Smoke Tree BBQ Bar & Grill

Brittany made my bbq experience amazing. This place is so delicious and she recommended all the best items on the menu. I will definitely be coming back.

Great and friendly service, food is good, portion is good, beef ribs could have had more meat but it was satisfying.
Great outdoor seating, relaxing and good atmosphere.
Wish my corn bread was slightly larger, sides were just right.
Offer 4 different type of sauces. Sweet molasses is very good.
Worth the stop. Will be back.

Service was atrocious but the food made up for it. Our poor server was running ragged, she said they had been bombarded during happy hour and were trying to catch their breath. Beers were not near cold enough. Seemed like several tables near us had ordered after us but got their food long before us for some reason. We split a 3 meat combo with ribs, brisket and Turkey. We had potato salad and mac&cheese as sides. Corn bread was mediocre but everything else was fabulous. The brisket itself was outrageously good. The ribs were killer, potato salad was great too. Several sauces to choose from. The wife liked the Kansas City sauce and I loved the Habanero sauce.
Food was 4 stars or better, service was 2 stars based on how long it took to get our order but is should be said that our server was apologetic. Would likely return if we were locals.

Somehow this place was on a list of top 10 Palm Springs restaurant… But if you like good food you will be sorely disappointed. Got a full rack of ribs with baked beans, garlic fries and mac & cheese. The ribs were cold, dry and a bit tough, like they’d been sitting out all day long. Corn bread was cold like it came from the fridge. And Mac & cheese was only okay. Baked beans were tasty and garlic fries were decent. But if you are a BBQ place you should be judged on your ribs, and those were not good at all…

This place is not on the side facing the parking lot and looks like its missing an entrance. After walking around back, they were nice and let me in. Wasn’t for the reviews I defiantly would have kept walking. The bartender was very nice and that is rare in this town. The pulled pork sandwich was great. The hot bbq sauce was perfect, but I had to ask for it.

This is some of the best BBQ I’ve had in the LA area. My girlfriend and I split a pulled pork and rib combo, with mac and cheese, okra, and baked beans. We also had an order of shishito peppers to start. Everything was delicious, and we didn’t feel nasty after eating it all. There are several sauces at the table, but my favorite was the Texas XXX Diablo– sweet heat!

Great find in an unassuming strip mall location. Completely exceeded my expectations for BBQ in Palm Springs. We had the pulled pork and baby back ribs — both delicious. Their sauces were super flavorful and went perfectly with the meat. All the sides were also tasty: Mac and cheese, baked beans and we couldn’t get enough of the fried okra. Also has a great beer selection to wash it all down!

Decent — Not Great — Overpriced — Weird Location
Came here over the long weekend, could have shot a cannon through the restaurant and nobody would have heard it, very dead — which is always a red flag. Pulled pork OK — pretty skimpy portion for over $ 10, however. Servers were OK — nothing to write home about. Have had better…

Soo good! BBQ baby ribs and pulled pork meat trip was delicious. I’ll definitely return

I love BBQ and this place is a disappointment. Not only did they not give us menus when we got there, they took the sauces and didn’t acknowledge the fact we didn’t have menus. It took like what seemed like an hour to get our food, the waitress was not present at all. She kind of got our food order confused. The food came cold and dried out. And they didn’t even bring the correct sides. So slow!!!

AMAZING! So happy a place like this opened in my home town! Was visiting from San Diego and saw this place on HWY111 in a strip mall with pretty quick eats. Very cool restaurant, with a hip design. Brianna was our server and since it was our first time at the restaurant she explained the 4 sauces on the table /​what they go good with. They also have an awesome IPA and other beer selection. We ended up just sharing a few appetizers and having a few beers since we were full from lunch but I am so excited to come back for some pulled pork sandwiches. OH and two words BURNT ENDS.
Ps. Just realized I reviewed the Palm Springs location– tried palm desert location

Thank you, Unilocalers, for leading us here for lunch!
Was looking to try something new, and found Smoke Tree under «Hot and New.»
* Four types of BBQ sauce on the tables that you can pick from; my two favourites were the Kansas style one and the Texas peppered one. I used mostly the Kansas one. Only wish here is that the sauces were a little thicker? They seemed to be a little. not watery, but not a thick consistency, so I seemed to use more sauce than I normally would.
* Beef brisket was TENDER! Yum! Not too fatty, either, which was nice.
* The corn and mac & cheese both have a little pepper kick to them.
* Iced tea was nice and fresh
* Sodas come in 12 oz cans (which they note on the menu)
Nice addition to the Palm Springs dining scene… and the service was AWESOME. One server running the whole place, but was VERY attentive and on top of things. Kudos!

Great… Great… Great… loving this BBQ place in the desert… jessica in the bar was a delight… The food=AMAZING!

Five star review
We had lunch at the Palm Desert store its soo good best I ever had … Finger lickin good. Looking forward to trying the other items on the menu.

