The Filling Station and Garage Bar

Ok, I see it unfortunately closed down, I still want to give my review.
Great choice of craft beer and cool name of burgers with hesitant ingredients like — Nutella or PB. I loved it.
It was pretty empty when we were there on a weekday in July. Great staff.

This restaurant was frickin awesome Not to mention that it was only 536 feet from my front door made it great too. I admit in the beginning they had some difficulties but what major chain of restaurants (Chilis, Applebee’s, Olive Garden, Changs, etc) doesn’t. As a former corporate trainer for General Mills and Chilis I can tell you anytime a new location of a well know brand restaurant opens it usually takes 2 – 3 weeks if that quick to work out the bugs. Just think if Apple or Microsoft sent out any new product without months and months if not years to prefect a product. Yet some people believe that a small mom and pop place should have it spot on from day one! Really? Get a life you jack offs! After the first few weeks things totally turned around and the lines were out the door. Great staff, great ales and food was just what the doctor ordered. Also, the fact that the Oakland Park Downtown has been a struggle for quiet sometime made it nice to see someone open something other than a brewery (which served food from a food truck parked illegally) to another establishment which can’t decide it it’s a rave training ground or a motorcycle gang bar. I for one will miss the filling station, I think they did a great job and think people were to over eager to be negative without giving them time to adjust, and improve the product. Usually suggestions help more than negative reviews but as all these people prove its easier to bitch than offer a suggestion to help a non big business succeed!
Any comments or question email me I’d be glad to chat

Dear Filling Station,
Downtown Miami misses you very much but Downtown Miami is proud of what you’ve become! My first time at the Filling Station was a few years back during a «Trivia Night». My friends, who at the time lived near the restaurant, invited me to attend. We walked on over and it was love at first site. Great beer, food, and service. I instantly became a mug club member which has its benefits. My mug would fill up with free beer the first Friday of the month and my mug would get more ounces every time I ordered a beer (larger mugs for Mug Club Members; regular glasses for the general public). The staff at the Downtown Miami location was always very friendly and welcoming. Adam the owner would occasionally hang out by the bar and talk to his customers about beer, food, and life in general. Surely enough my friends and I became «regulars» due to the numerous visits every month. It became a tradition to eat and drink at the Filling Station the first Friday of every month.
We decided to head over to the Filling Station the night of 01/​09/​2015 (Funky Buddha’s MBCP Day). A few friends and I participated in MBCP Day and we were all hungry once the event ended. The Filling Station is now located in Oakland Park near Funky Buddha Brewery so we all walked on over. It seems like no matter where the Filling Station is… we end up walking to it, not driving. The location is huge! I really enjoyed the «tap cemetery» up front. There’s plenty of parking and the area in general is calm and quiet therefore creating a peaceful outside seating area. The bathrooms were clean and spacious. The staff; just like the original Miami staff was very informative in regards to menu items and beers offered. We were helped by «Nancy» (I think that’s her name) and she was a sweetheart. She helped us all in deciding and was very patient when it came down to figuring out what our Mug Club membership numbers were. Yes we kept drinking alcohol after MBCP Day.
I ordered Howard’s Big Mac Truck which is a simple double-​cheddar burger with onion rings and pickles (I gobbled it down after finishing my beer; last beer of the night). I wanted something huge and filling because I didn’t eat anything all day due to spending the whole day drinking (morning, afternoon, and night). I really dislike drinking alcohol and eating all at once. I usually like to do one or the other. My burger included a side of the best tots in Florida! Their tot slogan «BEST TOTS IN TOWN». We all shared Mardi Gras Wings which were outstanding. The wings are also the «BEST WINGS IN TOWN».
The menu has evolved into something out of a movie. Lots of food items to choose from and tons of different beers from all over the country. Some of the decorations at the old location made the move into the new location which was awesome to see.
Thank you Filling Station and Garage Bar for doing what you do. South Florida loves and appreciates your business.

I really wanted to like this place and wanted to disregard another reviewer because a friend raved about it, but I just can’t. I ordered the Porky Tots which claims it has cheddar cheese and house smoked pork.
The pork was a fatty mess (far more than the norm!) that tasted like lunch meat and the cheddar cheese was clearly canned. The tots were seasoned and tasted good. I snagged one of my husband’s with nothing on them. He ordered a Sally’s Supersport burger which he enjoyed, but even he, who would eat anything, said my meal had a funny taste. I gave them two stars because our waiter was great, apologized, and took my meal off our bill.
I don’t know if I want to return, but their burgers do look delish, so I’ll probably try it again!

