Country-tinged toilets at Cecil's BBQ

Cecil's Texas Style Bar*B*Q
2800 S. Orange Ave.
Orlando, FL USA 32806

www.cecilsbbq.com

Where is it?

From the main entrance, go past the order station and buffet towards the back of the building. When you reach the cashier, turn right and enter the dining room, then take an immediate left. At that point, the drink fountain will be on your left, a soft-serve ice cream station will be in front of you and the restaurant's barbecue sauce station (with three buckets of warm sauce) will be to your far right. The various bathroom entrances are set in between these three markers, appropriately labeled of course.

What's it like?

Surprisingly entertaining. This down home BBQ spot, located just south of Orlando's city center offers, wonderful Texas-inspired BBQ. That means it's focus is on beef instead of the traditional pork. Of course, it offers pork too, as well as smoked chicken and turkey (the latter is stupendous), however brisket and spicy sausage are the specialties here, and Cecil's has some of the best in the city.

The atmosphere is much like a Texas roadhouse, with heavy wood tables, deep red brick walls and lots of humorous decor that pokes fun at the Texan spirit (Nolan Ryan posters, amusing licence plates, declarations of love to beef.....).

The bathrooms take that country spirit one step further, offering a homey (perhaps even homemade) environment that's made to look much like an outhouse. Wood paneling covers the walls. Red tile covers the floor. And, better still, the toilet stall isn't made of the standard metal divider but of wooden fence pickets, nailed loosely together with various bits of plywood and locked by a simple slip latch.

Of course, the stall does have a few scattered gaps in the wood -- not enough for someone to look in, mind you, but still enough to get the sitter to worry a little about his/her privacy, and that essentially makes up the loo's major misstep. On the flip side, however, the wood fence around the toilet offers a division line between the commode and urinal, which manages to increase the level of privacy there for the pee-er. Go figure.

The sink and mirror didn't quite match the decor (green tile against a wood look like hand-me-downs in the worst way, but they also were clean and well-kept, albeit a bit worn down and blended well with the down-home county charm exhibited here.

Marks out of 10:

7. The creativity used in the decor definitely lifts the score here. Yeehaw!

Comments to the Management:

Those little peepholes in the stall fencing make me want to paraphrase a line from the London Tube: "Mind the gaps."