WV Gourmet

Fathead’s is a great bar/restaurant on Pittsburgh’s South Side.  Not only does Fathead’s have an insane beerlist, their staff is knowledgeable about beer, AND they have great bar food.  It’s pretty much the greatest place in the world. 

The food:  They have an extensive menu of sandwiches (or headwiches, as they call them) and burgers, as well as generous sized appetizers and chicken wing flavors.  On my most recent trip, I went with an appetizer of five wings and the Double D.  For the wings I went with Fathead’s Original (their version of the classic Buffalo sauce).  They were very big and meaty with a crispy exterior and a good dose of very spicy Buffalo sauce.  My sandwich headwich was the Double D, which the menu describes as follows:   “Shaved Steak grilled with onions, mushrooms & hot peppers on top of hot sausage & pepperoni.  With tomato sauce, provolone and parmesan cheese.  Buy two, who wouldn’t want a pair of Double D’s.”  This sandwich was every bit as big, unhealthy and DELICIOUS as it sounds.  I did not capture a photo of it because it was so large that you couldn’t fit it into a single picture.  I’m not kidding, it was bigger than my oversized head.  It came with homemade chips, which were also very good. 

A delicious mug of Brutal Bitter

The beer:  Even if Fathead’s didn’t have exceptional bar food, it is well worth the visit for the beer.  They boast 42 beers on tap, many of which are rotating selections.  Forty of those taps are devoted to microbrews/imports, while one is for Lite Beer From Miller and the other Yeungling Lager.  They also always have one beer served on cask.  For those of you who don’t know about cask conditioned beers, they are a rare treat which you can learn about here.  On this particular visit, Rogue Brutal Bitter was on cask, so I started off with that.  It was slightly warm (as a cask beer should be), had a great full mouthfeel with assertive, yet somewhat mellow hops.  I followed this up with Great Divide Fresh Hop Ale - a very assertively hopped pale ale from Colorado.  The grapefruity bitterness of this beer paired well with the fatty Double D.  I then tried a sample of the Sierra Nevada Brown Saison, which had nice raisin and funky flavor.  I closed out with the Oskar Blues Ten Fidy Imperial Stout.  Why is this beer called “Ten Fidy”?  Because it is 10.5% alcohol by volume.  This is one hell of a strong and tasty beer, with strong roasted coffee and dried fruit flavors, but also a strong hop character, in other words a damn fine beer.  

A lilliputian selection of taphandles.

After finishing the Ten Fidy, I went back to my hotel, turned on the TV and was asleep before 8 p.m.  The combination of a long day, some good football, the Double D, and some damn fine beers had worn me out.  I awoke the next morning, refreshed and ready to go to Pamela’s Diner for pancakes, but that is another story.

For a few short years, I lived in Pittsburgh.  I have made several trips back up there in the seven years since I moved away, but there are some places that, until recently, I had not been to since 2002.  One such place is Wings Suds & Spuds, located in Moon Township.  On a recent trip, I went there with my old pal Big Mike (a veteran of Wings Suds & Spuds) and Rob (a Wings Suds & Spuds virgin).

Wings Suds & Spuds has pretty much the best Buffalo style wings in the world.  They have other things on the menu,  but I have only ever had two things there: wings and fries. 

A half pound of delicious curly fries.

I will discuss the fries first, since they are brought out as an appetizer.  There is only one size order of fries: a half pound boat of fresh cut curly fries.  You will find two bottles on your table to accompany your fries.  One is a bottle of ketchup, the other is a squeeze bottle of white vinegar.  As usual, I doused my fries with vinegar and salt, put a little ketchup on the side and dug in with my plastic fork and made quick work of my half pound of fries.  Big Mike took it up a level and ordered a side of cheese sauce for his fries, which he also made quick work of.  Rob, being a Wings Suds & Spuds virgin, did not order any fries. 

Then came the wings.  They have many flavors, but for me there are only two: traditional hot and hot garlic.  On this evening, I went with traditional, but there are two modifications available on the menu, which I always make: “extra hot” and “extra wet”.  “Extra hot” is pretty obvious: extra hot sauce is added to the mix.  “Extra wet” means that they are served up in extra sauce.  I love lots of sauce.  The non-extra wet wings come to you swimming in about a quarter inch of sauce, which seems pretty excessive compared to the measly doses of sauce you get at other places.  The extra wet wings come to you in about a half inch of sauce, which makes for an excellent dip if you still have any fries left over.  The wings themselves are big.  I mean really big, not like the sparrow wings you get at some places.  These things may have been pulled off an emu.  They are cooked until the skin is crispy, which is more than I can say for some places.  The sauce has the perfect balance of hot and vinegary.  Big Mike, a native of Buffalo, has proclaimed this his favorite wing place in the Pittsburgh area, and I don’t disagree.

The place is tight and the parking lot is tighter.  I have never been there when it was not crowded, but it is worth the drive out of the city and a little wait.  The beer selection is nothing special.  I think it is pretty much Bud, Bud Light, IC Light, and Yeungling, but you don’t go there for the beer, you go there for the wings.  Another added bonus is that they have a fantastic piece of art on the wall.  Their logo is a chicken in a tracksuit, running while carrying a pitcher of beer and a tray of wings.  They have immortalized this logo in the form of a carpet mural, which hangs on the wall of the dining room.  Regretably, I did not snap a picture of this piece of art.

I used to frequent this place with The Bundick Brothers, who would always invoke the Bundick No Wipe Rule, whereby you could not use a napkin until you were finished eating.  It added a little extra excitement to the consumption of spicy, saucy dead chicken parts.  Upon my most recent visit, there were no Bundicks in attendance so wiping was allowed. 

Behold, the extra hot, extra wet.

I have now been to the Buffalo Wild Wings at Southridge.  My review is in the form of a series of haikus (or is the plural of haiku simply haiku?)

Crispy and large wings

Mango habenero sauce

Good but needs more sauce

For the side order

Undercooked buffalo chips

Ketchup was not Heinz

Service was spotty

Food came out at diff’rent times

But the beer was cold.