Bartley's, in Grapevine not far from the airport,
was our last stop. We split a plate -

moist brisket was very moist, good marbling, but
not much of a ring, and the bark wilted by sitting on
the steam table: the flavor was quite good;

ribs were fattyish and not all that well trimmed, which
might put some off, but I enjoyed them; they were not of
the absolute freshest, and I could detect a slight edge
of that weird fishiness that not-greatest pork gets just
before it starts to go slimy. The counter man gave us an
extra rib, so I guess they hadn't been selling as well
as they'd expected.

There were turnip greens on the sides table. lili
thought they were okra (who has the defective eyesight?)
and I thought they were collards. I got myself a big
serving with lots of extra pot likker. These had been
cooked with a ham bone and were very good.

Fried okra were way too irregular to be a factory
product - they were excellent, the corn coating tasting
like hushpuppy of the best sort, the bigger pieces
very okra-y and green slimy in a good sense, the small
pieces crunchy and greasy in the good sense.

lili wanted cowboy beans, which came as small brown
beans cooked almost to explosion in a cuminy gravy.
Quite moreish.

This is a BYOB place (big sign out front), and our
bring was the Baritone Maxim Shiraz Cab 13, a decent
Australian blend mostly I believe from the Barossa,
slightly acid but with pleasant spice and bite, good
with barbecue.

We dawdled a bit and got slightly lost (the Google
Maps lady gets confused with several parallel roads
in close proximity, and the construction information
is by no means up to date) and so returned the car
with mere minutes to spare.

PreCheck was quite speedy despite there being lots
of infrequent flyers in the lane (how does this
happen?), so we had over an hour at the slightly
elitist and pseudo-posh Centurion Lounge to savor
Remy 1738 and various Dean Fearing oddities of which
blackened asparagus was the nicest. There was a rather
fishy brown sausage and shrimp gumbo over overcooked
Texmati rice and sage-roasted chicken thighs with
caramelized onions that might have been a good idea
but lost a considerable bit in the execution - the
meat tasted like boiled chicken, but it had hard
dried out edges. Desserts looked dreadful, so I
stuck with Cognac.

UA 510 DFW IAH 1706 1820 320 2E

A nothing but strangely elite-heavy flight, and I was
lucky to get the last front seat and happy that it was
a good one. A half hour flight, and there was plenty
of time to enjoy Pappadeaux or the club; I chose the
latter because it was free.

UA1953 IAH BOS 1930 0019 739 3F

The flight attendant announced a choice of beef
provincial or garlicky shrimp with cheese grits. I
said I'd take either, being distrustful of both
provincial and cheese grits.

The beef turned out to be a stewed concoction in
a tomato-scented but not flavored sweetish extremely
salty brown gravy with crushed olives, vaguely in a
southern French (provincial, get it?) style, with
carrot, celery, and potato bits on the side. It
could be eaten, if one left the gravy behind, but
even so I blew up like a balloon shortly afterward.
from the sodium.

-end-