“[If
you hear a] story about how eating sausage leads to anal cancer, you will be
skeptical, because it has never happened to anyone you know, and sausage, after
all, is delicious.”
---David
McRaney
HARDY’S
BEST BBQ
12903
Moorpark Street
Studio
City, CA 91604
818-761-3830
2:00
PM to 7:30 PM Saturday and Sunday
(Yes, that’s it!)
No
Web Site
If
you don’t know about this, and no one recommends it, you will never find this
place. And, if you live in the area, you
might be missing something. This
operation is in a small neighborhood market that has stood on the corner of
Coldwater Canyon and Moorpark for years.
The smoker is out in the parking lot so the smell of the smoking meat
greets you when you drive in. Yes, there
is a single picnic table between the smoker and the market entrance, but this
is strictly take-out. Go into the market
and order at the meat and deli counter.
The
menu is simple. You can order one or two
meat combo plates with two sides, sandwiches with one side, half a chicken with
or without sides, or individual sausages.
Your choices are Pulled Pork, Beef Ribs, Baby Back Ribs, Tri-Tip,
Brisket, Chicken and Chicken or Pork Sausage.
The hot sides are Corn-On-The-Cob, Baked Potato or Spanish rice. The cold sides are any of the salads from the
deli case.
We
ordered two combo plates, Sharon’s with Beef Ribs and Baby Back Ribs, and mine
with Tri-tip and Chicken. I also ordered
a couple of Sausages. All the deli
salads looked good but most had some kind of bell pepper or onion in them so
Sharon ordered a Baked Potato and a Fruit Salad. I ordered that Coleslaw and some of the great
looking Red Potato Salad. There were
other people ordering at the same time and here we had a problem. It seems that a little confusion happened
behind the counter since when we got home Sharon discovered that her plate had
Brisket and Chicken and mine had Tri-tip and Baby Back Ribs. It wasn’t really a problem since I wanted to
try the Brisket anyway, and all the combo plates are the same price, but it was
annoying and I’ll bet the other customer was surprised when he discovered that
he had Beef Ribs and not Brisket.
Baby
Back Ribs
These
ribs certainly looked right, properly smoked.
While they seem to be a little dry, they were not tough and the flavor
was so good that a bit of dryness could be forgiven. They are not the best baby backs I’ve ever
had and definitely not fall-off-the-bone tender, but not bad.
Brisket
It’s
not exactly the Texas style brisket I consider the standard of excellence but
it’s juicy, tender and flavorful. I
would prefer a bit more smoke in the flavor, and maybe it could use a bit more
rub and definitely cooked not quite as long, but unless your mother is a Texas
pit master it’s probably better than the brisket you grew up with. (Assuming your mother made brisket.)
Tri-tip
This
is a good, well smoked, flavorful, tender tri-tip. They slice it a bit thinner than I would
prefer, but it is still juicy and not over cooked with a nice smoke ring. While not destination que, I would call this
better than simply competent tri-tip.
Chicken
Maybe
it was because we were there an hour before closing, but the chicken seemed to
have been in the smoker too long. It was
definitely a bit dry, but you couldn’t argue that it had been smoked and it did
taste good. It was annoying that we were
not given a choice of white meat or dark.
All we got was legs and thighs.
We would have preferred white meat.
Pork
Sausage
One
look tells you that this is an in-house made sausage. It is not hot but well spiced, with a
delightful combination of herbs. It is
flavorful and juicy. Great sausage Italian
style! They also have chicken sausage if
you don’t eat pork. Of course, then one
wonders why you would be reading a blog dedicated to barbeque.
Coleslaw
The
coleslaw is more than competent. It is a
shredded two cabbage with carrots and herbs slaw that is just the way I like
it. And, best of all, for a deli counter
slaw, it is not too wet.
Red
Potato Salad
It
has just the right sized potato chunks with onions, cilantro with a mayonnaise
dressing with a touch of mustard and other seasonings. It is well balanced and smooth without being
over mixed. Again, this is a salad from
a deli counter. How can you go wrong?
Baked
Potato
It’s
just a baked potato, so what can go wrong?
Well, that’s the problem. It’s
just a baked potato, that’s all. Beside,
this is takeout and the potatoes have a range limitation. If you drive too far to get home they get
cold. We had to pop it into the
microwave for a few seconds when we got home, and then we had to add our own
toppings.
Fruit
Salad
Another
deli counter salad consisting of chunks of watermelon, cantaloupe, casaba melon,
pineapple and apples. It was fresh,
moist but nothing special yet refreshing when paired with all the meat.
Hardy’s
Best BBQ is probably one of the best kept secrets in the Valley. They have been doing this on weekends for twenty-eight
years and we just found out about it yesterday.
Some of the meats and sides are quite good, but the rest of the meat was
mediocre and the mixing up of the orders and the baked potato left us with some
negative feelings. Although maybe we should let it stay a secret,
overall we give it a seven.
