We’ve been anticipating the opening of the new Buffalo Wild Wings on Loudon Road for quite some time. The restaurant finally opened last week, and the Food Snob paid it a visit. We’ve never been to a BWW, but anyone who watches football has been inundated by commercials for the chain. They center around jersey-clad servers who can contact agents within NFL stadiums to stick out a foot and trip a ballcarrier or trigger an ill-timed field sprinkler (because if there’s anything a football fan loves, it’s outside sources messing with the outcome of the games. That’s why Bain was so popular!). Based on that, the Food Snob gathered two dining companions who could handle a good ole-fashioned bro-down.
We headed down on a Thursday night. There was an NFL game and a Celtics game on the slate for the evening, so we figured that there would be a sizeable crowd. Turned out, there were more people in Buffalo Wild Wings than we’d ever seen in one place in Concord – ever! Literally hundreds of people were there! We were told there would be a 45-minute wait for a table, so we bellied up to the bar, ordered some adult beverages (they had a fairly decent selection on tap, including Dogfish Head and Founder’s), and waited.
There was plenty to do to pass the time; dozens of screens bedecked the walls, showing football and basketball as well as the interactive bar games patrons played from their tables. We crushed a little trivia (“There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about” was totally said by Oscar Wilde, y’all) before our table buzzer started blowing up and we were shown to our seats. Realistically, it was about a 20-minute wait.
Our server arrived about the same time that they dimmed the lights and turned off the piped-in aggressive reggaeton in favor of the NFL announcing team. Although Brad Nessler’s head in HD is not super-appetizing, we were still ready to chow hard. We got a basket of fries ($4.29) sprinkled with “desert heat,” which sounds like it would be Stevie Nicks’s signature perfume line, but actually was a smoky mix of spices that singed the tongue pleasantly.
We weren’t getting out of there without ordering some wings, that was clear. Luckily for us, Thursday was boneless wing night – 60 cents a wing, and we could choose any of a dozen different flavors. We went with mango habanero, Asian zing, garlic parmesan and spicy garlic.
Spicy garlic was basically a garlic-infused buffalo sauce that delivered a dull burn. As our dining companion put it, “It’s got a little bite, but you still know you’re eating chicken.”
The mango habanero straddled the line between sweet and spicy with feet firmly planted on both sides. Parmesan garlic had a rich, buttery flavor that we all enjoyed.
The best flavor we tried was the Asian zing. At first taste, it was similar to a sweet version of the General Tso’s chicken one can find at any Chinese food restaurant. However, it had a sneaky burn that built to a comfortable plateau without being overpowering. We liked this flavor a lot.
After devouring eight wings apiece (and more than our fair share of fries), we fought off the urge to order dozens more. We were full, but they were just so delicious! Satisfied in knowing that we could come back and try the other flavors whenever we pleased, we kicked back and watched the games. We’re pleased to announce that they, too, were plenty entertaining, and featured no outside interference.
