Gus’s Open Pit BBQ

Pretty good for Tahoe BBQ! Price was fair, the service was great. Didn’t have to wait to long for our food. It was our first time. I had a great meal. Had the 2 meat combo! Should have got the 3 meat! It was delicious. I will be back for sure.

Guys go into a BBQ place to chow down on meat — not at this place…
I can’t even put ONE star on this place. Ordered the 2 MEAT COMBO PLATE. Comes with two sides. I asked for the St. Louis ribs and a chicken quarter with a side of baked mac /​cheese and a Caesar salad as my second side. I forgot to take a picture of this when it arrived so I will try to explain — two SMALL ribs that looked like they were baked and a piece of chicken that was so small that it looked like a Cornish hen leg. Now — the Caesar salad –WTF! It was warmer than the chicken!!! You serve salad COLD — especially a Caesar. Really it was warmer than the chicken. The mac and cheese was barely OK. It all came on a plate that had borders — like the kind I got in my kindergarten class.
Lets sum it up :
2 little riblets — no smoke flavor at all
1 peice of a chicken leg — no smoke flavor at all
mac/​cheese — too much breading
WARM Caesar salad — very small
Once again — guys go into a BBQ place to chow down — NOT HERE.
DO NOT GO THERE
Also it was so loud that we asked the management to turn the sound down — they said that the commercials are louder than the game — Bullshit. We had to yell across our table.
DO NOT GO THERE

Anyone who gives this place less than 5 stars is undoubtedly 1) a tourist 2) an idiot with poor taste. Plain and simple! Gus’ has the best baby back ribs in the area… Probably the best on the west coast. The owner (who also apparently owns the Big Water Grille) can be seen manning the pit himself– his passion for barbecue is apparent with every bite. There isn’t a whole lot of food around Tahoe that I would seek out in and of itself but Gus’ is a clear exception that should be on the top of any BBQ connoisseur’s list. It is… beyond exceptional.

Can’t beat the food or the customer service. Our waiter gave customer service you don’t see ANYWHERE I’m Vegas where were from. Good conversation with the kids and let them meet the cook because they wanted to tell him how amazing the food was. Keep up the great food and customer service and you’ve got a customer every time we visit incline village!

If you are looking for some good food this is the place to go. The tri-​tip was amazing and perfectly cooked! Even better than the food, was the amazing service from everyone there. Authentic customer service like theirs is hard to come by today and I would recommend this place to anyone.

Upstairs is a great place to catch a game on on of the big screens. Downstairs a quiet meal. St Lewis ribs very good. Hot links tasty and yes they are Hot. Cole Slaw pretty plain. They don’t skimp on the drinks.

For a 15 $ a plate meal I would really expect some better quality meat although it was tasty the 2 ribs I received as a part of my 2 meet combo were smaller then the French fries i received witch also came out cold I would never recommend this place to anyone unless you want to receive a unsatisfying meal that leaves your stomach and your pockets empty. Staff were grate tho!

One of our favorite local hangouts! We dine here at least twice a month. Love bringing our family and friends here to check out the great barbeque and upstairs bar.

We tried a bit of everything from chicken, tri-​tip, pulled pork, hot links. It all tasted great! Nice, casual atmosphere as well. Will be making a few more visits very soon

The short of it is that this is what you’d expect from a mediocre bbq place in a middle of nowhere airport.
Amazingly, the food came out in 4 minutes. Evidently it was waiting on warming plates. Dry and tasteless was the result.
The waitress was friendly, so plus one star for that.
I’m hoping management decides to invest some effort in making the food better.

