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Paul & Sandy's Real Barbecue Co
Categories: Restaurants Barbeque Restaurants Southern Barbeque, Southern [Edit]
4925 Dundas St WToronto, ON M9A
Neighbourhood: Etobicoke
(416) 233-7032
- Hours:
Tue-Thu 11:30 am - 8 pm
Fri 11:30 am - 9 pm
Sat 12 pm - 9 pm
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Attire:
- Casual
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Takes Reservations:
- No
- Delivery:
- No
- Take Away:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- No
- Wi-Fi:
- No
- Good For:
- Lunch, Dinner
- Alcohol:
- Beer & Wine Only
- Noise Level:
- Quiet
- Ambience:
- Casual
- Has TV:
- Yes
- Caters:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
22 reviews for Paul & Sandy's Real Barbecue Co
Review Highlights
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"Again, adding the homemade bbq sauce remedied things." In 4 reviews -
"...pork dinner, chicken and full rack of ribs - the ribs were..." In 4 reviews -
"Be glad I'm not a big Baked Beans fan or else this place..." In 3 reviews
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22 reviews in English
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Review from Stephen G.
Mississauga, ON
5/24/2012 1 Check-in Here
Went for lunch yesterday...after wanting to stop in for over a year or so based on what I had read here and on other sites and social media. Had the two meat platter of brisket and pulled pork with BBQ beans and cole slaw...thinking the slaw was needed to add some raw veg to the meaty mix. Added an order of jalapeno corn bread added just because I knew I would want it with the leftovers.
Service was cheerful and considerate. Folks were getting their food quite quickly even with the relatively large menu.
Everything was just delicious...brisket was very tender and moist with just the right amount of smoke and bark. Pulled pork was nice and chunky...hot and very tender. Two sauces were provided...one hot and one bourbon, both were great. I alternated back and forth...and made sure to douse the take home containers when the leftovers were piled in. You so want to be my lunch today! -
Review from sarah l.
3/11/2012 1 Check-in Here
The food here was really good but the service was somewhere between not-great and bad.
The good:
- Pulled pork is excellent
- Cameron's in bottles for $4
- GREAT fries; Some of the best I've ever had
- Really excellent BBQ sauce, hot and spicy or regular
- Inexpensive (other than the unbelievable $6 sharing surcharge)
The bad:
- Took forever to get the food (30m for fries and a sandwich)
- I was standing at the cash register wanting to pay and the owner actually made someone else's bill [manually! with a pen and paper and a calculator and looked up the prices on the menu...] and delivered it while I was standing there waiting instead of processing my transaction
- Waitress not friendly, owner not friendly - no one smiled at me, asked how the meal was, said thanks for coming, acknowledged my presence in any way whatsoever other than the bare minimum of taking my order and delivering my food
I'll probably come back here because the food was SO GOOD but I don't expect to be tipping next time if the experience is the same. I hate the social more of gratuities. I was happy to pay for the food I consumed here (it was amazing) but I resent being expected to tip for service like this.
A note to the family that owns this place... if you are gong to continue to expect a gratuity from me, I am going to require that you provide service that is at least as good as a TTC collector or a Tim Horton's drive-thru. Really, I am going to need you to UP your game to this very, very minimum standard. -
Review from Benjamin C.
Etobicoke, ON
10/14/2011
I'm a huge fan of meat/bbq places, and this is newly one of my favourites. We got the 2 person platter and added on a third person. A total of 30 bucks or so. Basically all you can eat meat. The platter consisted of ribs, brisket, pulled pork, pulled chicken and meatloaf: all of which were smoked. Will go through one at a time.
Ribs: Amazing ribs, they passed the 'peel right off the bone' test. As far as taste goes, they were pretty damn epic. They were probably the best thing in the platter.
Brisket: A bit dry, but very tender. I'm not much of a brisket person, but it was pretty tasty. Combined with their homemade bbq sauce on the table, it was pretty damn good.
