George Bush was voted in as the most powerful man on Earth twice. Young men blow themselves and hundreds of others to bits for religious reasons. A woman thought it would be a great idea to have a burly ape for a pet, and it ripped her face off. Seriously, I saw it on Oprah. People are stupid. Just because somebody says or does something doesn't mean it's right. You can't trust people - the best way to make a decision is to educate yourself on a subject, draw your own conclusions based on that research and establish an opinion. Contrary to an incessant "baaaing" heard in most Starbucks and BMW dealerships, people are not sheep. Sheep don't eat chicken wings. So why do we follow the heard when it comes to finding a nice pasture to graze upon and chew on chicken flavoured grass? I, for one, will not stand for it, and neither will my Wing Review cohorts. I'm hoping this sets the mood for the night's review...
A typical wing night at The Moose begins with a long wait at the door for a table to open up. Dozens of wing-hungry patrons fill every booth and table beyond capacity, with some resorting to grabbing a plate at the pool tables. The wait can last as long as a half hour; ample time to grab a pint and search for shoulder room to wait for a seat to open up like an orphan waiting for some parents. Tonight, however, we were lucky enough to walk straight into an open booth - a rare occurrence that would normally prompt me to run out and buy a lottery ticket. Our judges were thrilled that "we didn't have to run the usual gauntlet of dickheads," a sentiment felt round the table. With hasty beer service backing this up, we were beginning to feel that a good night was on the way.
There are 11 flavours to choose from at The Moose, and with no minimum on the number of wings it takes to make an order, options for variety and mixing on wing night can be overwhelming. Sometimes I feel sorry for the servers, subject to customers that could outlast Stairway to Heaven with the length and complexity of their orders. Having made this our watering hole for over five years, ordering slides off our tongues easier than the National Anthem, complete with Corky's order for "hot and honey garlic, but mixed," where he takes his two hands and weaves his fingers together to illustrate the mixing. Favorites around our table include hot, dry cajun and carribean hot.
Like Ray Charles facing Stevie Wonder in a boxing ring, wings at The Moose can be real hit and miss. There are times when these wings could stand toe-to-toe with the best, with flavourful sauces and sometimes perfect cooking. This was not one of those nights. Although our orders all came out at roughly the same time (occasionally a frustration,) these wings had about as much flavour as a cardboard box. Not to say that the sauces weren't good - it's the chicken that seemed past it's date this time. I've seen Kitchen Nightmares enough to know that Gordon Ramsay finds mounds of frozen chicken wings in 9 out of 10 freezers that he checks. I may be wrong, but to me this is what our wings tasted like. Perhaps in an attempted cover-up, we seemed to have double the sauce pooling on our plates. This has always been an issue of mine at The Moose because by the time you finish three wings your face is covered with more food than a baby with a big plate of spaghetti. Adding to this mess is the embarrassment of peeking up from your sloppy meal to undoubtedly find someone you know staring at you from across the over-crowded restaurant of locals. Many of us didn't finish orders that we had been getting regularly for the past five years, one judge commented that he "had to choke down the last five wings," and we were left wondering if our wing experience has opened our eyes to the world of wonderful wings around us, or if we simply happened to hit a bad night. Either is possible, but it certainly left us with a bad taste in our mouths.
From an outsider's perspective, The Moose must really seem like the place to be on a Wednesday night. The atmosphere of the bar has it's local charm and typical sports type appeal. There are plenty of servers running around to take your order, and the food is generally good for a pub. I'm the type to get claustrophobic in a place that gets as crowded as this when I'm just trying to eat some wings, but I'm sure most aren't quite as judgmental and weird as I am. If you happen upon this place on the right night, at the right time, with the right crowd and the right batch of wings, you will enjoy your experience here. The location is ideal if you live downtown and $.45/wing ain't bad. Unfortunately, we took a swing at that pinata and ended up whacking each other in the balls with a dismal and seemingly uninspired wing night. Kudos to our server Kayla for doing a great job with what she had to work with.
The marking came out lower than expected, but with wing night's that can end up producing plates of sawdust flavoured with Frank's Red Hot, there's not much we can do about that. We call's em as we see's em, and here's what we see'd. The atmosphere of The Moose is subject to contention, as I said I don't enjoy the large crowds but some enjoy the energy and local flavour. Also, having to put money into a jukebox for music is a pain in the ass: 3.5/5. Chicken meatiness can waiver at this place, this time it was average: 3.1/5. Temperature can be effected by the time you end up waiting for your plate to arrive, but seems to never be quite hot enough: 3/5. The flavour was the worst we've seen yet, with chicken wings dry enough to start a forest fire: 2.9/5. Like I said earlier, our service was the best part of the evening and one of the better nights here: 4.1/5. Bonus didn't rack up big time, with variety, wait time and price likely being the positive factors here: 2.5/5. That sums up to a disappointing 19.1/25, or 76%. This has been our lowest mark to date (minus the DQ), on what could have been a night for a contender. There is a certain nostalgia that I attach to The Moose and I do enjoy coming here, unfortunately inconsistent wing nights such as this it's hard to recommend it as the place to go in Huntsville.
Next wing review is The Cottage. Usually known for it's Saturday night dance parties with DJ Press Play, we'll see what this roofi-colada tastes like with the lights on.
Moose Delaney's does have really great wings. Best I've ever had! Bracebridge, just down the road from Huntsville, has wings almost as good at Dakota's Sports Bar. Both places are your typical hoser bars but, man, they have good wings.
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