It's been a couple of weeks now since Freebirds and Quaker Steak & Lube opened during a three-day span. Since then, I've fielded quite a few questions about Quaker Steak & Lube and not that many about Freebirds.
This is predictable, of course. Freebirds, a restaurant chain that originated in Texas, is a known quantity. Waco's Quaker Steak & Lube is the first of its kind in Texas, so very few people knew what to expect and even fewer had encountered The Lube.
Well, by way of explanation, I can relate that Monday night was just about the best kind of night to enjoy Quaker Steak & Lube and a good example of how the new place fits in our restaurant scene just right.
Monday night, I helped my buddy Jason Orts celebrate his birthday as a bunch of us sat at the garage bar at Quaker Steak & Lube drinking beer, scarfing an assortment of bar food and simultaneously watching the Packers-Seahawks game with passing interest and the Rangers-A's, which felt like a playoff game.
Since it was his birthday, Orts treated himself to a few Lube Tubes, which is a yard-long cylinder of beer. We didn't let him down all those by himself — actually Quaker Steak & Lube won't allow one person to order one. But we had finished off three of them by the time I left, so you do the math. At least we paced ourselves.
From my seat, the haut parm wings were delicious and the Rangers came from behind to win on Adrian Beltre's ninth-inning, walk-off single. So it was a good night.
With the Rangers closing out their third-straight American League West division title, it appears as if there are going to be a few more intense Ranger-watching nights ahead of us. I'll definitely move the location around town, but Quaker Steak & Lube is tough to beat for that purpose.
One more bite: On this same subject, my buddy Caleb Roberts texted me Friday night, as I was covering high school football, that he was loving eating wings and watching the Baylor game at Quaker Steak & Lube.