Pulled Chicken: I've never had pulled chicken before, I wasn't wow-ed by it or anything. There wasn't too much chicken flavour, and it was very dry. It tasted mostly of smoke (smoked chicken is very hard to do... you need to imbue it with more than one flavour, otherwise the smoke dominates like this did. That's why beer can chicken is very popular.). Again, adding the homemade bbq sauce remedied things.
Pulled Pork: Very dry, but very tasty. I wasn't wow-ed by this either, but it was good still.
Meat Loaf: This was amazing. It came with a gravy that was just wicked. It wasn't dry at all, and had a ton of flavour.
Generally everything was tasty (except the chicken), and a bit on the dry side except for the ribs/meatloaf which came with gravy. BBQ sauce made everything better. All in all a good, friendly BBQ joint that I will be frequenting more often. -
Review from Lara P.
1/11/2012
You know the meal is hearty and good when you are happyily trundling out of the establishment with enough leftover and a sigh of peace. How can a tiny place pack so much food? I came here and shared a platter with my friend. It was unbelievably good, meaty and en point on all scores. I think my favourite was the brisket, followed closely by the ribs, then pulled pork and smoked chicken. The sides are wonderfully complimentary and the service is warm and inviting especially since you actually see Paul and Sandy walking about taking pride in their establishment. This is consistently good if you need a BBQ fix. Don't go anywhere else. If you are hankering for finger-lickin good ribs just go straight here, no stopping at those "other" bbq chains.
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Review from Jonathan C.
Oakville, ON
2/15/2011 1 photo
In short, a great place for BBQ in Etobicoke. Fatty, greasy, moist comfort food for a good price.
After getting a traffic ticket, my natural coping mechanism (eating) kicked in. Having bookmarked Paul & Sandy's based on the great Yelp reviews I made the short trip to Paul & Sandy's for lunch.
The only thing I've tried here so far is the pulled pork sandwich, and it's pretty good. Most of the pork was moist and soft, though there were a few chunks of drier meat, enough that I had to pour some extra BBQ sauce onto the sandwich. Overall it was good and definitely one of the better ones in Toronto.
The baked beans were good, they had a distinctive flavor (there's some bacon in there) and a bit of a kick to it.
I'm a pretty big eater but a single sandwich with beans on the side (about $8 after tax) had me feeling comfortable and I had (nearly) forgotten about my traffic ticket.
There's actually a small parking lot in the back, so you might want to check that out before you park on the street.
I'll definitely be back, and next time I'm going to try the beef brisket which looked realllllllly good. I'll be sure to update my review after my next visit. -
Review from Sarah M.
Toronto, ON
12/16/2010
A great place for authentic bbq.
Living in little italy, we don't get out here all that often. However, when we crave real bbq, this is where we head. It's all extremely affordable, filling, and super tasty.
My favorite is the pulled pork and pulled chicken. Super tasty and very tender. A great way to try the bbq is one of their sampler platters. There is so much food you will definitely be taking some home, but bbq heats up well, so this is a definite bonus in my book!
The only weak spot in my opinion is the bbq sauce. It's good, but it's not quite 5 stars worth. It needs some more bottom to give it a more full richness, but I'm also an extremely picky person when it comes to bbq. My husband likes it just fine :)
overall, great place, friendly owners, worth the trek. -
Review from WaYnE c.
Maple, ON
11/27/2010 3 photos
Look for the "Sampson Academy" sign because the "Paul & Sandy" Red sign can be so easily overlooked right underneath. Side-street parking but Sunday is Free, however because of the side-street parking their is a bit of bottleneck driving here. Drive patiently because it's all about low and SLOW!
I was here early Sunday afternoon so the back-of-house LCD wasn't even turned on yet. Greeted warmly and sat near the front. Wine and Beers are offered here but no house-made Lemonades or Iced Teas. The decor is minimal Southern Jazz but has a slight Swiss Chalet feel.
