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Posted
On 10/20/2025 at 4:14 PM, Vegas64 said:

I had Sammy's downtown Dallas late last week for the first time in probably 10 years.

Wow. It's so bad.

Maybe I should have posted in the "how is this place still in business" thread. And that I would guess is a primo real estate location.

One of my closest friends owns Sammy's. It's never been BBQ on par with anybody that makes the Top 50 but it's a great location, a cool old food stamps grocery store, the family is wonderful (his mom and dad, who opened it in 1991, are now gone -- his sweetheart of a mom passed earlier this year) and the sides are still terrific. Best fried okra in town for my money. And it's relatively cheap. I stick to turkey sandwiches with a side of sausage, okra or potato salad, maybe the spinach. Apple pie is incredible too. I don't do pecan pie but I hear it's really good there.

They make a killing on events in the evenings such as rehearsal dinners, work deals, etc. It's not doing the numbers it did pre-COVID as downtown hasn't really rebounded as well as you'd hope but they sold the dirt to the Fed several years back and made a nice little bit of money.

Posted
25 minutes ago, C-Man said:

One of my closest friends owns Sammy's. It's never been BBQ on par with anybody that makes the Top 50 but it's a great location, a cool old food stamps grocery store, the family is wonderful (his mom and dad, who opened it in 1991, are now gone -- his sweetheart of a mom passed earlier this year) and the sides are still terrific. Best fried okra in town for my money. And it's relatively cheap. I stick to turkey sandwiches with a side of sausage, okra or potato salad, maybe the spinach. Apple pie is incredible too. I don't do pecan pie but I hear it's really good there.

They make a killing on events in the evenings such as rehearsal dinners, work deals, etc. It's not doing the numbers it did pre-COVID as downtown hasn't really rebounded as well as you'd hope but they sold the dirt to the Fed several years back and made a nice little bit of money.

So.....it's the El Fenix (on Field St.) of BBQ joints? I don't say that to be cheeky but that's the first comparison I thought of when you said it's kind of an old staple of Dallas, not gonna knock anyone's socks off with the food, but good location and does numbers on private events like rehersal dinners and Christmas parties.

Posted
58 minutes ago, C-Man said:

One of my closest friends owns Sammy's. It's never been BBQ on par with anybody that makes the Top 50 but it's a great location, a cool old food stamps grocery store, the family is wonderful (his mom and dad, who opened it in 1991, are now gone -- his sweetheart of a mom passed earlier this year) and the sides are still terrific. Best fried okra in town for my money. And it's relatively cheap. I stick to turkey sandwiches with a side of sausage, okra or potato salad, maybe the spinach. Apple pie is incredible too. I don't do pecan pie but I hear it's really good there.

They make a killing on events in the evenings such as rehearsal dinners, work deals, etc. It's not doing the numbers it did pre-COVID as downtown hasn't really rebounded as well as you'd hope but they sold the dirt to the Fed several years back and made a nice little bit of money.

That's cool.

Not every place is going to be Top 50 and not every place should try to be Top 50.  Communities need places that sell barbecue sandwiches for a fair price.    

Posted
9 minutes ago, Jerry Callo said:

That's cool.

Not every place is going to be Top 50 and not every place should try to be Top 50.  Communities need places that sell barbecue sandwiches for a fair price.    

Like this place when my kids were little: https://coltersbbq.com/

Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Vegas64 said:

So.....it's the El Fenix (on Field St.) of BBQ joints? I don't say that to be cheeky but that's the first comparison I thought of when you said it's kind of an old staple of Dallas, not gonna knock anyone's socks off with the food, but good location and does numbers on private events like rehersal dinners and Christmas parties.

I've never liked El Fenix so I cringe a little at the comparison. (But I grew in SAT.)

When Sammy's opened in 1991, Uptown was a ghetto. There was NOTHING down there. It basically sprung up around them, which is kind of wild. I moved to Dallas in '98 and started going there with my roommate. Met the owner's son (now my extremely close friend) through my ex-wife, who went to HPHS with him.

At one time, Sammy's was pretty good comparatively speaking before craft BBQ took off. It was better than Sonny Bryan's or Dickey's -- back when Dickey's was the OG location and maybe a dozen or so other places around town. And there wasn't much else. My buddy opened a second Sammy's in Preston Center that I helped him run for 18 months between newspaper and insurance careers. Like I said, my affinity for the Prichard family probably skews my feelings but that is about the nicest Highland Park family you will ever run across. The downtown Sammy's will always have a place in my heart as long as my buddy owns it.

Is the brisket world class? No. But it's not bad. And he's not charging $35-$40 per pound. And I stand by the sides -- baked potato casserole was practically invented there. The okra is legit as is the potato salad (if you like mayo potato salad -- I like to just a little bbq sauce to punch it up), onion rings are made from scratch (and to order) and Apple Pie is fanfuckingtastic. You can also eat lunch in there for less than $25, which has gotten impossible to do at many BBQ places in this state.

EDIT: /csb time. My buddy's parents used to be in the movie business. They used to do the low-budget type movies but they were ultimately put out of business by VHS. His grandfather (I think) produced Attack of the Killer Tomatoes or some shit like that. They used to own the Highland Park Theater. They went belly-up on that but his dad was a great backyard BBQ guy and his buddies said they'd stake him to open a place they could all hang out at. That's how Sammy's came about.

Edited by C-Man

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