Love this place, they are pet friendly, they see you with your dog and they come out immediately with a bowl of water, they also sell doggy ice cream, very friendly staff. Now the burgers are amazing love them
We love to walk our dog and stop there for beers and doggy ice cream.
Love the place

It’s a neighborhood place so I feel sure I’ll be back and will have a chance to add stars. Here’s the quandary, for me. When it was back in Miami it was five star all the way — there were pop up days when they did a taco theme, Jamaican food, they never wanted for ingenuity — and the taste of the food + service was always on point.
At their new home near my new home I can’t fault them for service — it’s with smiles and it’s done properly — water glasses are refilled, questions are answered promptly and food served as soon as it comes out of the kitchen. And to make matters 5-​star perfect, I actually had a coupon from one of my bosses for a free meal — and the owner went to high school with my companion, which meant the entire bill and bottle of wine was on the house — how much better does it get?
OK — why it wasn’t 2 stars. Packed place, good service, nice wine choices, but the food — at least that night — was a just a little on the bland side to be honest. We ordered a number of goodies (the sweet corn fritters far and away 10 star and a must if you like creamy corn goodness that’s deep fried for your belly) but for the most part I thought they tasted a little too greasy and a little too the same. My flat bread (pizza) made me wish I had stuck to what I know they’re good at — the burgers — which in fact are so delicious I know that’s while I be returning and get a chance to return the favor of their wonderful hospitality and put them in the 5 star rank where they deserve to be.

I wasn’t
over the moon for this new burger hot spot. It’s a Miami transplant. People are overjoyed. I though it was pretty good. I may need to give it another shot. Points for a unique burger with nutella topping — wild! Will probably be back to give it another go.

Sort of an obstacle course getting here. But I’ve come so far to allow a small stumbling block get the better of me. These navigational systems are often a pain in the butt… Took 95 North here exit east Oakland park and my car navigation told me to turn RIGHT on 16^th. Bad move. I circled the block and ended back on Oakland, this time made a left on 16^th and another left at the first stop sign. Then took this residential street all the way to the end. Restaurant is locate on the right.
Awwww…at last I’ve finally arrived! The place wasn’t busy at all for Friday night. We sat ourselves in the 2^nd compartment area. The same guy who was at the bar was our waiter. He allowed us sometime to get familiar with the menu and the ambiance of the place. I told him I had seen this place on the news and a ton of Unilocalers reviewed the place. And it’s been a bookmark of mine quite sometime. Being the food enthusiast that I am I was getting all excited about placing my order. Ohhhh Lawd, so many choices… What do I order? I finally decided to order The Caddy. Which is a cheeseburger anyway I want it. I’m a well done girl. I requested bacon, an egg, and the works with tater tots. My date ordered spicy wings. Now… the wait begins… Thank goodness for great conversation, which made the wait not so agonizing.
Our dinner arrives. Before I make love to every inch of this burger, i first had to bless the hands and all its deliciousness first. I don’t know about you but anything I have anticipated for a long time I have to look at all its beauty first before taking the first savory bite. After admiring this burger’s beauty, I picked this holy mother of goodness up and a smile came across my face that lit up the dim room. Oh… The joy and excitement I was experiencing made my toes wiggle and my body rock.
Ahhhhh… That first bite… Oh… my, my, my, thank you Lawd for this simple pleasure here on earth! This burger was by far, one of the best burgers I’ve ever had. It was giving me everything I expected; hot, fresh, juicy, and flavorful. It was a party going down in my mouth. Such pure ecstasy!
Ok ok. Ok. I’m back… I was having a moment. Don’t judge me. Now that I’ve dealt with my vices. On a real, the ambience of the place is a DDD, it’s a good place to meet up with friends. There is both in and outside seating. A place to sit that is within walking distance outside the restaurant after you’ve eaten. The food was good. If I could critique or improve a couple of things that would be to improve the quality of the pickles and toast the buns. This is the only reason why I didn’t give this place a 5-​Star. I’m looking forward to coming back.