BBQ Sampler Platter for 1 (Pulled Pork, Beef Brisket, Baby Back Ribs, BBQ Chicken, BBQ Meat Loaf - $23.95) came with choice of 2 sides. Pulled Pork, Beef Brisket, Baby Back Ribs, BBQ Chicken can all be summarized together by saying smokey, juicy, moist. Any Meat Loaf is hard to use juicy as the description but was pretty good like a big Meatball with smokey.
It was definitely a MEATFEST enough for 1 enormously hungry individual or 2 average couples. All the Meats showed some smokey outside crust while specifically the Meat Loaf and Ribs were sauced more so. Blistering Hot or Premium Hickey BBQ Sauce were given to the table where Blistering is necessary as the juice of the Meats mellow it as you eat.
Paul's BBQ Baked Beans, I can't say I'm expert enough to notice any difference to others. Be glad I'm not a big Baked Beans fan or else this place would smell GASY rather than smokey. The Creamy Cole Slaw wasn't all that great as it tasted like Packaged Slaw and a slight letdown compared to everything I had. Even the complimentary Buttered Bread starter was nice.
Btw, the TIP % on the Merchant Terminal uses the value Tax-in but the difference is really in the Pennies. You can do Value entry rather than Percentage otherwise Cash is always good but I only had $5.00 with me as usual. :PListed in: 4+ ****Stars****, Fire'd
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Review from Peter P.
Burlington, ON
2/7/2011
Terrific spot...was there a couple of weeks ago and we had a great 30 minute chat with the owner.....great guy !
Seems that an ' undercover team ' from Toronto Life magazine was there at the same time as we were to sample the pulled pork etc.. They took a lot of pics of the food they'd ordered - and by all accounts, they loved their meal.:)
Went there over the weekend again and 4 of us sampled the brisket sandwich, pulled pork dinner, chicken and full rack of ribs - the ribs were ( hands down ) the best ribs I've ever had !!!!!!
If you want authentic BBQ...it doesn't get any better than Paul and Sandy's !!! -
Review from Steph L.
11/16/2010
When there's smoke.... there's BBQ!
The second you walk in, all you smell is burning hickory and the sweet smell of BBQ.
We walked in at 7:55pm.
They announced that they close at 8:00pm.
My face fell with disappointment and despair!
But they said that we could still do take out!
I ordered the pulled pork sandwich, half a rack of ribs, and the jalapeno cornbread for $18. That's a great price for a whole lot of BBQ.
If you dine in you get free slaw.
Next time, I want slaw for my sandwich.
The pulled pork sandwich was HUGE. Soft, tender, chunks of meat, I took my extra sauce and loaded it on. I needed a fork to eat my sandwich.
The ribs were incredibly fall-away-from-bone-tender and juicy and oh-so-smokey! You can really taste the hickory.
The corn bread was freaking good, sweet with a hint of spiciness.
I can't wait to go back! -
Review from Christine C.
Etobicoke, ON
1/14/2010 ROTD 3/7/2010
I see a pig. I see the word barbecue. I slam on my breaks, pull over, roll down the window of my car and inhale deeply. Yup, that's smoke I smell and where there's smoke there is usually meat. I don't get this though because I pretty much know every eatery on Dundas between Jane Street and Sherway Gardens. There ain't no bbq to be had along this strip so when the hell did this place suddenly appear? You can't get much by this meat diva. I gotta check this out.
Paul & Sandy's Real Barbecue Co. has been open officially now for 18 days. So on my way home from work yesterday I hauled ass into this newly opened small eatery to see if they really had bbq worth lugging all the way back to Caledon. It's a small place and yes there really is a Paul and Sandy, who are a middle aged married couple whose love for bbq (every 'cue king has his/her story of how they followed their dream of being a real smoker) and this couple have theirs.
