Royal Swine BBQ
802 W. Michigan AvenueAnother day. Another trip to Lansing.
I had to meet a co-worker for a fairly quick job assignment in the afternoon near downtown Lansing. Those days are pretty easy. There’s just a lot of driving involved.
I had nothing in the morning so I took my time getting over there. I always look for places to eat when I’m out of town but I’ve been in Lansing so much recently, I’ve exhausted most of the places I’ve had queued up.
Instead of going all the way to Lansing to eat…and writing another blog about a Lansing restaurant, I had another idea.
How about I stop in Marshall? There are a couple of places there that have been on my list for a while and it’s been a couple of months since I’ve been in that area. Plus, it’s not much of a detour off I-69 on the way to Lansing.
I picked a place that I’ve been trying to find a reason to go to Marshall for.
Royal Swine is on Michigan Avenue and Plum Street west of downtown Marshall. The building and parking lot are really small. I had the same problem when I stopped at this place several years ago when it was a Speedy Chick. You just kind of have to make a parking spot. I pulled as close to the building as I could so a car could still drive behind me to get back to Michigan Avenue.
This place has undergone a total transformation from the outside to inside. Speedy Chick was kind of an old greasy chicken spot. Royal Swine has cleaned it up to give it a typical BBQ joint type of feel with a lot of black paint, farm animal accents, and neon signs.
The public area of the building is really, really tight. There’s enough room for an order counter and a menu written on a chalkboard next to it. There is not seating inside other than a bench to wait for your food but when someone else walked in to pick up an order, it felt really cramped.
I knew no matter what I ordered, I wasn’t going to be able to eat while driving but I would still have to eat in my car. There are some picnic tables outside but it was too cold and windy on the day I stopped in so car eating was the only choice.
I ordered a sliced brisket sandwich and an order of fries. The cost was a little over $16 after tax.
It didn’t take very long for the cashier to come out with a bag of food after I sat down to wait. I headed outside and broke open the box with the fries first. I figured I might as well eat them while they were hot and still crispy.
The fries are frozen, skin on restaurant style fries with a little bit of a spicy seasoning salt on them. They were fine and what I expect from this kind of fry. I could have used some BBQ sauce to dip them in but I didn’t want to make a huge mess of myself knowing I was eating in the car and that doesn’t always end well for me.
The sliced brisket sandwich came out much bigger than I expected. There was a big handful of peppery, smoky, tender brisket on a hearty bakery bun with just a bit of the Royal Sweet BBQ sauce. Brisket done the right way is one of my favorite guilty pleasures. Once I picked this sandwich up, I couldn’t put it down. The meat was that kind of brisket that just melts when you bite in to it.
I got exactly what I was hoping for on this trip to Royal Swine BBQ. Delicious, tender, smoky meat. I’ve all but given up on my backyard BBQ adventures because I just don’t have the time between work and the kids activities to throw a brisket on the smoker for 17 hours. This is way easier and way better. Definitely worth a hop off I-69 or I-94 if you’re traveling through the area.
SW Michigan Dining 