My husband and I were over at Citrus Park Mall earlier this week, with the family in tow, and decided to head across the street to Smokey Bones for dinner. We tried to go to the one in Clearwater when it first opened a few years ago, but the wait was 2 hours, so we skipped it. After hearing rave reviews from friends, I was anxious to try it, but I was so disappointed.

The restaurant wasn’t crowded (it was a Monday night) so we were seated immediately. Our waitress was extremely slow. After taking our drink orders, she came by our table 2 or 3 more times on her way to other places, without our drinks. Our dinner order (ribs, a BBQ sandwich, and 3 kids meals) took almost 25 minutes. We saw tables that came in after us get served before us. Finally, our food came out - Jim’s ribs were dry, my sandwich was dry, and the kids meals were ok. For the price, I’ve had better BBQ at much smaller local chains, like Pit Boss. Our meal was $50 for the meals, drinks (one beer) and the cornbread appetizer, which was good, but nothing special.