Restaurant Review: Sausage & Meat
Decorated in a clean, low-key style with a bar, two dining areas and a deli counter for take-home sausages and sauces, S&M seems like your typical neighborhood drop-in restaurant.
Slater’s 50/50 is a popular casual restaurant where the featured burgers are 50 percent beef and 50 percent bacon and the atmosphere occasionally resembles a frat-house party. So it’s a little surprising that Slater’s parent group opened a rather serious foray into the hyper-carnivorous lifestyle.
Sausage & Meat, which also goes by the mocking moniker of S&M, is in University Heights across the street from the terrific BFD (Big Front Door) and near the vintage clothing store Frock You. Obviously, word games appear to be on the minds of local entrepreneurs.
But it’s more than linguistics that give S&M its appeal. The menu, while largely pork-centric, showcases a range of exotic meats such as kangaroo, bison, alligator and boar, typically served as sausages, though occasionally appearing shredded in sliders; rounded into meatballs; sliced for meat and cheese boards; or roasted, braised, or fried. Chicken, rabbit and lamb are typically available, as are pretzels, deviled eggs, salads and donuts.
S&M has perfected its recipe for Hungarian kielbasa and smoked Italian sausage. Ditto for venison meatballs, the glorious hickory-smoked and honey-Sriracha bacon, the crisp cauliflower salad and an extraordinary pork-belly sandwich. Still in need of attention are a few of the dozen or so types of sausage that can be so intensely flavored as to be overwhelming. However, when those strongly flavored sausages are put on a bun and piled high with cucumber slaw, roasted peppers or fried pepperoni, even the most powerful among them turns mild and delicious.
Decorated in a clean, low-key style with a bar, two dining areas and a deli counter for take-home sausages and sauces, S&M seems like your typical neighborhood drop-in restaurant. That it’s devoted to seasonal cooking, exotic meats and some delightful food makes it a place to visit.
Patrons: There’s a bit of a drinking crowd here, but those folks are clearly outnumbered by the eating crowd. Diners are mostly youngish and hail from the neighborhood.
Service: Service is very friendly. Patrons order at a front counter, but the menu requires a lot of explaining so that the wait can grow long. Once seated at your table, you have the choice of putting up a sign that indicates you want service or prefer to be left alone.
Parking: Street parking.
Noise: Loud to very loud, except in the outdoor dining area.
Special diets: This is a place aimed squarely at the curious carnivore.
Details: 4130 Park Blvd. (University Heights), 619-344-2177. Open for lunch and dinner daily and for brunch on Saturday and Sunday. At dinner, prices for small bites range $5-$8 and for more substantial items $8-$18. Full bar.
