When we flew into Kansas City last week, getting in just in time for dinner, we were sorely tempted to go back to our favorite BBQ joint, Oklahoma Joe’s. In the pursuit of knowledge, however, we felt that we really needed to try somewhere new – you know, so we can say with authority where our favorite KC barbecue is. We’ve tried Gates, Smokestack and Joe’s, but we had never made it to one which is often touted as the best in the city: L.C.’s Bar-B-Q.

Located on the corner of Blue Parkway and Sni-a-Bar Road, just off of the eastern curve of 435, L.C.’s isn’t hard to find – there are even signs on the freeway to get you there. It’s not much to look at, and they don’t serve beer, so I would suggest getting takeout – that’s what almost everyone else was doing when we stopped in. If you eat in, though, you get a big bottle of extra sauce and plenty of paper towels.  We also got to eavesdrop on a really interesting conversation L.C. was having with another guy at the corner table.

I knew the servings would be generous, but we ordered plenty anyway: burnt ends, a sliced beef sandwich, fried okra, and baked beans. The sandwich came with fries as well, which were obviously cut in-house.

The burnt ends were fantastic, fatty and rich and doused in L.C.’s tart, cuminy sauce. They were served piled heavily on plain white bread, and pretty much needed to be eaten with a fork.

The beef sandwich was awesome, almost too big to bite into. The smoke ring on the beef was brilliant pink, and the meat was tender and flavorful. It was modestly sauced, which really gave the flavor of the smoked meat a chance to shine.

We love fried okra, and can hardly ever get it on the west coast. This was blazingly hot and crisp. The only thing I wished for was a dish of mayo or ranch dressing to dip it in.

And the baked beans! They were thick, sweet with molasses, and well studded with shredded beef. Some of the best beans I’ve had. I could easily make a meal of a bowl of these and some cornbread.

We ate about half of all this, and took the rest home to my in-laws’ house, where it all got eaten for lunch the next day. L.C. does not skimp on his servings. I would love to come back and get a vast amount of takeout from here, especially ribs, and have a proper feast with Boulevard beer and lots of napkins.

By the way, this post marks the end of NaBloPoMo! Posting may be a bit less frequent for a while, but I guarantee I won’t stop talking about food anytime soon.

We spent a short, but enjoyable time in Kansas City. It was tough figuring out where to go, though, because while KC has a rapidly growing food scene of great variety, it is still a wonderful place to get hunks of meat, whether barbecued, fried or broiled. We managed to work in a fair blend – here are the three best restaurant meals that we had in town.

First stop, straight from the airport: Oklahoma Joe’s BBQ. This is the real thing, let me tell you: the restaurant is set up in a strip mall adjacent to a gas station – in fact, the gas station store is in the restaurant. You order from the vast blackboard menu up at the kitchen, then pick up your food and a drink at the cashier. Then all you have to do is find a seat, not so easy. We got ourselves some Boulevard Wheat in plastic Budweiser cups, then ended up at the bar by the window, which had a good view of the parking lot and plenty of paper towels.

The ribs were fan-tas-tic. The pulled pork may have been the best I’ve ever eaten. The sauce was really good, with a little vinegar kick to it. And I really loved the barbecue beans, and the squishy white bread to mop them up. This place may be a bit more Carolina than Kansas City in its barbecue style, but I sure like it.

Breakfast the next morning was at the Bluebird Cafe up on Summit Avenue. I liked this place a lot, except for the waitstaff’s inclination to ignore anyone who walked in, apparently in the hope that they would then go away. The food was terrific, though. The cafe specializes in a blend of healthy/organic/local and serves breakfast, lunch and dinner – I’d love to come back for another meal.

J got the biscuits and gravy. The biscuits were perfect, and the gravy was full of mushrooms, herbs and big sausage chunks. I do believe it was the best biscuits and gravy I’ve ever tasted.

I got eggs benedict with vegetables, and it made me very happy indeed. It was built on whole wheat English muffins, and had a mix of onions, peppers, mushrooms and lots of capers. The hollandaise was very fresh and lemony, and misleadingly light. The coffee was really good, too.

For dinner that night, we went to 1924 Main, a place which is doing something really admirable: a menu that changes monthly, arranged as a three course prix fixe only (no a la carte menu), featuring midwest/Southern style cooking in a fine-dining format. J and I ordered the prix fixe with wine pairings included, and J’s aunt M just did the prix fixe.

First course: butterleaf salad for me, with shaved fennel and a slightly creamy dressing, paired with an Argentinian chardonnay/torrontes blend. Tomato soup for J, paired with a sparkling rose, and shrimp and grits for M, with a pile of sliced pickled green tomato. M said this was amazing, a sort of ultimate form of shrimp and grits.

Second course: flatiron steak for me, thinly sliced with some pickled shallot on top, served along with a “caprese” of fried green tomatoes and mozzarella, and a glass of Liberty school Cabernet. J and M both had the short ribs, with potatoes and fresh corn. The wine with that was a grenache/syrah blend. All was very tasty.