I want to start this review by saying how awesome the service was. From beginning to end our server «Lyric» gave us the most warm and genuine service ever. He was so descriptive about each item on the menu so it really helped us narrow down our choices. My husband and I kept saying that if we had our own restaurant, we would want someone like Lyric working with us — he was just so great to be around and you could tell he took pride in the place — really cool vibe!
We ordered 2 beer specials for the day, corn fritters, wings and the porky tots. Our favorites were the corn fritters and porky tots. The corn fritters were perfectly fried, not overdone with plenty of SWEET corn inside. Lyric went out of his way to let us try every sauce available for the wings and the corn fritters. So I tried each sauce, liked every single one and ended up making a concoction out of like 4 of them — lol. The porky tots were a heart attack on a platter which I never knew I would enjoy as much as I did– just pure gluttonous, cheesy, porky, fried heaven.
The whole interior was meant to feel like an auto shop or gas station… super funky and laid back. Loved the fact that as we were eating, more and more people started coming in like they were regulars… a very good sign — and we plan on being one of them soon!

Ok. so when my fiancé told me about his spot, I was pretty excited to go. I think I remember seeing it on the news as a hot spot to go.
As we pulled up, I thought it was a cute little restaurant, I liked the option of sitting outside (even though we are in hot Florida)! As we walked in, I felt like I was in Georgia-​it reminded me of a little mom and pop restaurant we went to before. It was cute, with different license plates on the walls, and cool little posters.
The host took our names and we only had to wait a little while for a table. The host was super nice and friendly, so I was thinking the same thing for our waitress-​ummm wrong!
So we get our table which was towards the back of the restaurant, although I wanted a booth, but we were starving so I didn’t feel like waiting any longer. We looked over the menu, and waited. And waited… and waited…(birds chirping). My son was starving, and we haven’t even placed drink orders yet. Where was our waitress? Finally another waiter caught eyes with us and probably saw that we were sitting there and annoyed, so he took our drink orders and our food order, because I wasn’t going to wait any longer to find our waitress and wait even longer to get our food.
My son’s kids burger and shoestring fries came out first. It was pretty good, he gobbled the whole thing down in no time. Then we waited for our food. The waitress finally came over to check, well I should say to look at us and I guess see if we needed anything, obviously not because we already ordered! CAN WE GET AT LEAST SOME NAPKINS?! :/​
On to the food which took a while to come out-​not too good. We got the porky tots, which were just okay. If you took the pulled pork off, the tots had no flavor, not even salty! The pulled pork was eh ok, nothing to brag about. I ordered the Mike’s Speed Racer burger, with a side of onion rings. I am the type of person who hates soggy buns, and my bun came out supeeeer soggy! :(The burger description sounded better than it actually was. The burger itself was ok, but the spinach made it too mushy. I actually took everything off the burger and just ate the patty. The onion rings were good, and I liked dipping it in this tangy BBQ sauce it came with. We also ordered chicken wings. I’m usually a fan of wings, but they were dry and tasted like they were sitting out for a while until our other food came out. I asked the waitress for some napkins .
The waitress made her way over maybe twice and then offered us dessert which she said was on the house; must of seen how irritated we were waiting so long for everything. We got the peanut butter pie, which was pretty good. They make their pies fresh daily we were told.
All being said, this experience was not what I expected (food wise) but the place itself was ok.

This is one of the places I really wanted to like. I’ve heard about the filling station since they were in Miami. I wanted to try it since, but when they moved into Broward I knew I had to go.
Just this past week, they had a special on this place, ranting and raving about the food. That was a sign I had to go and try it.
Pulling up to place the first thing I noticed was how dark the parking lot and the business was. It reminded me of places in the country, so I was really excited about eating here-​plus I was starving.
So we made our way in. We were greeted by our host and he gave us the choice of eating outside or inside. We chose to sit inside thinking we would be able to get our food quicker. I was wrong. We were seated quickly and it took 20 mins for us to order drinks (not from our waitress but another waiter that was walking by!) He stopped and asked if we needed drinks since our waitress didn’t make it over to us yet. He took our drink order and our waitress delivered the drinks. She didn’t even apologize or introduce herself to us.
She dropped the drinks of and walked away. Another 30 mins went by-​the same guy stopped and took our food order. At this point I was ready to leave. I ordered the wings and tater tots. The food took about 25 – 30 mins. The most disappointing thing about this is the fact that the food was not hot like I expected. Everything felt warm like it was sitting on a counter.
The wings had barely any flavor, the cheese and pork on on the tots were cold. What capped this whole experience was our waitress telling us we get a free desert because we had to wait so long. She never acknowledged the fact that she never introduced her self to us or waited on us. I don’t think I will be back here anytime soon. I can deal with bad service and good food, but if your service is bad and the food is bad, there’s no point of going.

