SIMCOE ARMS PUB ~ Simcoe ON

In the ending days of 2011 my buddy Jason and I cruised on over to Simcoe. We did a little catching up, some DVD shopping, we even caught a movie (Sherlock Holmes 2 was pretty good). We also stopped for dinner to a little Pub that Jason recommended. Who was I to disagree?

In a mini mall in Simcoe is a pub called the Simcoe Arms. It's almost tucked away and with some construction in the parking lot it could be hard to find. But we were there for an early supper and it was busy enough with locals it seemed.

The entrance outside makes the place look small, but inside it's quite spacious. There is a bar area, the lower dining area and the upper dinning area (where we sat ourselves). Our waitress was Mary-Ann and she was friendly and answering all my questions about wings or bringing me a drink refill.

Jason went for his Simcoe Arms standby, liver and onions. Ya, you heard that right.

It was a monster portion of liver, with fries and cooked veggies. Now I haven't had liver in, well not this decade or even the last. I don't have a good memory of it, but Jason's was covered in bacon and onions and gravy and I'm up for trying new things, so he let me try a piece.

Now I took that piece, with bacon, I cut it in half and took the plunge: at first things were good. The outside was crispy while the inside was smooth - I was thinking this is not bad. Love the texture. Maybe I could be a liver guy. But then it hit. It was an after-flavour that came into my mouth, went down my throat, and made my stomach go "uh-unh, no thank you." I did not finish the other half of the piece and I am not a liver guy. But I gave it a shot. But let me clarify, if you do like liver, this is good stuff.

I got an order of onion rings on the side. These were homemade battered onion rings that were crispy, and just darn tasty. They came with a ranch dip that was tasty, but it was also good with my wings blue cheese dip.

As I said, I got wings.

 I had to ask Mary-Ann about 'Bundy' sauce - it's honey garlic and a heat mixed in. I did not ask why it was called Bundy sauce though. I should have. Shame on me.

Wings come in an order of a pound, which is about 8 or 9 wings. The wings are dusted and then deep fried. They come with veggies and dip too.

The wings were a good size. Medium in length, but very meaty. The meat of the wings was almost tough, but not quite. The skin started off crispy, but half way through the sauce was fully absorbed eliminating the crispness.

BUTTER HOT

The picture above is Butter Hot, not just hot. They have hot, but this was butter hot, which meant hot sauce, with butter added. Basically Buffalo wing sauce, but the wings aren`t Buffalo wings because they are dusted wings. But this was a good sauce - savoury, with a hint of heat. Tasty, overall.

SUICIDE

I also got a side of suicide sauce.  It had a nice heat that warmed the mouth. I wasn't crazy for the flavour, but I appreciate that it seemed to be homemade.

FINAL SCORE:

Good wings especially when they came out fresh. The pub works hard on it's food and it shows. I'd have the wings again for sure, the onion rings were good, I know Jason enjoyed his liver, and there were a dozen other things on the menu I would have ordered for sure. If you stop by Simcoe, stop by the Simcoe Arms. 6/10

Simcoe Arms Pub
140 Queensway Drive East, Simcoe On
http://www.facebook.com/TheSimcoeArms