Okay, we’re starting off our Spinal Rib tour today and I thought a great place to start would be at one of my favorite barbecue restaurants in Peoria: The Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern!
I love their food there but I don’t think I’ve ever had their ribs, in fact I was thinking last week, I haven’t really ever ordered a rib dinner on the blog, at least that I can remember! Well all that changes today as we begin our first week of this saucy tour!
Saucy? Hmmm…oh, boys, do you mind starting us off with a song?
Nice! I That’s going to be our theme song for the next eleven weeks!
And now, off we go to our first stop on this ribtacular tour, the Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern!
Here we are at Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern in beautiful downtown Peoria.
The menu is posted outside and ribs are definitely a star of this show! Let’s go in and start week number one of this rib-snacking tour!
Here’s the foyer with the Blue Duck sign hanging on the wall.
As I stroll down the front hallway leading into the restaurant I have to take a photo of the fox with pipe and hat that always makes me think of this scene from Best In Show!
As I walk up to the elevated dining area I see a familiar back of the head…
It turns out it two heads and it’s our two special guest stars for this first week of our rib eating tour, on the right is Terry Grawey and on the left is his grandson, Connor!
Here’s a proper shot of them as I sat down in the booth. As you can see, Grandpa Terry hasdriven young Connor to drink. I know the feeling, Connor…I know the feeling!
Terry is running for Peoria Township Assessor and MBIP is happy to endorse him for that position. There will be more about this as voting time gets closer, stay tuned!
Great to have both of them along for this first week of sampling ribs!
These two pretty women are sisters and they both work here!
Kristin on the left is our friendly waitress and Kuryn was working behind the bar. Kristin has appeared on the blog in the past and it was great to see her and her sister!
We started off with an order of their chicken wings, which are some of the best chicken wings in Peoria. We’re off to quite a flavorful start today!
After the wings, I abandoned Terry and Connor to get some shots of the restaurant.
Here’s the tables and booths up in the front and a colorful menu adorns the front wall as you walk in.
There’s both sides of the bar and the many beers on tap available at the bar.
Tables and chairs line the wall opposite the bar and there’s a shot of the entire bar from the elevated dining room.
I ran into the owner of Blue Duck, Tony and he posed for a shot with Kristin.
He said business has been great and it was wonderful to see him and chat for a while. He’s a friendly fellow and always a pleasure to see him!
Meanwhile, back at our table, our main courses have arrived!
Connor got an order of Mac and Cheese, Terry got the Wedge Salad and i got a Half a Rack of the Dry-Rubbed Wings with a side of the Bacon Potato Salad.
Everything looks fabulous and I can’t wait to dig in to those fantastic looking ribs!
And here I go on the maiden voyage of rib eating on this eleven week tour!
These are dry-rubbed ribs and they are pigs belly ribs. They are so tender and juicy and the dry rub is a tasty and zingy seasoning. They are bursting with flavor!
And if you like your ribs with a little sauce they have two different sauces at the table and other flavors are available for a slight charge.
These sauces added a nice additional flavor level and these ribs are some of the best I’ve ever had, it’ll be tough to top these on the tour!
There’s Terry sampling a rib and Connor is wondering if I’ll ever stop taking photos!
I will say that Connor is one of the best behaved young boys I’ve ever had the pleasure of being around. He patiently sat there in his seat and spoke when he was spoken to and let Terry and I converse without making a peep. He was a wonderful addition to our lunch!
Thanks to Connor and Terry for joining me on this first week and to Kristin, Kuryn, Tony and everyone at the Blue Duck Barbecue for the wonderful service and tasty food!
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The Rating
In true Spinal Tap fashion, this rating scale goes from one to eleven!
These ribs were very tasty and fall off the bone tender. I loved the dry-rub seasoning and their sauces were tangy and delicious, these ribs get a very high rating of 10.4! These will be hard to beat, but we’ll see!
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212 SW Water Street
Peoria
309-981-5801
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Related Post: Palate Cleanser @: Las Delicias.