J’Harvey’s BBQ
It was another Lunchtime Live! in downtown Kalamazoo but I had to make a run out to Portage on my lunch break.
I was still planning on getting back to the park in time to grab lunch. I had to take a co-worker down to a business on South Sprinkle Road way down by Romence Road.
As we were driving south, I spotted a food truck I had never seen before. I was going to do a food truck downtown but here was a BBQ truck that was new to me.
On my way back to the office, I decided to stop.
J’Harvey’s BBQ is parked on the corner of Merideth Street and Sprinkle Road in the parking lot of Lume Cannabis which, many years ago, was a Circle K. The all black food truck with painted flames around the bottom sits in the back of the parking lot near the road. I just parked in a spot up near the building since there were several open spots and walked to the truck.
The menu is written on a chalkboard that sits in front of the order window. My eyes went straight to the rib tips. I got a small order of tip and a small order for fries. The lady taking the order it would take about five minutes on the fries and I said that was fine. The cost was $19 and they didn’t even ask for a tip on the credit card machine.
As promised, it took about five minutes and the bag with a to-go box was handed through the window. I grabbed it and headed back to the office to eat.
I popped open the box to find it over flowing with food. I ordered both the small fries and small tips and they packed every part of this box full of food.
I started with the fries because I dipped them in the sauce from the ribs. They actually asked if I wanted sauce on the fries but I said no because I didn’t want it to be too messy. The fries were thicker, skin on frozen fries with a bit of a cajun seasoning dusting on top them. They probably could have used a couple of more minutes in the fryer but they were actually fine the way they were. I like to use the fries in a meal like this as a vehicle to get more BBQ sauce in my mouth.
I couldn’t wait to get to the rib tips. I could smell the smokiness the whole drive back to the office. I grabbed a big piece by the bone and the meat just slid off. They gave me a fork so I went back in with that to pick up a super tender piece of rib meat that was covered in a sweet, thick, sticky BBQ sauce. All of the tips in the box were super tender and almost literally melted in my mouth. Rib tips can be very hit or miss. It’s easy to over or under cook them but getting the whole lot of them to be this tender is a special skill.
J’Harvey’s BBQ has been around for several years. They started out in a tent that would set up in parking lots and now they’ve moved on to a mobile food truck. There are a lot of BBQ food trucks in the world. Many of them stick to brisket and pulled pork. J’Harvey’s doing rib tips…and super delicious rib tips at that, will make them unique. I don’t hit this part of Portage very often but I made the right decision to stop as I was driving through the area last Friday.
SW Michigan Dining 