In the olden days of yore, I was a truck driver, and I roamed all across the land. One of the bonuses of my job that stayed my hand every time I fantasized about plowing my bald-tired pickup into a Murano was trying every taco truck and barbecue shack in the metropolitan region. I ate a lot of smoked and grilled murdered animal. Some good, some bad, and the meat at Roadside BBQ (3751 Geary, SF) is more good than bad.

My approach to barbecue is to control the experiment: I order the same thing at every place, so I have a basis for comparison. You can't compare apples and links, you hear? One of the things I appreciate about barbecue joints is the standardization of menu options. Every place has pork ribs, and calls them pork ribs. Unlike smoothie/juice bars that all have a version of tropical smoothie, but call it by different silly names--Mango Madness at one place and Tropical Tantrum at another. That way, every damn smoothie place I have to study the whole menu all over again and can't just order The Usual.

In the interest of having a perfect laboratory environment, every barbecue place I visit for the first time, I order the ribs and brisket combo. These two dishes show the mettle of the business. Don't bother ordering chicken unless you keep kosher, and links don't showcase the cook or the meat. Ribs and brisket, son.

At Roadside BBQ, the ribs were excellent and the brisket was ok, the difference residing in the flavor. Ribs were tender, moist, and not gristly. Yet my brisket was a little dull. My major complaint about Roadside BBQ was the self-lubricating approach to sauce. They had a choice of sauces on a consol, and the meat came un-sauced. The hot sauce was smoky and sweet with a slow burn, just like my gonorrhea, but I'm opposed on principle to self-saucing. Unless it's the top of the line motherfucking swine (and cow), which this most assuredly wasn't, the meat should be dry-rubbed, marinated, basted, and sauced before it ever reaches me.

I also evaluate barbecue places by the choice and quality of sides. Some places offer ONLY potato salad. Roadside BBQ, to its eternal credit, had a great many choices, and I went with the sweet potato fries and coleslaw. The fries were fantastic, and the coleslaw was tangy and mercifully bereft of mayonnaise.

While I won't be abandoning Memphis Minnie's transcendent brisket for Roadside, if I find myself, as I did last night, killing time in the Richmond before a gig, I might belly up for some satisfying ribs and fries.