Checking out Nick & Sam’s Grill in Dallas: What’s the big deal?

Hint: It ain't the food or the service.

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill exterior. Note revolving-door effect of blondes in, blondes out.

Restaurants in Dallas haven't had an easy time of it in 2009, but Nick & Sam's Grill, the cheaper sibling of Nick & Sam's, has been an exception. Since it opened in February, it's been a madhouse, whether you're trying to grab a table at lunch or looking for a seat on the patio at 7 p.m.

Its success defies not only our downer economy but also a location that's had its share of turnover. The last occupant was Strong's Everyday Tavern, and they had the same goals of casual atmosphere, strong bar component, and overtly "affordable" food, yet they didn't survive.

So what's the deal? Well, it sure as hell isn't the food or service. Aside from a few exceptions, the menu had the same trite staples you find everywhere -- calamari, meatloaf, sliders. Items sampled didn't possess the kind of ingredients or preparation that would make you die to have them again. And service seemed laughably, deliberately bad, with young staffers who were both aggressively upbeat and pin-headedly oblivious. (A young woman, for example, who was not our server walked by and, spying the semi-empty bowl of white bean soup, stopped to interrupt the conversation at the table and say, "Don't you LOVE that soup? It's so goooood, I really love it.") It truly seems like whoever's in charge of service training is perpetrating some twisted joke.

Part of the deal here is the ostensible low prices; however, given the $8 martinis everyone's ordering, these obviously are not budget diners. Instead, there is the perception of value. While entrees are in the relatively low $8 to $14 bracket, by combining that with their use of the Nick & Sam's name, they cannily convey the sense that you're getting the cachet of the more-expensive original (though hardly the same dishes) at a discount.

The real draw is as a watering hole -- but with the veneer of restaurant. This is a page from the book of Consilient and, by extension, Neighborhood Services. Going to a bar and snacking on bar food isn't cool anymore. But going to a restaurant, making a big show of eating a little something for a small amount of money, and drinking three martinis, is.

Here's a blow-by-blow:

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill girl with martini. Doesn't this look like an Edward Hopper painting? Yay, Marc. On this random weeknight, the restaurant's patio was Absolutely Packed with groups of girls: lotsa "girls' night out," or two girls with one guy, or double dates.

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill complimentary house-made potato chips were pretty good: light on the salt but thick and flat.

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill "grown-up" grilled cheese sandwich with salad and tomato-basil soup: a lot of bang for $9 with Comte cheese -- a semi-firm cheese from France -- melted between two slices of grilled bread, smoked ham, and pears, with mesclun greens in an overdose of bitter, mustardy dressing.

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill sliders, served with semi-pointless shoestring potatoes. Who doesn't have sliders? But the Nick & Sam's people seem to really like them.

Marc Lee

Nick & Sam's Grill grilled vegetable sandwich with white bean soup

Marc Lee

The story with these two photos is awesome. Marc was shooting the exterior from the window of his car. He likes to get "perfect" photos so he was taking his usual sweet time by aiming, focusing, gazing, zzzzz, whatever it is he does. The gals seated on the patio were definitely able to spot that photos were being taken. Initially, I thought they were getting mad; they seemed to be coming back with pointed stares. But instead --

Marc Lee

-- they all started "preening." It was an amazing thing to witness. I love those public-television shows that talk about the biological basis of attraction, and that's what it reminded me of. Like birds. Like, all of a sudden the arms were up and the hair was being stroked. If you notice, all three of these gals in the foreground all of a sudden have their hands on their heads. Wild. Anyway, that's Nick & Sam's Grill for you.

Russ Vandeveerdonk, verified:

Teresa Gubbins, this is a very well done review, I like your approach. By the way, that is a good location, it is the "last stop", the "northern tip" of downtown and the McKinney avenue strip scene. While I was there this week-end, I saw the George Michael-Kenny Goss place has closed or moved away.