All of this aside, for me it comes down to the meat. I'm a 'cue snob, without question. The bar is high when one inhales the smoke up at the Stockyards or over at Phil's or along College St. for some hard core smoked brisket at Caplansky's. I'm thinking to myself these two better be bringing their 'smokin mojo or get the eff outta Dodge City.
So I order the take out to lug home and let my ever loving, meat chuffing, rib sucking, beef gnawing man of a husband have a go at this with me. Just like so many other smokin joints P&S's have run out of a few things. Ok, so it's like the Stockyards. Ya snooze, ya lose. I asked for pulled pork on a bun and am told that the pork is done but they have the "bark" bits if I'd like. I love crispy outter bits of pork so I go for it. I also order the brisket on a bun, a half rack of ribs (lucky me, only a couple racks left), an order of hand cut fries and a small tub of homemade red skinned potato salad. Cost of the order $28 bucks. Wow, so far, a bbq bargain.
Ok, I'll admit. I'm surprised. The beef brisket is juicy, pink and hand cut. The pork "bark" is absolutely delicious and considering they are the outter crispy bits it is still tender meat. I'm really happy to say that they don't use those big frisbee, foam core buns. These sandwiches are a bargain ($4.50-$5.25) packed with a solid 8 ounces of well smoked, sweet to the edge, lip licking meat. The ribs are fall off the bone good, have good smoke flavour, fill my schnoz with the smell of smoke and in my opinion are the biggest bargain on the menu at $14.25 for a full slab (compared to the $25 up at Stockyard's or Phil's).
I'm a tater hater here though which is a stab in my heart because spuds are nothing but manna to me. The fries were soggy and not cooked thoroughly. However the potatoes are fresh cut so there is hope for Paul & Sandy to get their frying skills in order and improve the spuds. If you are going to sell potato salad as red skinned then you might want to make sure you are actually using red skinned potatoes. The potato salad, while actually quite tasty is way to heavy on the mayo concoction. They should try The Swan's potato salad because those guys have it right.
I am always amazed that in a risky business such as restaurants, neophytes, with absolutely no resto or food management background take the quantum leap of faith and try their hand at this. I think Paul and Sandy can smoke up some great eating but they need to invest a bit of time and effort into creating some atmosphere and for gawd sakes lose that loser looking menu. The counter is disorganized. Dad is cooking. Mom is trying to help. Daughter is also trying her best but at least these are personable people and small talk ensues as food is prepped.
BBQ is hip! BBQ is hot! Their look is not. A shame this is because P&S Barbecue Co. sits in a fairly affluent hood and they could really create a niche for themselves since there is no one within eyesight of any smoke signals serving delicious 'cue like this.
Dennis hummed at me and gave me a thumb's up with a mouthful of meat. He aint' a guy you can blow smoke up the ass of easily so if he say's it's good eatin...it's good eatin. Here's hoping Paul & Sandy work out the hiccups.Listed in: Where There's…
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Review from Brenda S.
Etobicoke, ON
1/23/2010
We've been reading a lot of reviews for this place lately, so we decided to go check it out. It doesn't disappoint!
We both decided on the 2 meat dinners, I picked brisket and chicken and my boyfriend picked brisket & pulled pork. Really, really tasty with just the right amount of smokiness. Mmmm. The servings are more than adequate (we ended up taking some home with us) and the price is amazing as well! -
Review from Lee H.
Etobicoke, ON
8/8/2011
Whenever the weekend's here and I have a hankering for BBQ, it's off to Paul & Sandy's for some neighbourhood charm and great cooking. We have been numerous times and never disappointed! With only a few tables, there is sometimes a short wait but it's worth it.
Each of the mains are superb and portions are generous - I'm always a sucker for the 2 meats and sides but would go home satisfied with just one meat. How to choose though?
The Jalapeno Cornbread goes quickly but always delights. Grab it if you can. -
Review from Peter G.
