Island Style BBQ
2245 W. Columbia AvenueIt’s been a pretty slow week at work. The colleague I typically work with is on vacation and we’ve been short staffed in our other office so they haven’t sent anyone to work with me. On the plus side, it means I’ve been on my own around lunch time so I can be a little more adventurous in seeking out places.
I was in Battle Creek earlier this week and needed to kill a few hours. I was sitting downtown and trying to think of a place that I haven’t been to yet that I keep seeing delicious looking pictures from on the Battle Creek Carryout Club Facebook group.
I wasn’t having a ton of luck so I decided to try the Eats BC website. At least there I knew I could put in an online order for whatever I found.
There were a few options on that website but BBQ sounded good and Island Style BBQ is the one that won me over.
Island Style BBQ is on the corner of Columbia Avenue and Helmer Road on the west side of Battle Creek. The small restaurant is in the Plaza West strip mall across Helmer Road from the Meijer .
I used Eats BC to put in my order but the restaurant is counter service with the menu written on a chalkboard hanging off to the side. . Had I know, I probably would have just walked in an ordered but using the online ordering was much easier.
There is a small dining area off to the side of the order counter. Colorful metal furniture and oceans scene paintings are used for the “Island” vibe.
There was a lot on the menu that sounded good to me but I ordered the chicken wings.
I picked three wings which are wood smoked and have a delicious brown, smoke colored appearance to them. They’re not very big but they are whole wings. The flavor of the wings is fantastic. I only ordered three because I thought they’d be a little bigger at $10 but you really only get about three bites of meat off each wing. I get it…chicken is expensive. What these wings lack in size they make up for in flavor.
You get a choice of Jerk or BBQ sauce with the wings. I picked both the Sweet Carolina BBQ sauce and the Signature Jerk sauce. I only used the Jerk sauce since there were only three wings. The disappointing part of this was there was an upcharge for it. It’s their “signature” sauce so I was a little bummed to have to pay extra for it but I knew I had to try it. The sauce it really thin and has some of the veggies used to make it still floating in the cup. There was quite a bit of the sauce in the cup and since I was eating on the hood of my car, I basically decided to dip the wings in to it instead of dumping it over the chicken. The sauce was delicious to the point I thought I about drinking it. It wasn’t super spicy when it was on the wings but I don’t think it would have been the same if I tried to just eat it straight.
I clicked on the wrong option when I ordered and got the wings without a side. I missed there was an option to get a small side.
Instead, I ordered a medium side of mac & cheese. The medium size could be a meal for some people. I’m a little bigger than some people so it worked good but there is a lot of macaroni stuffed into that plastic container. The mac & cheese was pretty standard. Nothing made it stand out but it was tasty and very filling.
The cost of the meal was about $16 before the tip.
Island Style BBQ is a little different than most BBQ places that focus on ribs and sweet, sticky sauces. The thin, soup like jerk sauce Island Style offers is really good. Instead of pork ribs, they do beef short ribs which I bet that sauce is really good on.
The food from Island Style is really tasty. I know prices are high right now and that’s out of the restaurants control so I’m not faulting them for that. I spent a little more than I wanted to but I can’t complain too much about a delicious meal. There’s a lot of other Caribbean inspired options that I didn’t get this time to make Island Style BBQ a place worth checking out.
SW Michigan Dining 