I’ll admit it. I have a friendly rivalry with Miami. I mean it’s literally, it’s basically in my job description to believe that my community is the best in the world… and because Miami is so close, I often times find myself comparing BPB to our big sister to the South — that often times gets the headlines and has the glitz and the glamour.
Well, the Filling Station used to be located in Miami. When they announced they were moving to Oakland Park, I almost jumped out of my seat. It was like we just stole the hottest free agent — from our rivals! SO happy they’ve found a new home in BPB.
In between meetings I made it in for a quick lunch and got the porky tots. A mountain of tater tots with pork on top… smothered in cheese with a cool dolop of sour cream. YUMMO. Get this to split wth a friend. I orderd it to have a «ligher lunch» thinking the size wouldn’t be too big… wrong. The plate is massive.
They have a killer selection of beer. I got a Cigar City brew to wash down the tots. They feature local and state beers and some national ones as well. Check out the awesome «beer garden» out front that’s made up of various tap handles — in a garden!
Great service. My server was super attentive and checked in on me from time to time.
Parking was easy — but this was midday… not sure how it is in the evening. I got parking right out front.
So many things on the menu caught my eye, and I’ll be back very soon to try various things.

Been a fan for years and was so excited when I saw they were opening close to home. Finally made it out Sunday afternoon with some friends. Plenty of parking here! When we pulled into the parking lot they had many jeeps lined up. What a great idea and a perfect place to have such a meet up. They were having raffles outside, playing games, and of course drinking great craft beers.
The outside patio area is very nice with many tables and games to play. The inside is smaller than I expected but I am looking forward to sitting outside once the weather chills down a bit. As soon as we sat down our server greeted us and took our order. He was awesome! Adam, the owner always hires the most friendly staff. I do miss some of the older staff from the old Miami location, but I am sure this team will be just as great.
As usual they have some great craft beers to choose from. We started with some tots with pork and cheese… OK, these bad boys are addicting and oh so good. Not sure what they do to these tots but oh my are they ever so delicious! My friend and I both ordered the veggie burger, she loved it and I did not care much for it. I believe the only reason is because it came with guacamole and instead of chunky homemade guacamole it was a spread that I could not bare the taste so it ruined me enjoying the black bean burger. Otherwise it would have been very good, no biggie next time I would just say no guacamole. My daughter gave me half of her buffalo chicken sandwich and it was very good. Nice spice to it, loved the hoagie they put it on, fresh with good flavor.
We sat, enjoyed each other’s company, ate and drank and even went outside to play some games. We met Adam out there and what a great guy! We told him how happy we were to see them here. Adam is happy to be in Fort Lauderdale and told us the business is going well. Yay!!!
This is a great hangout bar with good food. If you walk in… know you will get great service in a fun environment, good beer, take it for what it is… a bar that is loads of fun!!!
See you soon!!!

The venerable Miami watering hole recently picked up and moved to Oakland Park. Their loss is mostly definitely our gain.
Inhabiting the space previously occupied by By Word of Mouth (which obviously didn’t) it’s a small little bar, with a rather extensive menu — a gastropub, in modern parlance.
Usually when a place markets itself as «gastro» anything that means that everything costs just a little more than your run of the mill «burger n beer» joint; and the Filling Station is no different. Most burgers ave sandwiches tend to run in the $ 11-​$ 14 range which is pretty on par with most of the local gastrothings.
But is the food any good? Well yeah, it is. Quite good in fact. On a recent outing we tried two different offerings, The Caddie and the General Lee. Notice the car theme… ha ha. The GL is a pulled pork bbq sandwich topped with Carolina bbq sauce, cheese and fried pickles. As a Texas boy I feel guilty giving credence to blasphemous bbq imposters, but it was damn good (shhhh, I’ll turn in my Texas passport). The sauce was slightly sweet, with a tang. The fried pickle spears added a nice crunch to what would normally be a very soft sandwich. The pork itself was very nicely seasoned and juicy. It should be noted that, thankfully, the sandwich wasn’t dripping in sauce.
The Caddie is a traditional half pound burger with all the usual toppings. We added some bacon as well which makes everything better. It was cooked perfectly and full of flavor.
Overall, the food was very good a bit too pricey maybe, but very good.
Overall, we’ll defiantly be back. This good ‘ol boy may find himself craving the General Lee.
As a side note, the Filling Station hosts an LGBT themed event — B3 (burgers, boys and beer) — on Tuesdays

