itself is pretty small, with very limited seating arrangements. In fact, they have no reason to have seating arrangements. The only time they serve food is on Tuesday from 5-8 PM, which is when they have their wing night. It is the oddest thing I have ever heard. Since this is the only night they serve food, it was bound to be super busy, and it most definitely was. It took us about an hour to get our food. They do have plenty of things to keep you busy during that time. The place had darts, music, pool table, arcade games, and gambling games. It was a pretty nice day out, so they had the front and side door open for fresh air. It still did not stop my clothes from reeking of cigarette smoke when I left. Since it was so packed, we had to sit on a side bar area, just facing the wall. We had to go up to the bar to order our food and drinks, which is understandable in such a busy time. You are only allowed to place orders of 6, but that is still better than some places that make you get a minimum of 10.
For $0.40, this wasn’t a bad price on wings. They weren’t gargantuan, but they were decent enough to leave me satisfied at the end of my meal. I completed my 18 with no struggle.
I was very surprised by the amount of flavors at AJs. There isn’t a crazy amount of flavors, but there are enough to keep you satisfied. On the bottom of the menu was something that stated you could have mixture of flavors you requested. Unfortunately, this was crossed out on all the menus. This would have greatly expanded the number of options available.
I ordered the Buffalo, Hot Ranch, and Teriyaki. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect with these wings. I was thinking they would be horrible as who would care about making wings only one night a week. I also thought, maybe the person treated this as their one moment to shine for the week as the leading wing chef of Carbondale. Maybe they thought, “Well, this is my one chance to show the world what I’m made off. I’m going to use this 3 hour window to truly make people believe that I can be one hell of a cook.” Needless to say, the wings were pretty tasty. The Buffalo were good and spicy. I’ve been complaining of people advertising hot wings when really they serve up some wimpy wings. These were spicy and tasty. The Hot Ranch were pretty good as well. They were very similar to the Hot Blue, with not really a difference in taste, but they were good nonetheless. They were a good mixture of their spicy Buffalo sauce and ranch dressing. The Teriyaki were pretty decent. It was more of a sweet sauce then the saltiness that I have come to love out of a Teriyaki. They weren’t necessary bad, but I would put them more along the lines of an Asian Sesame than a Teriyaki.
The atmosphere at Aj’s in Carbondale is one that you wouldn’t necessarily put up to that of the atmosphere you found at the Double Deuce in the movie Road House before Dalton took over but it isn’t one that that far away either. The crowd is a working man’s crowd where people who just got off work congregate for a few bottles of suds. The subtle rowdiness should keep you on your toes while you are there. Playing pool is an option and chances are whoever is running the table will challenge to a game where the loser has to buy shots. If you are looking for a delicate place inside, you have made a bad choice. When ordering wings you need to do so at the bar and I must say the woman who was taking our orders was very nice. I will say that if you are planning on eating wings there get there early. We ordered at 6:45 and didn’t eat until 7:40.
At 40 cents a wing for wing night, you won’t be breaking any banks but the size of wing leaves much to be desired. They weren’t the smallest ever but walked away not entirely full and I ordered 20.
I was actually surprised at the number of flavors there were. There were only about 8 or so but I was still surprised. They had hot, mild, bbq, honey mustard, butter/garlic hot ranch, hot bleu and teriyaki. Some different flavors compared to the standard hot, bbq and honey mustard.
With a descent selection to choose from I was hoping for a more impressionable taste. But that did not happen. The hot were fine but did not have any long lasting characteristics other than not being very hot. The honey mustard was descent. The honey was more dominant than the mustard and that jived well. The butter and garlic were a big letdown. They only had garlic on the side that the sprinkled the garlic on and I found some of the wings to be dry and lacking of butter on them. Finally, I got the hot ranch. I’ve had some real good hot ranch wings lately and Aj’s version wasn’t bad but that particular wing was only above average. I would still order them if I were you.
