Colts Grille

This is a restaurant that I probably would not have eaten in if it had not been for the blog.  Not because I am not a Colts fan (I don’t want to rile anyone up), but because well, a) sports bars are not my typical places, b) it’s a chain, and c) it is centered around tons of tvs playing sports all the time.  But I actually had several people recommend this place to me, which was enough for me to at least give it a go. Also, we had my son with us, who has been playing “football” on the playground for the last couple of years (we’re talking preschool) so we knew he would dig it regardless.  It is amazing how this sports thing is born and bred here in Indiana.

Anyhow, we sort of worked our way in to the place (if you come from the garage, it is a little bit of a maze to get there) and were seated right away. It wasn’t a football night, so the place was pretty much empty. It was sort of depressingly empty actually, and aside from the tvs, the décor is pretty much 90s airport.  A little grim I have to say (although very clean. Sterile, actually).

The menu is sort of one of those ridiculously big types, and it is really hard to decide where their area of expertise might be, if it exists.  They do have an area called “specialties," so we figured we should go with one of those. And then we also had a burger.  But first, we asked the server what were good appetizers and we went with the deep fried pretzel sticks ($7.99) which are soft, breadstick-esque things but that taste like a pretzel.  Ok, basically like a soft pretzel that is deep fried.  Not like it has a batter, but just a little crunchier exterior than your normal soft pretzel. Our server also recommended that we get a side of the house made queso dip instead of the honey mustard that came along with it, so we got both.  She was totally right about the dip. The queso wasn’t fancy, but it tasted pretty good. It wasn’t just your out of a can nacho cheese stuff.  It had red and green peppers mixed into what I am assuming was your regular block of processed cheese.  But it went well on the pretzels which I also quite enjoyed.  They were a little crispier on the outside, like I said, than your average breadstick and nice and salty.  They were by far the best item of the evening.

We split the breakfast burger ($11.99) which was described as being served open-faced, with a fried egg, bacon marmalade, and mozzarella.  So first of all, am I crazy or does open-faced not mean served on only one piece of bread?  This had a regular bun (both sides) although they were served next to each other, but whatever.  So the burger was pretty bad actually.  They asked me how I wanted it (the beef and the egg) and I told them I wanted the beef medium rare and the egg over easy.  The beef was really practically raw and the egg was barely soft in the middle.  The cheese was sort of sliding off and the bacon marmalade was more like just regular marmalade to me, I couldn’t really taste the bacon.  I see they are trying to be unique, but throw a couple of slices of bacon on that thing. It couldn’t hurt. (Not that I would ever order it again).  Hubby was even less kind in his description. The fries were of the battered food service type and were ok.

The other thing we shared was the southern balsamic chicken ($15.99) which was described as tempura battered bone-in chicken.  So, I thought it was interesting they mention it was bone-in, when it was actually a de-boned breast with just a little attached wing bone.  Anyhow, it was super thick crunchy tempura batter.  The chicken was pretty tender and juicy and HOT.  It wasn’t bad.  It sort of reminded me of Long John Silver batter, if you are into that kind of thing.  The battered type sweet potato fries were a little soggy.  The sautéed veg medly was blah.  But the chicken was not bad.  There was a drizzle of a balsamic glaze across it.  I appreciate that they didn’t overdo it with this, it was almost more of a plate decoration, because too much would have been too sweet and too soggy-inducing.

My son, of course, loved it (always happens when we don't really like a place and vice versa).  He had a kids dish of pasta with marinara and was happy as a clam (I didn’t try it).  So there you go.  And of course there were all those tvs.

So I am guessing with the Superbowl and all that, this place will do fine at least for awhile (although the night we were there, not so much).  Honestly though, it will be interesting to see how this place does after that.

Colts Grille

110 West Washington Street

Indy  46204

317/631-2007

http://coltsgrille.g3restaurants.com/