Barbecue Bonanza at Badlands Bar-B-Que in Norco

 Badlands Bar-B-Que

120 Hidden Valley Parkway D

Norco, CA 92860

When I started this restaurant review site back in 2009, the best barbecue you could get in Southern California was probably from Lucille's or Wood Ranch. Both of these restaurants are still really quite popular, most nights they still have a wait for a table. Fast forward thirteen years, and the barbecue landscape has changed. 

A new generation of barbecue restaurants has opened up in the last couple of years. The better ones were opened by people that went to Texas and other parts of the country to learn from the legendary pitmasters in those regions. They brought their techniques and tricks back with them here and opened up their own restaurants to share what barbecue should taste like. Heritage BBQ, Evan's Smokehouse, and Jav's BBQ come quickly to mind. 

I'm not really sure about the history behind Norco's Badland's Bar-B-Que. Their website is pretty informative but is lacking when it comes to the history of this restaurant. I know that they opened their doors in 2014 and it's run by Greg Wolcott. They have a very impressive four-and-a-half star rating on Yelp, with well over 1000 reviews posted. They are open every day from 11 to 8, except Mondays when they are closed. This was enough for Katie and me to meet our, good friends, Ozker and Bianca, and their wonderful daughters for a much overdue visit to Badlands. 

We arrived at the restaurant on a recent Saturday at 5. Badlands is located close to the corner of Hamner and Hidden Valley Parkway, in the same shopping plaza as Hobby Lobby, Floor & Decor, and McDonald"s. The restaurant is bigger and busier than it appears from the outside. Ordering is done at the counter, and then the food is brought out to you. 

The menu is divided into sections of appetizers, salads, sandwiches, burgers, sides, and of course the meats. They offer brisket, pulled pork, baby back ribs, chicken, and hot links. They come as plates or two to three-item combo plates. Want to try some meat but don't have a huge appetite? Badlands also sells quarter-pound tastes of all their meats so it's easier to get the full experience here. A really nice feature, which I wish more barbecue restaurants would adopt. Let's check out the grub we got on this early evening. 

We started big with this Big Daddy Sampler ($30). It comes with four baby back ribs, a quarter pound of brisket, pulled pork, and hotlink, four wings, onion straws, fried pickles, and spicy ranch. This platter might be a great way for someone visiting Badlands for the first time to get aquatinted with the place. The ribs were pretty solid, with plenty of meat on them that pulled away with just a little tug. They were glazed with a layer of slightly sweet sauce and possessed a lovely pink smoke ring encasing the tender meat underneath the bark. The pulled pork had nice varied bites with chopped skin and equal parts lean and fatty shards, but it was a tad on the dry side. The wings were nicely flavored, but the drumette that I had was a tad overdone. The flats were the much better option this evening  The brisket was fine, but the two slices I had on this platter were too lean, and I needed a bit more bark to enhance the flavor of the meat. The sausage had pleasing grill marks and might have soaked up the most smoke flavor of the meats on this sampler. I really enjoyed the fried pickles and onion straws. The pickles were cut into small slices with an evenly coated breading surrounding each pickle chip. They went great with the provided ranch, which was not spicy, but still did the trick. 

I can never have enough meat, as evident by my entree, the Triple Threat Combo Platter ($27). For my three proteins, I went with the baby back ribs, the brisket, and the jalapeno cheddar link. The ribs were just as good as on the platter, sauced perfectly with plenty of tender meat underneath, With this serving of brisket I got more bark and some fat which helped elevate this portion. There were still some bites that were a bit dry and lacked flavor, but there were also some forkfuls that showed real promise. The hotlink was good, but it needed more of both the cheddar and the jalapeno to help waken things up. It just tasted like the regular link, which was not bad, but when you are promised cheese and jalapeno, you get a little let down when it doesn't pop. I've had some really good luck with mac and cheese at barbecue restaurants lately, and that held true at Badlands. This version was topped with jalapeno and bacon and then sprinkled with a few breadcrumbs. The jalapeno did not stand out, but there was enough cheese and bacon on this to make up for it. The garlic mashed potatoes had a nice whipped consistency but needed some more garlic. 

Katie also went the combo meal route with this Double Trouble Combo Meal ($21). She had the brisket and pulled pork, with potato salad and chipotle corn on the cob as her sides. Her brisket was even better than the one on the platter and the one that I had. Very tender, with plenty of the great-tasting bark. She was a fan of the potato salad, which she claimed tastes just like it could have been made for a family picnic. Probably not her family, because they can't cook, but maybe somebody else's family. The corn on the cob was a nice change of pace with a healthy sprinkling of cotija cheese. Everyone else really loved the cornbread at Badlands, but I'm not much of a fan of cornbread, unless it's extra sweet, like the one at Marie Callender's.  

Finishing up this visit was Ari's dinner, the Badlands Potato ($12). This good-sized spud was topped with cheese, bacon, sour cream, butter, chives, and your choice of pulled pork, chicken, or brisket. I'm not entirely sure which protein she went with, but she could not finish this huge loaded potato. She was probably in a hurry to go home and chat with her boyfriend or create a new Tik Tok dance or something. 

I know I was a little too critical with my review of Badlands, but that just goes to show how far we have come in the barbecue game in Southern California. Five to ten years ago this would have been considered outstanding barbecue, but these days it would be classified as good barbecue. I wish it was a little more consistent. Katie's brisket was way better than what I had for my meal or the platter that we started with. I was also hoping that the flavors would pop a bit more. It seemed that everything that had jalapeno kind of fell flat. Not awful, but when you are expecting some heat, it's disappointing when you don't get it in any bites. On a positive note, Badlands is one of the most modestly priced barbecue restaurants we have been to in a long while. That opening platter was only $30 and could have easily fed two to three people. Combos were under $30, which is $10 less than what Lucille's charges, for way more inferior barbecue. Badlands is definitely a step in the right direction from where we were just five years ago. 

Out of five pheasants, (because Badlands National Park is located in South Dakota, a state where the state bird and state food are both listed as pheasant, and maybe the perfect idea for another barbecued meat choice), five being best to zero being worst,  Badlands Bar-B-Que gets 3 pheasants.

For more information about Badlands Bar-B-Que, head to their website by clicking here: https://www.badlandsbarbecue.com/