Hecky’s Barbecue

Very good baby back ribs, well cooked, a bit on the dry side, but I like ‘em this way. Good sauces (regular and hot), good coleslaw. Organizationally, even though I pre-​ordered, the order was not ready, but it was pre-​Superball madness at takeout…

Great Ribs, sandwiches, and OMG the mac and cheese is great wish the serving was bigger :(

Saw this place as i was driving by, looked good and i was hungry, so gave it a try. It was fine. but nothing great. I asked the worker whats more popular, the brisket or the pulled pork sandwich. She said she didnt know. I said, ok… then what do you like better?. She said she had never tried either sandwich. I almost fell over. How can an employee not know
what the food tastes like? I decided to get the pulled pork. The meat was tender, the sauce was fine, but i didnt like the bread as it turned to a ball of moosh almost instantly. The sandwich was also small for $ 7:30.

I heard from a few co-​workers the food was GREAT and from reading the comments, I was extremely excited to try the food here.
So I ordered the Chicago style rib tips and hot links combo which includes fries and bread. I LOVE rib tips and hot links. I was very disappointed. The hot links was actually just one link cut up (the person on the phone told me). That wasn’t even the worst part. They were dry, shriveled and tasted like they were made last week and reheated.
The fries and bread… I could care less about but I mean come on. If you’re going to throw in bread and fries with some BBQ please put some effort into it. I would have at least thought they would have toasted the bread and butter or something and instead. it’s just one slice of wonder bread or wherever they get it from. Fries sucked. I mean all you have to do is fry them and salt them…
Rib tips were okay. I didn’t think they were really special or anything, The saving grace was the BBQ sauce which was delicious and had a bit of spice to it. All I needed was MORE of it.
Yes my food was delivered and I didn’t expect it super fresh but I also didn’t expect it (hot links) to taste like it was cooked last week and reheated.

Just picked up delicious perfectly smoked chicken. Great turkey leg. Fries were a bit soggy but the spices on them kicked em up a notch. Nice staff. We have ordered the smoked duck in the past and it was delicious. Ribs are tasty. The beef ribs were poor quality. The flavors however are nice. The house sauce is tasty too.

Some of the food is really good, but some just isn’t. Get the rib tips, it’s what they do well. Unfortunately everything is at least a little spicy so until my kids grow up a little they can’t handle it, but it is a tasty sauce. Cole slaw is very good too. But the cornbread muffins are terrible, so dry and crumbly that you just want it out of your mouth immediately. Maybe it’s meant to be drenched in butter or sauce?

The place itself looks like it may need a good scrubbin, however, that is where the best food comes from! (not a complaint). The mac and cheese was super creamy and delicious but wish it had a little bit more for the amount they are charging. The corn muffin was pretty stale and will not try again. The pulled pork was flavorful was a very descent size. I will try this place again and try the baby back ribs next time.

My brother in law brought me to Hecky’s while I was in town visiting because I’m a big fan of ribs. I walked in and I was immediately greeted by Mr. Hecky himself. Really nice guy.
I placed and order for a full rack of baby back ribs with sauce and brought them back to my brother in law’s house.
I opened the bag and found out they came with crinkle fries. They were good but I wasn’t interested in things that weren’t full racks of ribs. The sauce was great and had a very unique flavor. The quality of the rib meat was top notch. No fat or garbage to eat around. All edible. The ribs were tender but not fall off the bone. If you think they are supposed to be fall off the bone, you don’t know anything about ribs. If that is what you want, don’t be an idiot, get pulled pork.
I’ll definitely make my brother in law take me here the next time I am in town.

I had the BBQ pulled pork sandwich and it was okay. I also ordered the mac and cheese and the size of the portion was ridiculous for $ 4.50, it’s about a third of the size it should be for that price. I ordered it to go and you would think for $ 13 you get a napkin and a spoon but no. I hate places that trying to nickel and dime you. Will not be returning.

I had Mr. Heckeys BBQ… good
I had Mr. Heckeys BBQ… good
I had Mr. Heckeys BBQ… good
I had Mr. Heckeys BBQ… good
«Whatever son». Really though!
Whatever wood you’re using is
Very tasting… Great BBQ combo.
(It is the sauce!)Hey Mr Heckeys
Where can I buy your BBQ sauce?

I can’t remember if I reviewed this place or not but better safe than sorry. After eating here 3 times I ordered it for my whole office one Friday. They went nuts over it. I’m now taking all visitors all the way up to Evanston from Chicago to try Hecky’s. For a Texan, it takes a lot to get excited about bbq. Hecky’s does it right.

Thank you for your response Mr Hecky!
It was disappointing but maybe I just got unlucky! Going to give it another try.
I realize I let the food get cold and I reheated it, which may have been why I didn’t like it as much so I’ll be trying you guys again soon!

Being new to the area, everybody raves about Hecky’s so I was pretty pumped to try it. I ordered the combo and was pretty shocked… but not in a good way. I was excited about the sauce, well, because their motto is «It’s all about the sauce» and there was no shortage of it all over my ribs and hot links. The problem is that the main ingredient in the sauce is High Fructose Corn Syrup. Blech! This is 2015. We need to evolve! The hot links were good but the ribs were chopped up pieces and tasted kind of low quality. Doubtful I’ll be back.

