Quality Seafood - 5621 Airport Blvd, Austin, TX 78751

**Pepper this,
**Pepper that.
**Why you ruin my beans like dat??

I ate here a few times in 2001/2002, which was before they added a bar to the mix.  Once I moved away from my home at Guadalupe/51st to NW Austin, I just never made my way back to QS.  Until one Saturday evening, that is.

I have to say, the times I went before I always got a shrimp po'boy, and I thought it could be improved upon.  Perhaps that's why it never occurred to me to go back.

Met a first date here Saturday evening for dinner.  He paid.  Cool beans.  (Actually, not so *cool* beans, as you'll read later.)  Nice Jewish psychotherapist who likes Christmas trees, two of which QS still had up on 1/11/10 and nicely decorated.  We sat at the bar, and the bartender was nice and helpful.  All the patrons were really chill and down-to-earth.

I ordered 6 jumbo shrimp, fried, with broccoli and green beans.  The shrimp was excellent, as I expected it would be.  The broccoli was good, too, but can you really screw up broccoli?  The green beans, however, were not so good.  They were cooked just fine, but they were heavily infected with pepper.  Folks, a tiny smidgeon of pepper goes a long way.  You just don't need that much for flavor.  Perhaps they assumed I had stuffed up sinuses and were doing me a favor by adding all that pepper, except that you're supposed to use hot peppers instead of black pepper.  Was I talking like Fran Drescher?  Nah.  I think they treat everyone's green beans this way, which is unfortunate.  I thought perhaps it was some strange Cajun witch-doctor thing, but the times I ate green beans in N'awlins, I don't remember there being several tablespoons of pepper on them.

That pepper issue is the only negative thing I can say about the food.  I also have to say that I had trouble deciding what to get in the first place, as so many things on the menu sounded so good.

And by the way, the date went well.  Though, I just now had a memory that we talked at great length about menopause.  WTF?  Oh yeah, because HE volunteered that he's been suffering from hot flashes lately.  Again, WTF?  I'll see him again as long as he keeps his hot flashes under wraps.

Next time I'm near Airport/290 and hungry, I'll definitely stop by QS and try some other seafood... and will request NO pepper on my beans.