Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon

Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon
Several locations in the US
1271 US Highway 22 (Location visited)
Bridgewater, NJ

Did I mention I ate a lot of beef on this trip? Similar to my post yesterday where I went to Famous Dave’s BBQ for meat, on my last night in New Jersey, I decided to go for meat, again – this time in the form of a steak. Lone Star Steakhouse was the place I ended up going just because it happened to be on the way from my customer’s site back to the hotel. But, being a chain restaurant, I was sure there will be some gotchas. The question was instead if these were tolerable…

Now, now, I mentioned “gotchas” because Lone Star isn’t a high-end restaurant. In fact, it wasn’t even my first option: that “honour” will go to Char Steakhouse. So, why I did not go there? Since I was on business, that meant I was under a budget on how much I could spend on meals per day. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to check their prices on-line which made my decision difficult (*). Should I take a plunge to find out? Also, being on the higher end, what about somebody taking pictures, not to mention how packed full it might be? Recession? What recession? There were too many variables to consider – plus one that I will mention in the end – and, reality is, I wasn’t in thinking mood. So, in the end, I just went for the easy way out, i.e., Lone Star.

(*) It wasn’t until I came back and did further digging that I found out the cost of one of a meal: with sides, a drink and tips, it would have blown my meal budget…

Did I mention I was not in thinking mode? Well, when I walked in, they asked me if I wanted one of their bucket of peanuts. Yup, they have peanuts in buckets as appetizers too. I am not sure if it would have been in addition to the bread above. Regardless, somehow I said “no”. What? A food blogger saying “no” to an opportunity to take a picture of food? After I realized what I said, I thought I should have killed myself… But, back to the bread. The waitress mentioned the name/component of the bread that made it chocolate coloured but, because of the background noise, I couldn’t really hear what she said. As for the bread itself, it was surprising it was still warm and, when I spread the butter, it melted nicely. The taste was… Strange. It did not have that bland white bread taste but had some undertones I couldn’t identify. Regardless, it was OK not something I would die for.

Before I go to the actual steak, first the sides I ordered, starting with the creamed spinach which was topped with some cheese and broiled. It wasn’t actually that bad, despite there wasn’t too much spinach taste left. How come it is good still? It was creamy and rather than overpower any other side (or the steak itself), it was able to complement the rest. I would order this as a side again.

I must apologize for this really odd picture. In fact, for most of the pictures in this post, as the lightning conditions (again, a common theme on this trip) were somewhat challenging. Back to the picture above, it is supposed to be a baked sweet potato. One part that really threw me off was that it had a huge dollop of butter plus a generous serving of brown sugar on top. Sure, they asked me if I wanted that (and I foolishly said yes – second time that night!) but, do you really need it? It is not called *sweet* potato for nothing! Anyway, I ended up scrapping the butter and sugar out and ate what was left. And, reality is, the sweet potato was actually quite good on its own. That extra butter and sugar was not required at all.

Not knowing how much food I was getting, I decided to order one additional side in the form of mushroom and onion. I won’t say much more about it other than it was OK. I guess 2 out of three wasn’t that bad, eh?

And finally, the steak itself…

Behold, Lone Star’s Delmonico steak, a “12 oz. classic marbled ribeye”. I know the picture is not the prettiest but there are reasons behind it. See, in the last couple of months, based on some feedback, I have learned to take a picture of the food “as delivered” and, depending on what was ordered, might take additional shots. Obviously, that is not the case. Why? After I received my order, I was asked to cut the steak open to ensure it is cooked the way I wanted it. The part I cut it at first was a bit too too red to be medium-rare but it was OK for me. But, as I kept eating the other part of the meat was medium rare pink. Add that “puddle” of juice at the bottom of the plate translates into a piece of steak that wasn’t rested before being delivered. While that is something I can deal with to an extent, there is one thing that failed: Notice that piece of fat at the bottom right of the second picture? Yup it was actually a blob. While I want my steak to be fatty to a certain point, I do not want it to be as fat as that. As for the taste of the steak, while it did not require some side sauces, it wasn’t too outstanding.

In the end, there is something I must keep in mind. The steak was $19, not that bad considering it came with two sides. While it is not Brave Bull’s House of Steak type of steak, I must understand there will be some limitations. Still, I believe it could have been better. Which now circles back to Char. Again, I knowingly chose not to go there and then there is a marketing component behind it. Some time ago, fellow blogger o-toro of F o o d o s o p h y wrote a post on Chop, a steakhouse in Edmonton, which started strong but started to fail almost miserably afterwards. One noticeable marketing gimmick (for the lack of word for it) was their claim of cooking the steaks at 1800F – a claim also made by Char. That post was in a way lingering in the back of my head which in an unconscious way made me go to Lone Star instead. In my case, while I was not necessarily fulfilled, my stomach was full and seeing families gathered around the table enjoying their meal means something.

Tagged under: New Jersey • Steaks