SEAReview
Included In
Look around at any BBQ spot, and you’ll see the gang’s all here: pulled pork sandwiches, ribs, sausages, maybe some pimento cheese. But at Lady Jaye, a BBQ spot in West Seattle, their pulled pork is molded into balls, panko-breaded, and fried. Their sandwiches are topped with housemade bologna. The pastrami’s made with pork collar. The sausage is mixed into a creole-style dirty rice, the pimento cheese is stuffed inside cream puffs, and the cocktails have ingredients like pumpkin seed orgeat and rose vermouth. Even though this is far from your traditional BBQ, Lady Jaye is the kind of truly excellent BBQ restaurant that Seattle has always lacked.
At first glance, Lady Jaye looks like a bar - and you could certainly just come here and drink. The cocktails are terrific, ranging from the Havana Banana made with banana-infused cognac and pineapple rum to the Bourbon Crusta, a citrusy drink with an absinthe rinse and a rim of tart sugar that tastes like Sour Patch Kids. And despite how different the cocktails are from each other, they all pair mysteriously well with the BBQ dishes.
The plates here are all less than $23, and work within the Greater Barbecue Universe (you know, the GBU). But they have a spin on them that’s completely their own. Sure, there’s no brisket sandwich at Lady Jaye, and that might make you sad for a half-second. The incredible fried bologna sandwich is here to comfort you, though. The meat has a good amount of smoke, the shaved dill pickle slaw gives it some tang, and there’s a nice crunch from homemade potato chips. There’s also some slow-smoked turkey, but it’s in the form of a massive drumstick that you’d normally spot at amusement parks and renaissance fairs. Even at Universal Studios, though, your turkey isn’t falling off the bone or covered in ancho-barbecue sauce and lime crema. And then they even serve burrata, which seems totally out of left field for a BBQ place. But when it comes with smoked tomato, green beans, and fried shallots, it makes perfect sense on this menu.
Even though there are other good BBQ spots in Seattle, there is nowhere that’s doing it quite like Lady Jaye. It’s hard to imagine a time before trying BBQ that tasted like this, and we’re glad we don’t have to anymore. Now, when we look around at our fried bologna, pork collar pastrami, and ancho turkey drumstick, we’ll agree - the gang is indeed all here.
Food Rundown
Fried Pork Cakes
Pimento Cheese Puffs
photo credit: Paul Sevilla