Mike Kelly's Westsider: Tuesday Steak Night

Deal: 10.95 12 oz. KC strip and two sides


Forgive me father for I have sinned, it has been 14 days since my last steak. This is pretty serious for me. I rarely go 2 weeks without having a steak, whether I report about it on here or not. When I came to the frightening realization that it had really been two weeks since I had a steak I decided to go grab a steak.

This Kansas City Steak Night adventure was in the West Plaza area. I went to Mike Kelly's Westsider. This bar has been around for a long time. I bet most people have driven by it on multiple occasions and said "I really should go there." And you should! Mike Kelly's is an unassuming bar with a friendly atmosphere that is classy yet not pretentious. Low key, but not dull. You'll love the high tin ceilings, and the retro decor. The bar was established over 30 years ago, and continues to be a great neighborhood/local bar. It sits on Westport Road in-between State Line and Southwest Trafficway. They have live music most every night of the week.  Check out their website to see what they have playing. 


I arrived around 8:00 to get a steak, so I was too late for happy hour. They have a happy hour. Unfortunately I didn't ask what the deals were so you will have to forgive me. I have no ability to tell you what drink specials you may be able to get with the steak if you arrive at happy hour.   

I had the Flying Monkey Amber Ale they had on tap. I always enjoy that beer, even when it is full priced. I was highly impressed that they had the a Flying Monkey pint glass for my beer. Most of the beers they have on tap here are local beers, with the exception of bud light for the beer drinker who cares more about calories than flavor.


I observed that "local" is a theme they have going on here. They are a local pub for the West Plaza, they support local music by promoting local musicians nightly, and they serve local beer. Quite cool if you ask me. I like to keep money in our economy here in KC when possible.


Onto the steak!!

The steak night deal at Mike Kelly's Westsider is a 12 oz KC strip steak with 2 sides. I ordered my steak medium rare as always. The standard sides they have here are garlic mashed potatoes and green beans. You can get steamed veggies, fries or sweet potato fries if you want (but you shouldn't).

This steak came out looking excellent.  It had the grill marks that I love with the quarter turn. There was a nice layer of fat on the top of the strip that wasn't too big. I then cut into the steak and it was perfectly cooked medium rare all the way through as you can see.  

When I bit into the steak my first thought was this is a decent cut of meat, but they didn't really season it. It was obviously a choice cut of beef, and was sufficiently marbled. In some places it was a bit fatty with the hard fat you cannot eat. My dinning companion, who likes less fat than I do, thought it was too much fat. In a few bites I would agree, but overall for a 12 oz steak at a bar with a steak night this was actually a pretty good cut of meat. But like I said there was very little crusting (seasoning) to it. They would be well served to get some kosher or sea salt and cracked fresh pepper to put on the steak. I hate to admit this but I actually used a bit of A-1 toward the end to give the steak a bit more flavor. I realize that is a cardinal sin. But the steak needed something, and dumping the salt on wasn't really doing much for it.  

The sides here were phenomenal.  The garlic mashed potatoes were seriously the second best I've had in town, and that is including some of the finer steak house establishments in town. The grean beans as well were top notch. These weren't some green beans out of a can, they were at minimum fresh flash frozen, and the bacon and onion that was chopped up in the green beans was all very fresh.  The sides took this place over the top, and made up for the lack of flavor in the steak.  


The service was great. I was obviously not one of the regulars, as I sat down at a table (all the cool people were gathered around the bar). There was a bartender who was doubling as a server, but it didn't matter much because he was quite able to handle both duties with diligence and skill.

To sum it up this KC Steak Night adventure: 

• Restaurant: Mike Kelly's Westsider
• Location - West Plaza - 1515 Westport Road, Kansas City, MO 64111
• Ambiance - casual classy meets local pub
• Steak - Decent cut, needs more flavor 
• Sides - Holy shit are they awesome  
• Service - Excellent  

If you want to try a new place out (that has been around for a while), and are in the West Plaza area on a Tuesday stop by Mike Kelly's Westsider for a steak.

   
  

Fric & Frac: Tuesday Steak Night

Deal: $10.99 10 oz KC strip with baked potato and a side salad.  

This is my first post as a non-law school student! It has no relevance for finding red meat awesomeness but I wanted to brag.

My most recent Kansas City steak night adventure was to an old Kansas City neighborhood bar and institution: Fric & Frac.