Mississauga, ON
Updated - 1/13/2012
The best beef brisket in the GTA.
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Review from Frank O.
Mississauga, ON
1/23/2010
A big thanks to trusty Christine for her heads-up on this little treasure in Etobicoke.
The "Real Barbecue" in the name is for real yelpers. Here there's none of the usual desiccated meat slathered in some way too-sweet sauce that so often passes for Q in Toronto. To my experience, this sets the new standard for authentic smokey Southern goodness. Go and experience how Paul skillfully tends to his products and achieves wonderful outcomes. -
Review from Vince T.
Pickering, ON
3/26/2010 1 Check-in Here
I have eaten at several BBQ restaurants in the US and this is how this place compares
Restaurant appearance 8 - Very good clean
Service 5 - Nice people but service could be quicker. Would not recommend for lunch.
Food Quality 7 - This is the only BBQ eatery I have seen in T.O. I have tried their sample platter which has all the meats they serve. (Brisket, Pulled Pork, Ribs, Meatloaf, Chicken and Ribs). I would recommend the pulled pork or Ribs, Meatloaf was good also, I found the Brisket dry and tough and chicken is chicken (Portuguese style I prefer). The baked beans and fries were pretty good also.
Value for the money 6 - Average price per person $15 -
Review from Just W.
Etobicoke, ON
11/17/2011
Wait times are too long, if they even have the menu item in stock (???). Quality of food is inconsistent and now you can't order take-out on weekends. Ridiculous.
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Review from Conan W.
Mississauga, ON
8/27/2011
Bit disappointing that we showed up later in the evening and they were out of a few things (understandable with how they cook though) what we did get was great though. The service was great, the food was awesome. Would stop in again if i'm over that way (and the prices were really reasonable as well).
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Review from Ed S.
5/31/2010
If you want good bbq in Toronto, you've got few choices. If you want mediocre to bad bbq, you've got plenty of choices. Paul & Sandy's has the goods for good bbq. I had the pulled pork and brisket combo with beans and slaw. I asked for "moist" (fatty) brisket with sauce on the side, and Paul obliged me with some moist, non-sauced brisket. The pulled pork was tasty, but definitely needed the sauce. The brisket could go either way w/ the addition of s&p or the sauce. The beans were tasty with a little something extra, and the slaw is the creamy type, with a good crunch and again, that something extra. My wife had the pulled chicken which was moist, smokey and tasty with the added sauce. The garlic bread is a nice touch, but a little odd since I'm used to cornbread, but I'm not complaining cuz I like garlic bread. Portions are good and you'll leave full.
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Review from Jennifer M.
Etobicoke, ON
6/24/2010 1 Check-in Here
Yummy! The best I have had in TO
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Review from Zen K.
Etobicoke, ON
4/2/2011
Is this the best BBQ spot in Etobicoke? Maybe. I have no idea. I arrived hoping to get a full rack of ribs and a whole smoked chicken to go. They tell me that the smoked chicken as to be ordered in advance (2 days or so I'm told). This is not mentioned on the website. I figured okay, I'll get 2 racks of ribs instead. I am then informed that I can get 1 rack of ribs to go, but not 2. They didn't say, "sorry, we only have one rack left", I just got a straight "No".Where is the logic in that? Why would 1 rack of ribs be do-able, but two becomes impossible? Does it not fit in a container? Then cut it in half and put it in two. Not wanting to spend anymore of my time trying to figure out this place, I just left. It did smell good inside though.
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Review from Henry N.
Orillia, ON
2/1/2010
We used yelp to find a good place to eat. So we decided on Paul and sandys. When we got there it was closed up shop. No hours of operations or anything. Very disappointed
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Review from Dave W.
Etobicoke, ON
1/19/2010
Great review Christine. I have been here a couple of times so far and agree its the real deal. I have had the pulled Pork, Brisket, meatloaf, beans and coleslaw. I thought that they were all fist rate