Walked past a vegan restaurant in a strip mall feeling a liiiiiiiiiiiittle worried and then came in on a hot mirage — Smoke Tree BBQ. Hell. Yes. We were pre wedding noshing, so didn’t go too heavy handed but here’s the quick download on our short trip.
Go for the combo plates — I think we ended up paying ~$ 20 a person by splitting two between the five of us + a pulled pork sandwich.
Mains: The Brisket is super tender — a few slabs goes a long way. The pulled pork and ribs combo — very flavorful (they said their most popular dish).
Sides: garlic fries were super crispy and not too smelly. Mac and Cheese — probably could have ordered about 10 more sides of it. Potato salad, meh. Roasted veggies — nothing to write home about.
Service was very quick and friendly, they have a full bar, and delicious meat smells — there’s not reason not to stop by!

Small BBQ restaurant hidden in a quiet corner of a strip mall. Excellent table service, friendly and the habanero sauce is incredible. My friend and I ordered a full rack of short ribs. The color and rub is aromatic and decent, with the habanero sauce it’s great. The sides, garlic fries, potato salad and pickles were top notch. What is average is the cut of the meat. The ribs have less meat than expected and the ribs were too fatty.
We did not order dessert but the choices sounded very complementary for a BBQ.
I will not return; I’ve been spoiled by better cuts of meat.

Grabbed some snacks before my salon appointment in the same plaza. Sat at the bar, had a lemon drop martini, it was very tasty and strong.
We had some finger food like shishito peppers, onion rings and sausage link. They were all delicious. Loved the shishito peppers, smoky and flavorful, the sauce came with it was bomb, the mustard with sausage was so yummy too.
A quick stop but we loved the food and service!

Well deserved 5 star rating to this bbq. Best I have had in a while and anytime I’m back in palms springs I’m coming back for this nomination ass meal. Toooooo bomb !!! Them baby back ribs are lit. Falling right off the bone & so damn dank. Dry rub season was so on point. Even the dry rub on the chicken wing appetizer was so yummy. Everything I had was very good.
Great selection of bbq sauces that are house made. My favorite one was the Diablo one. Had habanero & I loooove spicy. I did try the other 4 sauces they had and they were yummy also. There was one with vinegar mustard, sweet & mild, one with ghost pepper but I just prefer super spicy. The garlic aioli sauce was soooooo dank too with them sweet potato fries. And that banana bread pudding topped with the bourbon caramel sauces was a beautifully yummy icing on the cake for the meal.
On top of all the goodness and the little fairies dancing on my tongue from eating we had amazing customer service. On point lovely experience & great yummmyness. Worth the try fo sho !

Tucked away inside of a strip mall, Smoke Tree BBQ is legit barbecue. I read about this place in an advertisement email about things to do in Palm Springs and decided to check it out. My expectations weren’t very high because Courtney and I have had some pretty incredible BBQ when we were in Kansas City a few years ago. But this place passed the BBQ taste test in all categories — quality of the sauce, tenderness and smokiness of the meats, appropriate sides and portion size.
Food: We each ordered a sandwich off the lunch menu which came with a side. We ordered the brisket and the pulled pork sandwiches and then split them so we each got to try two different meats (best thing about being in any relationship is sharing food and dessert!). The brisket was tender and the sandwich had a slice of melted cheese that didn’t overpower the rest of the sandwich. The pulled pork had a mustard vinegar based sauce along with a cabbage slaw with raisins that was nice.
We didn’t try all of the sides but the garlic fries were crispy and the garlic wasn’t overpowering. Very nice texture and I couldn’t resist trying out all four of their different sauces. Their potato salad was also a very good and not swimming in mayonaise.
The scene: No sit down tables inside which is set up mostly for bar type high chairs and tables with a small banquet room in the back. But the great thing about Palm Springs is that the weather is great year round and there’s a nice covered patio with misters that has plenty of tables and chairs.
Service: Friendly and fast although we were there during lunch in July which is usually the slow down time in the desert.
Overall: This place was great and if we’re in the desert again and are craving BBQ, we’ll definitely come back.

I really wanted to like this place more than I did. I remember eagerly waiting to get the chance to eat there, and I came in like a giddy child once I finally did.
Unfortunately, our dining experience didn’t quite measure up to the anticipation. Service was fine — we were well taken care of. But let me break down the experience:
Dining room: You’re seated on communal benches and tables, which is fine if the restaurant’s empty. I know some places and people love this idea, but I don’t. I really don’t want to rub elbows with the dude next to me if I don’t have to.
Drinks: Canned sodas from the bar. No fountain sodas. Fine, you don’t want to pay for Pepsi/​Coke to maintain a fountain. But that seems odd considering you’re not some little hole in the wall restaurant. Serving canned sodas is really kind of a small sandwich shop kind of thing, not a nice BBQ joint kind of thing.
Price: Goodness gracious. The food was good, but not $ 50 good. We split a combo plate and sides and it came to nearly $ 50. That’s just way too high for the level of BBQ (very fatty — not into that) here. It wasn’t earth-​shattering, so I’m not sure why I paid more than what I’d pay at say, Famous Dave’s.
It’s too bad. With Tootie’s in CC closed, the mediocre Cowboy Way, and just crappy Dickey’s, there’s not a whole lot of BBQ options in the Coachella Valley. Smoke Tree could really be something special, but they miss the mark.