Town East – Chili’s
3909 Pavilion Court
Mesquite, TX. 75150-6519
www.chilis.com

My mom was in town recently to visit the grandkids, which allowed my wife and I to go out for dinner together. Just the two of us. No kids. Ahhh! When I was a kid I never dreamed that one of life’s great enjoyments could include a nice quiet meal and relaxed conversation.

This turned out to be a wonderful date, but there were a few speed-bumps along the way. First of all, we couldn’t decide where to eat. We had just eaten out the night before and had lots of great burgers and steaks off the grill the night before that, so my wife didn’t want anything too heavy.

That canceled out our first idea of eating at some Chinese place with a good buffet. My wife wanted to wanted to avoid the temptation of grazing too long at the big spread. So we decided to go to Chili’s.

But we had a little trouble finding how to get to this particular Chili’s. You can’t get to it off of Highway 635 or the service road. You have to take the Town East exit and turn in like you’re going to the Genghis Mongolian Grill restaurant.

Then just keep making your way straight back. When we turned in to park, we discovered that literally half of Chili’s parking lot had been ripped up for repairs, so it took awhile to find a spot.

The final speed-bump in our dining experience was the fact that there was a group of high school students from the Mesquite school district who were celebrating their graduation at Chili’s that night. Fortunately, they were too young to drink, or we might have been in real trouble. Still they were a little bit rowdy and noisy.

The worst part was that one of them really enjoyed whistling. I am not a fan of whistling. Still, after life with three young boys, these high school grads were just background noise to me.

Also, I wasn’t responsible for them, so I didn’t need to worry about putting them in time-out. That said, I found the rest of our dining experience quite relaxing and enjoyable.

Our server was great. She was just the kind of waitress I like. Some waitresses get you your order and disappear for vast stretches of time. You can’t get any refills or ask them for what you need. Others pester you about your meal every five seconds.

This one was friendly and attentive and got us what we wanted when we wanted it. I started my drink order with a boring Coke Zero but quickly switched to the tasty Strawberry Lemonade. I think next time I will try the Blackberry Lemonade.

I might have been tempted to go for a margarita but apparently Chili’s doesn’t serve any frozen margaritas, only the regular kind.

We started our meal with the Triple Dipper Appetizer. With the Triple Dipper you can choose your three favorite out of these seven options – Big Mouth Bites (the trendy mini-burger done up gourmet-style), Boneless Buffalo Wings, Southwestern Egg rolls, Chicken Crispers, Wings over Buffalo, Crispy Onion String and Jalapeno Stack, and Hot Spinach & Artichoke Dip.

All of these options come with different dipping sauces, depending on what you order. My wife chose the Southwestern Egg rolls (crispy flour tortillas stuffed with chicken, black beans, corn, jalapeno jack cheese, red peppers and spinach and served with avocado-ranch dressing) Chicken Crispers (crispy chicken strips served with honey mustard sauce), and the Crispy Onion String and Jalapeno Stack.

My wife was a little disappointed with the Southwestern Egg Rolls but I thought they were tasty enough. The Chicken Crispers were pretty basic. Nothing out of the ordinary to me, but my wife and others rave about them. The Crispy Onion String and Jalapeno Stack was good. I was surprised that the jalapenos were not hot and spicy. That will be a plus for some of you and a minus for others.

For my entrée, I ordered one of Chili’s Custom Combinations. With the Custom Combination, you choose your favorite two of the following seven options -Fried Shrimp, Half Rack of Baby Back Ribs, Monterrey Chicken, Margarita Grilled Chicken, Grilled Salmon with Garlic and Herbs, Spicy Garlic and Lime Grilled Shrimp, and for a $1.25 extra, you can get the Classic Sirloin.

All of the Custom Combinations come with seasonal veggies and loaded mashed potatoes, but you can switch these out with Chili’s other sides.

There other sides include: mashed potatoes with black pepper gravy, home-style fries, spicy cole slaw, black beans, rice, sweet corn on the cob, and cinnamon apples. I swapped the sweet corn on the cob for the seasonal veggies.

There is a lot of pepper on their corn on the cob, but I found it quite tasty. The loaded mashed potatoes were awesome. Lots of flavor and fixings. For my Custom Combination, I ordered the Monterrey Chicken and the Half Rack of Baby Back Ribs.

The Monterrey Chicken is a chicken breast topped with BBQ sauce, cheese, and applewood smoked bacon. It’s really tasty. You have three options in the way your ribs are prepared.

There’s Chili’s classic BBQ sauce, the Memphis dry rub which is great, and the new sweet and tangy Shiner Bock BBQ sauce. I decided to try my ribs with the Shiner Bock BBQ sauce and I’m glad I did.

It was very good and the ribs were tender and delicious.
​Next time I visit Chili’s, I might order the Shiner Bock BBQ Burger. The burger is topped with the Shiner Bock BBQ sauce, cheddar cheese, and crispy onion strings.

But there are lots of other great burgers there that I’m eager to taste. Chili’s has eleven burger options, but these are the ones that I am most interested in – the Ground Peppercorn Burger (the burger is crusted with black pepper and spices, and topped with crispy onion strings, and bleu cheese dressing), the Jalapeno Smokehouse Bacon Burger (topped with applewood smoked bacon, smoked cheddar, tortilla strips, red onion, mayo, jalapenos, and jalapeno ranch-dressing), and the Southern Smokehouse Bacon Burger (topped with maple bacon, smoked cheddar, crispy onion strings, and ancho-chile BBQ sauce.
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My wife ordered the Grilled Salmon with Garlic and Herbs. She thought it was so-so. Not great. We’re a little spoiled, though. When we visit my parents in Wisconsin, my Dad goes out on his boat and catches lots of big salmon from Lake Michigan and cooks them up fresh on the grill. So we’re used to really great salmon.

This was much dryer, as you might guess. Also, the rice had an unfamiliar (to her palate, anyway) herb that she didn’t care for much either, but grew on her when she ate the leftovers later.

​We didn’t get dessert that night but I’m very interested in trying one of Chili’s Molten Chocolate cakes. Their other desserts include chocolate chip paradise pie (a chewy bar of chocolate chips, walnuts, and coconut, topped with vanilla ice cream, hot fudge and caramel), White Chocolate Molten Cake, Brownie Sundae, Chocolate Chip Cookie Molten Cake (warm chocolate chip cookie cake filled with milk chocolate filling, topped with vanilla ice cream under a crunchy chocolate shell), cheesecake with strawberry sauce, and a frosty chocolate shake.

One particularly fun option is Chili’s Sweet Shots. You can simply order your favorite item (Key Lime Pie, Red Velvet Cake, Warm Cinnamon Roll, Warm Double Chocolate Fudge Brownie.) or you choose any three and create your own sampler plate.

Whatever your dinner plans are, you could do a lot worse than Chili’s. I’m glad we went. I just hope they have the parking lot completed next time we go back.