Fric & Frac has been around since 1976 dutifully serving the KU Med/39th street crowd beverages and food for 36 years. This is the only Tuesday steak night that I am aware of (right now) in the metro. 

Fric & Frac is located at the corner of Genessee and 39th St in Kansas City Missouri. It is a wonderful bar that is famous for its cheese steaks and burgers.  This is a great place to shoot pool, have a beer and some tasty food.  If you haven't been to the 39th street corridor in a while you should it is loaded with great restaurants, bars, boutiques, cafe's and fun stores.

I was leaving work and had been eating tacos for days.  I had one of my favorite taco places cater my graduation party on Cinco de Mayo, and had tons of left overs. Pastor tacos with pineapple are one of my favorite foods, but the thought of another taco was frightening.

Not being able to eat anymore Mexican I decided it was time to return north of the boarder for some classic American food. What is more American than a juicy steak?  My dining companion and I sat down and looked over the menu.  Not sure why, I did I know what I was going to get.

The deal here is a 10 oz. Kansas City Strip Steak with a side and salad. I opted for the baked potato. Also available are fries or steamed veggies.  Not being a fan of low carb diets, a classic baked potato with my steak sounded heavenly.

While my dining partner perused the menu we ordered a pitcher of PBR.  I'm not a regular PBR drinker, but this time it hit the spot. It was crisp, refreshing and cheap. They didn't have any great drink specials when we were there. They do have 2 for 1 drinks for happy hour from 3-6 p.m., and half off of all wells after 9PM. If you plan your steak night properly you can take advantage. Unfortunately I arrived at 7:15 p.m. and left at 8:45 p.m..  The PBR pitcher was $9.00, had I opted to order by the glass it would have been $3.10. They had glasses of wine for $5.00 as well.   

After we had some suds, my dining companion figured out what sounded good and we went on to order.

The salad came out quickly.  It was your classic house salad, iceberg lettuce, shredded purple cabbage, shredded carrots, black olives, onions, tomato, and a surprise of garbanzo beans. I ordered Italian dressing on the salad.  My dining partner and I ended up in a debate on whether anything but ranch or blue cheese dressing is appropriate with a steak. While I normally prefer a ranch dressing on my salad when having a steak, this time I decided against it.  Let me know if you think I committed a cardinal sin.

Onto the steak! This was a surprisingly excellent steak. It was obviously a choice cut of KC Strip steak and was lean yet well marbled.  It had the perfect amount of fat topping the upper portion of the steak. You could tell it had been cooked on a flat electric skillet with butter on it. I prefer less buttery flavor, but the buttery flavor was not so dominate to overpowered the steak's natural flavor like you get in some dinners (looking at you Denny's).

The steak was also fresh never frozen and hand cut, not prepackaged, which gets high marks in my book. Frozen steak is an abomination against all that is good an holy in the world. As always I ordered the steak medium rare. This came out exactly how I believe medium rare ought to be. It was brown on the outside, pink most of the way through and slightly red in the middle.

This steak did not have any crust built up around the outside, they appeared to only cook the steak in butter.  I personally like some cracked pepper and kosher salt on the outside. Overall the steak was excellent, especially when comparing to other steaks I've had at other steak nights.

I will only briefly address the baked potato. It tasted like a baked potato, classic steak side. Done.  

While this blog is dedicated to steak, my dinner companion ordered a Philly cheese steak that deserves honorable mention. Fric & Frac has amazing cheese steaks. While they don't use the same super high quality french bread that is mandatory on every Cheese Steak if you are in Philadelphia, Fric & Frac does offer a cheese steak with Philly cream cheese. I had a bite and wow is it good. I will go back and eat one another night (or possibly another afternoon) when I have not stuffed myself full of a KC Strip. If you are there on a non steak night do treat yourself to one of these it is quite choice. 

The service here was great once they realized we were there.  It is a seat yourself place so you need to catch the servers eye so they know you are there, found that one out the hard way. But the service was great, the server was quick with suggestions and offered bits of great information about the menu. 

To sum it up this Kansas City steak night adventure:

• Restaurant: Fric & Frac 
• Location: 1700 West 39th Street, Kansas City, MO 64111 
• Phone Number: (816) 753-6102 
• Ambiance: Fun bar atmosphere
• Steak: Excellent 
• Sides: Classics with no frills 
• Service: Good
• Philly Cheese Steak with cream cheese - worth the heart attack   

Fric & Frac does not have a website I can direct you to.  If you're craving a steak on a Tuesday night this is a great place to go.