Spitfire - Bristol food review

Posted on: 2017-03-21

Our rating:

Plentiful in both size and flavour, the food at Spitfire is packed full of a heat that is well-worthy of the BBQ restaurant’s fiery name.


Spitfire bristol

Though the Spitfire remains one of the most enduringly quintessential symbols of Britain thanks to its airborne exploits in World War II, the restaurant on Bristol’s Harbourside, with which the fighter plane shares a name, swings much more to the tune of our cousins across the Pond. With bonfires raging outside and an interior bedecked with wood-panelled décor, which echoes with a nonstop alternation between Americana and country and western music, Spitfire feels like a smokehouse straight out of the southern states - with a hint of the South African thrown in by owner Billy Steyn.

 

Essentially, the restaurant could not be more American if it tried - which, when it comes to the food, is a very good thing. The menu does little to detract from the restaurant’s adherence to the proven US philosophy that bigger is indeed better, with scattered hyperbole denoting the various dishes: one beef chuck composition is given the enviable title of the ‘Chuck Norris Roll’, a ‘Super V8’ represents a 6oz falafel burger and dominating the centre of the menu (which it should here be noted that is, itself, pretty enormous, occupying an A2 slab of card) is a dish simply called ‘Spitfire Rib Huge’. A pretentious eatery, this is not.

Spitfire Bristol wings

I plump for the down-sized version of this dish (entitled, no imagination spared, the ‘Spitfire Rib Big (£26.30)), as advised by our waiter, while my companion James, having loudly posited his penchant for “a good rump”, opts, unsurprisingly, for the ‘Louisiana Cheese Rump’ (£17.95). We agree to share a portion of ‘Bangkok Wings’ (£6.45, above) to start, which arrive promptly alongside our respective pints of Edison Lager. Crisp and beautifully cold, the beers represent the perfect tonic to the real spice coating the wings, which, in truth, are hotter than the sun. Having been cooked brilliantly over hot coals, it is the sauce with which they are finished that provides the real spark, really letting you know that they’re there. The chicken is nicely tender and falls off the bone with ease. All in all, the wings get a 4.2.

 

Shortly after the bones have been sucked clean and downed, our mains arrive. The plate of ribs plonked in front of me is almost overwhelmingly large - it is almost no exaggeration to say that before today I hadn’t seen something this big on which you couldn’t cross the Atlantic. Amazed and almost daunted, I assume my cutlery and embark on an eye-opening gustatory odyssey.

Spitfire Bristol ribs

Upon taking a knife to the glossy back of the piece (accounted for by the fabulous dosing of the meat in the house Pitfire rub), the plate reveals eight ribs of pig cooked quite brilliantly. The light pink of the pork blends seamlessly with the layer of fat atop, all making for a fabulously tender mouthful. It is at this point that the real value of the patience in preparation - each rib spends up to 15 hours in the Spitfire low smoker - becomes readily apparent.

 

Four ribs into my culinary Sisyphean task, my eyes catch the lurid yellow of the cheese atop the Louisiana rump in front of my companion James, which appears to have been well-grilled to the rare he so assuredly requested earlier. I begin to give him a grilling of my own; as to its flavour, texture and overall composition as a dish.

Spitfire Bristol steak

“That looks like it contains enough calories to satisfy a Somalian township for a week!” I postulate, before asking, “How is it?”

 

“Tasteless!” replies James, before quickly recognising the confusion that could have arisen from the ambiguity of his reply, and blurting out, “Your observation, I mean! The steak is very, very tasty.” It looks it too - while it lasts; the speed with which it disappears down his gullet providing ready testament to this.

 

Both the food and overall dining experience at Spitfire suggest that though the restaurant is many things but it is not for the faint of heart. It is big, it is brash, but it is ultimately brilliant.

 

Food: 4

Value: 3

Atmosphere: 3

Service: 4



Article by:

Sam Mason-Jones

An ardent Geordie minus the accent, Sam seemingly strove to get as far away from the Toon as possible, as soon as university beckoned. Three undergraduate years at UoB were more than ample time for Bristol (as it inevitably does) to get under his skin, and so here he remains: reporting, as Assistant Editor, on the cultural happenings which so infatuated him with the city. Catch him at sam@365bristol.com.