Hubby has been pouting, crying and groaning about this restaurant abandoning Brickell, bugging FBB workers when and where this place would open.
This is my first time, definitely not my last. The space inside is designed «long» and not so much wide. We sat at the bar, our waitress was so good! Friendly, attentive and very anticipatory. She was juggling quite a few tasks, we felt she didn’t skip a beat with our meal and our experience. she even took the time to chat with us about their move to Broward. Apparently this place has so many fans, and I am sure there is back story my fanatic hubby can attest to so hopefully one day he writes a review about it.
This visit, I had wings w the Carolina BBQ… now the unique amazing thing for me was that they weren’t swimming in BBQ sauce… there was NO excess sauce in the bottom of the basket. I was in awe, I almost sent them back, but I held back, took a bite, the proceeded to inhale my 8 pieces. It’s like the skin of the wings was infused with the flavor. That’s the only way I can describe it. I’ve never had wings like that, I will never view wings the same. Hubby inhaled his beloved buttermilk chicken sandwich called «the hog», the sandwiches and the burgers are on my upcoming list, for sure.
We also shared the corn poppers, sweet potato waffle cut fries and a very unusual and tasty order of flat bread fries… strips of flat bread fried crispily and topped with parmesan and chives. So good. Gee whiz, who came up with that tasty idea? There is a awesome selection of draft and bottles, if FBB is not an option for the evening, or maybe it is — drink at both. Lol.
New fave. Love.

We came here when Big Dog Station (the original destination) backfired because it was packed! We sat down and I was already scoping out the draft beer list. I must add how amazing this list is. I was very impressed for a place that I was assuming to be just a dive bar. Ordered my favorite cider that I usually never find, Cigar City Cider and ordered a Burgatti. The boys ordered crazy burgers, one with peanut butter and one with Nutella. I was excited to see what everyone thought. Everyone was super pleased! And everyone LOVED their food. My burger was cooked to perfection and it was delicious, I even added mushrooms because the one with mushrooms, I didn’t really want. The Tots were crispy and amazing, a few of the guys ordered the upgraded tots and they were all happy. My boyfriend even compared them to our favorite spot in Ohio.
This is definitely a place I will revisit. Oakland Park has some serious potential to be my favorite area for food and beer.

Though as of this writing it’s only been open three weeks, The Filling Station and Garage Bar seems to be up and running with any opening kinks already worked out. The service I had was good and the staff seems professional, trained and knowledgeable about their menu and beer offerings.
The décor is definitely kicky, somewhat on the whimsical side, a novelty beer garden of planted in gravel varying draft beer levers and spouts, patron and other pictures imbedded in the table tops and signs, t-​shirts and posters on the walls. It has both a good bar seating as well as patio, indoor table and booth seating.
I was really surprised at the size of their draft beer offerings which is as large and more varied than are those of any other establishment in the area. However, oddly enough, no offerings from nearby Funky Buddha brewery which is located just down the street.
The menu is also exceptionally large particularly in its selection of burgers, most of which are rather creative and novel combinations of ingredients. For myself I went for one of their burgers (Eric’s) consisting of a fried onion, crumpled cheese and bacon, $ 12.95, along with their tater tots and a draft of Belgian beer.
As far as burgers go, it not only consisted of some rather uniquely prepared ingredients but was tasty as well. On the downside, there wasn’t any bun selection. The bun I had looked and tasted like a plain old white two day old bread from one of Publix’s expiration sales and though the burger was tasty, greasy to the extreme. As for their tater tots, an item I’m not all that fond of, actually some of the best I’ve ever tasted.
Though I haven’t seen any official advertisement of it, and in fact there may be none, I’ve gotten several shouts on various social apps for what may be theme nights, such as from GROWLr for a Tuesday «Bear Night.» Whether or not those will ever amount to anything, I have no idea, but I can say that with the number of Wilton Manors refugees coming into the Oakland Park area in order to avoid the high costs of rentals or real estate, such might be likely.

