Big Daddy’s Roadhouse BBQ
Lavon, TX 75166
Hours: Open 7 days 10:40–9.
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Texas Monthly rating: 4.00
TEXAS MONTHLY SAYS:
2008: Big Daddy’s prides itself on being biker-friendly, but it’s really just friendly. The first time we visited (anonymously, of course) the server insisted on putting extra meat on our plates so that our party could try a bit of everything. We came away with a profound respect for the moist, tender brisket and fell in love with the hot links. Neither required a dab of the sweet-and-spicy sauce, but we would have been foolish to pass it up.
BBQ SNOB SAYS: 2010: Both fatty and lean brisket are listed on the menu, so I felt confident that an order of the fatty stuff would bring me some barbecue joy on this day. Samples of their weak commercial sausage and what I think were Smokey Denmark’s hot links convinced me to venture away from the tube steaks, so I rounded out the three-meat plate with pulled pork and ribs.
A mishmash of dry and moist meat, neither with much smokiness, was thrown together in my pile of pulled pork. The meat was too salty and contained too much unrendered fat. The ribs were the best item, the meat moist and tender with just enough give as it came off the bone. The brisket was just plain bad—the fatty slices proved undercooked and chewy.
2008: This place was a new edition to TEXAS MONTHLY’s Top 50, so we had high hopes. The lack of pungent smoke flavor as we entered tempered our expectations. We ordered brisket, ribs, and sausage. The sausage was just above grocery store grade. The brisket proved tender, but it lacked a strong flavor and was bone dry. The ribs matched the brisket in their mediocrity with no crust, little smoke, and no intense flavor.
