of a meal, I had to at least take a look at the dessert opitons. We went with a classic, Crème brûlée. Once again, a fantastic dessert that had the staple "crack" you are looking for when you dig into it. Not burnt on the top, torched to perfection! Overall, I give the experience and meal a 9.2/10. Hats off to the chef, Lance!