Best ribs I’ve ever had. And I’ve eaten a lot of ribs. I just moved from the area and I’ll surely miss these ribs.
Don’t tell me there’s another place in Chicago that’s the best until you’ve had these.

This is thee worst place to get ribs. I understand in order to get a decent order from here you must know someone on the inside or be a regular customer. I’m neither & have tried their food on two separate occasions. Both times I was presented with garbage. The meat was so old it was too tough to chew. Oh, the other option to get good food from here is to be white to whom this establishment tend to cater to. I would never recommend this restaurant to anyone. Heck, I wouldn’t even allow my dog to chew the bones from here. This place is just gross and should be closed down. However, it is the only establishment on the North Shore that sell barbecue from a pit. Even though I’ve never driven passed this place and smelled the aroma of charcoal burning from the pit. To me this is a fake BBQ house. You should try Alice’s!

I ordered the rib tips and hot links combo with sauce on and ordered my daughter chicken tenders with sauce on the side. The place smells so good and I was so excited to actually find a good BBQ place suggested by a friend. It was a total of $ 23, the rib tips and hot links were a generous amount of food I thought, while eating the tips I realized how fatty and how many bones were in this meal. The sauce was a major over kill to where I couldn’t eat my fries they were drenched with the worst sauce I ever tried. It was extremely tangy and very very bitter. I took one bite of the hot link and just wasn’t enjoying what was in my mouth. The sauce was just awful. My boyfriend ordered his with sauce on but accidentally gave him a side of sauce, a tiny cup. I should have ordered without but he he thought the sauce was just awful. I tried my daughters chicken tenders and I really liked those the best out of all the food we had ordered. I threw away most of my food as it was inedible and drenched with sauce. I will NOT return to this place again. Plus there’s no room to sit and eat unless you wanna stand but it was going to be pretty hard to feed my 3 year old. So being from Chicago we had to drive and hopefully find a park or somewhere with tables to eat… It was a journey. I do not like this place at all.

Sigh. I really wanted to like Hecky’s, since it pitches itself as a long-​standing Evanston staple for BBQ and has elected to maintain its hole-​in-​the-​wall ambience all these years. Indeed, the restaurant was charming enough, with friendly and attentive employees behind the counter and scores of newspaper columns praising the joint along the walls. I picked up my 4^th of July order made 15 minutes earlier by phone with only minor hiccups and was out the door soon after.
When I got home, I opened my Rib Tips and Hot Links combo box to no shortage of food, but my first bite of the ribs yielded a depressingly bland and charred taste. I took another bite and was still unimpressed. The hot links were okay, with the right amount of spicy kick to them, but revealed the true deficiency of the meal: the sauce.
A disclaimer is in order: I hail from Kansas City and have grown up knowing I was surrounded by the best BBQ in the country. I know what excellent barbecue and sauce taste like, and Hecky’s didn’t live up to what I’ve had, which sadly ruined the experience for me. Whereas my favorite KC BBQ sauces are complex, peppery, and tangy, the Hecky’s sauce was fairly vanilla, only worth writing home about because it wasn’t anywhere comparable to home.
I went through the rest of my meal uninspired, chewing down the sauce-​drenched fries (which were tasty enough compared to what one might find at, say, Burger King), but fries should never be the centerpiece of a meal. I hate to be so harsh on this restaurant, but I guess I’ve been spoiled in my lifetime with the undisputed best.

Like so many other reviewers, I’m very sad that my fave BBQ place has gone to the dogs. I’ve been going to Hecky’s on-​and-​off since I was at Northwestern back in the early 90s. 20+ years a loyal fan. But the last few times we’ve been disappointed, the quality has surely gone down. The last few times my husband said the ribs tasted old.
Today was the worst. The ribs were tough as shoe leather, the rib tips were just an assortment of bones, and the sauce was aweful– not the rich brown sauce from years ago, but a ketchup-​vinegar disaster. Why the heck would they change the BBQ sauce recipe??? Also the sides were ridiculously overpriced. $ 4.50 for a tiny ½-​pint of mac and cheese, that everyone said was «just ok.»
I can’t tell you how upset I am that my favorite BBQ place has taken such a nosedive.

A-​OK BBQ for take-​out. The pulled pork and hot links are better than the ribs and rib tips. I haven’t like any of the sides, and I’ve tried their regular fries (which look and taste like the frozen fries that come in 5+ pound bags in the grocery store freezer aisle), mac and cheese (Velveeta to the max), baked beans (very sweet), and cole slaw (bland). If you’re driving here, the location and limited street parking make it a gamble whether or not you’ll have to idle in a no-​parking zone to get your food.

Loved the place once upon a time, but I think the city stopped them from smoking the meat due to a bunch of locals who complained about the BBQ process. Too bad, I’m no longer a fan of the ribs. However they have great links and chicken.