And thirdly: J was wise and got the cheese plate. It was very showy, served on a slab of rock with a nice splot of fig preserves. M got the deep fried oreos. I am not kidding, I swear. She ate them but I’m not sure she thought they were a good idea. Still, we figured one of us needed to try them. I got three scoops of ice cream, served with three different cookies. The vanilla ice cream was fine, with an oatmeal cookie that I didn’t even taste (I’m not big on oatmeal cookies without chocolate in them). The green tea ice cream was very good, served with a chocolate chip and hot pepper cookie that was very odd (and very spicy!). The prickly pear sorbet was kind of nasty (J and M made faces when they tasted it) and the cookie that came with it was chunky, grainy and had no flavor at all. When I mentioned it to the waiter, he cheerfully agreed that it was weird and he had no idea what was in it. Dessert is not, perhaps, this place’s strong point.

Over all, we were very happy with our meal and service, and I would definitely come here again.

P.S. I wish I had gotten a picture of this, but we couldn’t stop: there was a sign next to a very run-down, possibly abandoned place out in west Kansas City. It read: Southren [sic] Fried Chicken And More! Where you get what you pay for! Does that make your flesh crawl like it does mine?

Options for the day after Thanksgiving tend to be limited, assuming you’re not interested in hurling yourself into the shopping fray. When we spend the holiday in Kansas City we almost always do the same thing on Friday – go to an art museum. The Nelson-Atkins is awesome, of course, but it’s a lot of museum to get hit with at once. I prefer the Kemper Modern Art Museum, which is small, manageable – and free!

We spent the morning looking through the museum, the main exhibit being some rather odd works from East Germany, and I got to visit my favorite painting in the collection. We had lunch in the museum’s restaurant, which is called Cafe Sebastienne. It’s really pretty good, and a nice setting, too – most of the tables are in an open, glass-ceilinged courtyard so it’s very bright and airy.

J ordered the Arctic char with cauliflower puree, chard and a maple-bourbon sauce. He doesn’t usually go for fish in restaurants, but we were able to buy char at our local fish counter a few months ago and were very taken by it. This seemed nice, the fish was a little overcooked by my standards but the flavors were interesting.

I got a plate with a couple of Merguez sausages with lots of red peppers on a bed of couscous, and a heaping side of cooked spinach. The sausage was very dense and a bit gristly, but the overall effect was tasty and it got lots of vegetables in me (something I felt in need of at this point in the trip).

My in-laws got a pizza (excellent, I ate a piece) and a plate of linguine. J and I were rather thrilled to see that the wine list had a bottle of Lot 20 red blend from Bookwalter Winery, one of our favorite stops in the Tri-Cities area. It suited the lunch perfectly.

Afterwards, fortified, we headed for the gift shop!

The west coast has barbecue. Really, it does exist! I can’t claim to be a qualified BBQ connoisseur, but there are at least two good places to get real barbecued ribs and brisket within fifty miles of our house: one is the Skagit River Brewery, which does its own barbecue out back of the restaurant - I walk through the wonderful woodsmoke scent of it every morning. They do a very untraditional peach-jalapeño sauce that somehow works fantastically, and I’ve probably ordered their brisket sandwich at least two dozen times. Then there’s the Depot Smokehouse in Everett, which has got to be the best kept secret in Western Washington – it’s always mostly empty when we go and the food is just fantastic. Try the chili. And the pulled pork. Heck, try everything, you’ll like it.

Otherwise, I admit, the pickings are pretty slim. We were going to try a place in Burlington called Double Barrel BBQ, but it burned down the week we were going to go there. Most of the Seattle joints don’t get real good reviews – I liked that the OK Corral had collards on the menu but I didn’t care for the big jug of Kool-Aid that was the only beverage available. So you can see why we like visiting Kansas City!

Our Kansas and Missouri relatives are always good about making sure we get our BBQ fix when we visit. We used to get Gates takeout, but it’s frankly not my favorite. We once visited a Gates branch in person, and that didn’t really help – it combines all the joy of going to a standard American fast food restaurant with the added excitement of being yelled at (“WelcometoGatesmayItakeyourorderanyoneinline!”).

The last couple of times we’ve visited we’ve gone to Jack Stack Barbecue down in South Kansas City, and that’s my idea of good barbecue (I will cheerfully admit we need to try a whole lot more places to form an educated opinion – feel free to give suggestions!) Jack Stack is handy to where we stay, and they have an enormous menu that includes lamb ribs (which I have never seen anywhere else) and burnt ends. The beans and coleslaw are classic.

And what better to drink with barbecue than….

Another great thing on this trip was getting to taste some local beers! My mother-in-law recommended the Schlafly Pale Ale from St. Louis, and it was right up my alley (hops are my friend). J liked the Boulevard Stout pretty well, and we heard approving noises from the people drinking the Smoked Porter but I didn’t get around to trying it myself. Nice to know other parts of the country are doing good things with beer!