Something that really irks me is the lack of consistency in Tahoe-​area businesses. Gus’s is no exception. Their business hours are all over the place (which i can’t complain too much about since they are clearly stated), and when my boyfriend and I were finally hungry at a time they were open on a day they were open… the upstairs bar area was closed until later that day. I took a deep breath & we decided to eat downstairs anyway. Downstairs is much smaller than upstairs. About four tables.
That being said, I am a huge fan of bar-​style seating, and look forward to the casual, open atmosphere that a bar can offer, but was turned down even though the restaurant was clearly staffed enough to run the upstairs as well.
So about the food. I read the menu online and was excited to order the Gus’s Bowl, but when we got there and looked at the menu, the Gus’s Bowl wasn’t on it. I suppose I could have asked for a special order since they have all of the ingredients, but I didn’t feel like being a special-​needs customer. Here’s what we ordered and how it tasted:
Buffalo Pickle Fries: My highlight of the meal. These were FANTASTIC!
Baked Mac & Cheese: Pretty good. A little too much breading for my taste, but I’d probably order it again.
Kale Salad: Not my favorite. Maybe it was the honey mustard dressing that I ordered or… I don’t know, but I would skip it.
Garlic Bread: Came with the salad… it wasn’t really seasoned, and didn’t taste garlicky.
Pulled Pork/​Tri-​Tip Plate: The boyfriend ate all of it, so there’s that.
The BBQ sauces were good. Maybe we’ll come back again.

Decent BBQ place with a rustic sports bar feel. We sat upstairs where there’s a full bar, lots of TVs and a big screen. They have embedded ice pits in the middle of the tall tables to keep your glass chilled. Their signature appetizer, the Gus bowl, is really heavenly after a run on the slopes. It consists of fries, Mac n cheese, cole slaw, BBQ sauce, beans with added tri tip — I think they invented it by mixing their left overs! Their tri tip was fatty and wasn’t that good, but the bowl made a great drunchy. They had a small variety of craft beer, so I tried the milk stout which was pretty good. I also had their kale salad & cheeseburger. Their salad was saucy & was like cole slaw. Cheese burger came medium rare with fries — pretty good! Our server was nice and didn’t mess up anything for our party of 8. Price was normal. Good place overall.

This place was great!
We came here after a hard day of skiing & breaking bones & we had a great time!
The waiter was great! He was attentive & made sure we didn’t need anything.
The food was great we had the ribs, pulled pork sandwich and something else that was great.
This place has a great environment, the staff and customers were friendly, the restaurant was clean and not to noisy and the food was great!
We will defiantly be back next visit!

1÷1÷16: Came up to Tahoe to snowboard Squaw and Northstar over New Year’s with friends and family, and despite all the craziness of the day somehow my gf managed to cook multi-​course meals for the whole group for a couple nights, and gourmet breakfasts before we all wake up. Yup, that’s my girl…
But alas, for this one night we decided to take a break from all the amazingly awesome home-​cooked food to go out. Unfortunately, this being a holiday night, all the highest rated and coolest sounding restaurants were all booked, but this place kindly seated us! But the precedence set by my gf was just too high of a bar…
…I think even if we came without any previous yummy experiences this place would still be a let-​down. But the fact that everything put in my mouth was so extraordinary for the days previous just made the difference that much huger…
1. House Sauvignon Blanc $ 5
2. Pitcher of Pyramid Hefeweizen $ 22: Seems high for a pitcher of the cheap stuff right?
3. Kale Salad Large $ 8.95: Not bad. Pretty standard, but I did like that they had brussels sprouts and other cabbage-​family stuffs in there. Makes me feel healthy. ⁵⁄₁₀
4. Tri Tip /​Ribs /​Links Family Pack Meal $ 69: Very overpriced. I could have easily eaten half of the tray, despite them saying this was for 4 – 6 people. It does come with a couple sides and garlic bread. We got mac & cheese and some vegetables. Was pretty good, those sides. But the meat…
4a. Tri Tip: Not bad. Cooked well, being about medium-​done. Not particularly flavorful. Zero smoke. But at least was not overdone and tasted good. ⁵⁄₁₀.
4b. St. Louis Ribs: Again, like the tri-​tip, cooked well. Tender but no overly so (I hate the term «falling-​off-​the-​bone»… then why have a bone right?) Juicy enough. But again, zero smoke. You can see the pictures – no pink, no nothing. ⁵⁄₁₀
4c. Hot Links: Not bad. Pretty good amount of hot kick. But otherwise nothing special. ⁵⁄₁₀
5. St. Louis Ribs Full Rack $ 27.95: Same deal as #4b from our meal combo.
Well, k, food was passable, but we don’t come brave the cold and snow to get «passable» right? Our server was really nice though, as was the crew who all wished us well as we left. But I don’t recommend the food here too much.
³⁄₅
#americanbbq #bbq

