DALLAS — Keith Lee’s DFW food tour has officially begun.

The TikTok-famous food critic has touched down in North Texas and has posted reviews on three restaurants: Terry Black’s Barbecue, Thunderbird Pies, and Halal Fusionz.

In the words of his catchphrase, he got ’em, he tried ’em, and rated them 1-10.

Remember, Lee’s trip around DFW will be different from his previous food tours. This time, he’s splitting his restaurant picks into three categories:

1. Places with good food and good customer service, but needs more marketing
2. Popular local spots voted on by DFW locals
3. Restaurants with diverse backgrounds

Thunderbird Pies, a Detroit-style pizza place in East Dallas, was the first review Lee posted Sunday.

Lee said Thunderbird fits Category 1 of his tour; he said it was highly recommended to him and it likely wasn’t well-known due to marketing. (For the record: The owners of Cane Rosso and Zoli’s Pizza, both well-known North Texas pizzerias with no shortage of local and social marketing, also own Thunderbird. But we’re just passing along what Lee said.)

For transparency’s sake, here’s the Yelp page for Thunderbird to give you an idea of what other people have to say.

Lee and his family spent $139.12 on his order, which he said was easy to order online. Here were his ratings on each dish:

The fried brussels sprouts are topped with bacon marmalade, sweety drop peppers, and balsamic reduction.

Lee said the toppings were good, but the sprouts were too greasy for his liking and he couldn’t taste them that well.

Lee liked the wings themselves for the “pizza shop wing” standards, in his words.

For the ranch, he said the banana pepper twist made it more tangy, but not in the best way.

The Goat pizza is Thunderbird’s Pizza of the Month for January 2024. It has a brick cheese blend with pepperoni, hot soppressata, brisket, goat cheese, and jalapeño pesto.

Lee said he’s a big fan of Detroit-style pizza, which has its sauce on top. 

He noted that the Goat didn’t have regular sauce, so if the pesto was meant to replace the sauce, he thought there should be more.

The Budd pizza is a regular dish for Thunderbird. On top of the brick cheese blend, it has caramelized cheese crust and tomato sauce on top.

Lee liked cheesy crust, but he said the sauce’s onion flavor was too strong for his taste.

“Everybody’s palette is different, so other people might like the onions. I’m just not a huge fan of it,” he said.

The original Connie pizza just has double pepperoni cups and tomato sauce. The bacon was Lee’s request.

Lee said the Connie was his favorite meal from Thunderbird. He said the presentation looked good and he liked the sauce-to-cheese ratio.

The bacon he added overpowered the pizza, in his opinion. It balanced out the sauce, but he said people who aren’t pork fans may not like the bacon.

After Lee’s review dropped, Jeff Amador said he and the Thunderbird Pies staff had to stop reading the comments on the video, many of which said the restaurant did Dallas wrong. Amador is the  chief marketing officer for the restaurant group behind Thunderbird Pies.

“We have no reason to push back on anything,” said Amador. “He did a nice job of saying it was just his opinion and encouraged people to try it for themselves, and that’s what we hope people do.

Terry Black’s is a popular barbecue spot in Dallas with two other locations in Texas. Here’s their Yelp page to get a sense of what people think.

Terry Black’s fits Category 2 of Keith Lee’s tour. He said the restaurant won the first poll on his Instagram story with over 10,000 votes.

He also said he’s gotten mixed reviews about the place, but the poll has spoken.

Lee said he and his family spent $191.03 on the to-go order. He also said he didn’t like how the to-go orders were only available online and that those orders had a $75 minimum.

Lee said the Original Sausage was high quality, had a good snap and was nicely smoked.

Lee admitted that he spat out the cheese sausage off camera. He said the taste of the cheese and grease, and the taste of the meat itself was too overpowering for him.

The turkey was moist, high-quality and could work really well on a sandwich, according to Lee.

The brisket was Lee’s highlight from his review. He liked the smokiness and the peppery flavor.

“I could be wrong, but it tastes like mesquite wood. And if it’s not mesquite wood, whatever wood they used was really strong, and I’m a fan,” Lee said.

He then tried the brisket with Terry Black’s barbecue sauce. He preferred the brisket on its own.

Lee had to go back to order a rack of ribs. For $100, he said he got 13 ribs.

With that being said, he said the ribs were so good, he would’ve been mad if he left without trying them.

“Is it expensive? Yes. It barbecue expensive? Yes. But this is personally the highest rating for me,” he said. 

In Lee’s words, “The cornbread was just cornbread, and it was on the drier side.”

Lee’s family bought a quart size of mac and cheese, which he said was the smallest size they could get.

And he admitted that he wasn’t a fan.

“It just taste like a salty, wet noodle,” he said. “Excuse my description, but that’s just my personal opinion.”

Halal Fusionz is located in Farmers Branch and is described on their website as a modern blend of Pakistani and Tex Mex. 

The owner of the restaurant, Ahmed Siyaji, emailed Keith Lee asking for him to stop by saying he started the restaurant in his late mother’s memory.

Halal Fusionz fits Category 3 of Keith Lee’s tour. Lee said he and his family spent $18 on the to-go order, and he admitted he paid via Apple Pay revealing his identity by accident.

Instead of the traditional birria meat Halal Fusionz uses Nihari meat served inside a naan shell.

“It’s amazing but it’s spicy..boyyy… omg I’m sweating. I’m in a full sweat,” Lee said.

He went on to say it featured a lot of spices he’s never tried but says the combination of the cheese, meat, and shell was a highlight to give it a high rating.

Lee normally doesn’t rate drinks but said the mango mojito mocktail was a refreshing taste after eating a combo of spicy foods.

This taco was created for vegetarians and although Lee isn’t one he was impressed with the flavor. He said the cucumber cool-down sauce paired well with it.

“This is delicious. You can see that they really care about quality here. It’s real fresh,” Lee said.

“That’s the best one,” he said after taking a bite. “They use an amazing amount of spices and seasonings on this meat.”

This taco got Lee’s highest rating so far on his food tour.

Lee couldn’t finish the corn saying it was too spicy – in fact, the spiciest item he tried thus far.

He felt it was missing mayo, cheese, chili powder, salt, and lime. All of which are commonly used to make traditional elotes.

After his review, Lee went inside to meet the owner Ahmed Siyaji, and tipped him $1,000.

North Texas started off rough with Keith Lee’s food tour, but based on his latest review it’s starting to make a turn for the better.

Lee’s been posting polls on his Instagram stories for popular eateries to check out.

For less popular spots, Lee says you can tag or message him on social media. You can also send him an email.