Ok, so I had never been to the Filling Station in Miami (yes, bad Savanna) but I had tried them at a few burger competitions, so when I heard they were opening in Broward, down the street from Funky Buddha, I hopped right on the excitement train!
I have friends who are absolutely obsessed, and despite The Filling Station only being open now for 2 weeks (only 1 week officially) they’ve already been 3+ times, and were happy to invite a few of us along to do it AGAIN.
We arrived around 8pm and immediately took our seats to look over the menu. I was a little disappointed that the old mahi sandwich wasn’t on it, but owner Adam explained that he’s still getting a feel for the popularity of fish at this new location and doesn’t want to serve it until he knows he won’t have to keep it frozen forever… in his words «he’d rather sell no fish, than old fish» which completely makes sense and I give him credit for this. So I instead went with a tried a true Burger and got the Hamburgini (sp?) — a burger with salami and pesto mayo… which was pretty damn good, and almost even better when I reheated the second half the next day. I opted for a side of tots.
To split before our food came out I also tried the sweet corn fritters, which were different (in a good way) from any other fritter I’ve had before and were bursting with ooey-​gooey corn goodness. PRO TIP — add some sriracha to the dipping sauce and you’ll love me forever ;)
We also tried some not on the menu pepper poppers… which really cleared the sinuses and left us all cracking up over each other’s pepper facial expression. The habaneros were amazing!
I opted not to drink, but the rest of the group loved the lengthy craft beer list, and they even had a Berliner for people like me!
To be honest we did have some service kinks, but in the end left happy (and full), and without a doubt that these «kinks» are only due to initial growing pains. I wouldn’t hesitate to come back, and I’m sure this will easily become my pre-​drink or after drink spot when at Funky Buddha!

I’ve been here a couple of times since its opening a couple of weeks ago. The food is top notch for bar food. Very spacious indoors, with an outdoor café section.
I’ve had burgers on both occasions. The bleu burger has the bleu cheese, which has an intense flavor. During my most recent visit I had the regular burger with cheese. The burgers are top notch.
They accidentally brought out tater tots instead of fries, but those were so damn delicious, too. They brought out the fries very quickly afterward, but I was able to snack on the tater tots. Very good, especially when dunked in brown mustard.
Service is terrific. It’s clear to me that this place cares about its customers. And, there always seems to be something going on. My first visit revolved around a power eater who was able to eat nine burgers in 24 minutes, including onion rings and tater tots. My second visit, I met two folks who frequented the Miami location. To me, it speaks volumes that in both visits, loyal customers from Miami are showing their support for this new location.
If you’re hungry, I would strongly recommend checking this place out. It’s a couple of blocks away from The Funky Buddha. Plus, they have a very impressive craft beer selection.
I’m rooting for this place! I’m looking forward to returning.

I’ve been waiting for The Filling Station to open since the day they closed their doors (in Miami) last year. As a regular at the old location, and a lover of the dark, divey restaurant that served some bomb ass burgers & beers, with a smile and friendly service– I had some high expectations.
I do have to say, the new spot has a WAY different feel. The restaurant is well lit, and has more of a family restaurant feel than a «garage bar» (like the old location).
As I was sitting waiting for my burger, I couldn’t help but wish they had pulled the carpet from the floor (not much of a fan of carpet in a dining room & there were stains on it– which made the place look a tad bit shady). However, I would not let this deter me, what I came for after all was the food.
My burger did not disappoint! Same great flavor as before (something I was so very thankful for!) Tots and sweet potato waffle fries were crisp, beer was cold, and service was friendly and quick.
I do hope that they expand their beer list, as I feel it used to be longer. (But if they don’t at least they are super close to the Funky Buddha: D)
I pray that the filling station stays in business for a long time so I can continue to frequent to satisfy my burger cravings.