Eggh. 630 on a Friday night and no problem getting a table for 14. Immediate seating. Should have been red flag. Not bad but nothing to write home about. Tri tip was under cooked. Hot links were ok. Both bbq sauces were bad. Wife says the chicken was ok. No on coleslaw, no one touched it.
Not bad, was hungry and now not. But really not good

I came here over the Fourth of July weekend. First things first, the staff here is very accommodating and friendly! Not even just the staff, people sitting at the bar (who I assume were locals from the area) were so nice to talk to.
The downstairs is small and has a few tables. You order in the cashier area and they give you a number and serve you your food. The cashier gave great recommendations and walked us through the menu. We sat downstairs after we ordered assuming that we could only sit there since the upstairs was a full service area. We asked if we could sit upstairs and they didn’t mind at all. Upstairs is the place to be at! We came around 9pm and there weren’t many people at all. There are TV’s mounted against the walls and a bar on the other side. The bartenders were really friendly and told us to come to the windows to watch the fireworks with them. We asked them as well as the people sitting at the bar where the best place to see fireworks are and they gave us some great tips.
Onto the food– the prices here are fair. I’m used to BBQ places giving heaping portions of food for which I can’t finish 99% of the time, but this place gave fair portions that still fill you up but aren’t overly excessive. The plates (we got the tri tip and chicken quarters) come with two sides each. Fries were delicious and the pinquinto beans were something as well. There is a great selection of food and drinks… would recommend trying it out if you’re in the Incline Village area.

Not just good food for the Lake… good food period. I ate the Gus’ tri-​tip and the wife had pulled pork sandy. Flip pin’ amazing. Fried pickles, Mac and cheese and cole slaw: all devoured. Atmosphere is bad ass too. Big tv’s for baseball, wood everywhere and friendly staff.
This is THE go-​to place at the Lake. Might be the go-​to place period.
P. S. Beer selection is amazing too.

If you choose to sit downstairs, you order at the counter and sit wherever you’d like.
If you choose to sit upstairs, you get full service and there’s a huge tv to watch sports on.
We sat upstairs so that we could watch a baseball game. The food was good, especially for the price. I enjoyed the ribs. I got the 4 piece and it was more than enough. Each plate comes with two sides so there’s definitely enough food to fill you up. I had the macaroni and cheese and caesar salad. The sides lacked a little flavor in my opinion, but the flavorful bbq made up for it.
Overall, pretty good bbq in a good location in Incline Village.

Ordered pulled pork sandwich and root beer float! Which was around 15 bucks!
The flavor is very good!
Place is also very cool.
Only thing I don’t like is that I need to pay upfront.

3.5
Just didn’t knock my socks off, but it was fine. Coming in from the parking lot and knowing how they brag about how they cook their BBQ Santa Maria style with red oak wood, I thought I’d smell something good emanating from the restaurant. Nope. And even when I walked into the restaurant itself, the fresh smell of BBQ was very very faint.
I was welcomed warmly by the guy manning the cash register who asked me politely if I’d been there before (nice touch), then explained what they had available and the day’s special. I opted for the $ 9 tri-​tip classic sandwich, which came with beautiful slices of meat, topped with a nice tangy pico de gallo. The problem? The bread. It was either stale or over toasted. Taking my first bite, the top of the sandwich was not just crusty in a good way, but rock hard like «Holy crap, I think I’m gonna break a tooth» rock hard. I ended up picking off the rock hard bits of the top of the bread. The bread just overwhelmed the meat. Otherwise, actually, the sandwich was decent and I liked the pico de gallo topping.
They only had one bottle of BBQ sauce on the tables — for me, a tad too sweet when I taste-​tested it.
Finally, the concept downstairs is an open kitchen. The classic rock music blasting out of there was so loud and frankly, annoying. Just not a fan of music blaring loudly while I’m eating, especially if it’s music that I hate. Turn the volume down and at least I can try to ignore it.