The Austin City Limits Music Festival (ACL) kicks off today, and it isn’t just the music scene that is attracting hoards of attendees to the festival grounds. The food lineup is just as alluring as the assortment of bands scheduled to play this year.

A myriad of Texas restaurants, including The Salt Lick, Second Bar + Kitchen, and Woodshed, will be just some of the many food vendors at the event. In years past, places like The Mighty Cone, Amy’s Ice Creams, and P. Terry’s Burger Stand have been the main culinary attractions of the festival, but this year there are some fresh talented faces in attendance, such as Pâté Letelier and Torchy’s Tacos.

To get an idea of what kind of preparation – not to mention anxiety – goes into an event like this, I reached out to a few of the vendors and asked them about the work that goes into the days leading up to ACL. You’ll see answers from them posted over the next three days of ACL. To start things off, David Bull of Second Bar + Kitchen explains how his restaurant is handling its first year as an ACL vendor.

What factors go into deciding what kind of dishes you’ll serve at an event like this?

We’re serving three different bánh mì sandwiches and our black truffle pomme frites. It was actually a long and grueling process to decide on the sandwiches. We surveyed our team on what they would want to eat, and we landed on something that was healthy-ish, hand-held, and had spice.

Avocado Bánh Mì

After a lot of brainstorming, we came up with the bánh mì sandwich, which is delicious, fresh, and hits all of the earlier points. Once we decided on the bánh mì sandwich, we then had to determine costs, yield percentage tests, and product availability, and most importantly, make sure it tasted great.

What sort of prep work and labor goes into an event like this? 

We’re preparing food for tens of thousands of people within three days; it’s crazy! By the time ACL hits, we’ll have been working for a week prior to make sure we’re prepped and ready. We’re bringing on extra hands from the Auguste Escoffier School of Culinary Arts to help us prepare and serve at the festival – which will be invaluable experience for the students.

Pork Belly Bánh Mì

Are you going to catch any shows during ACL? If so, which ones?

If I get a chance to see shows, I will be extremely lucky!

Tagged: ACL, Amy's Ice Creams, Austin City Limits, bánh mì, David Bull, Layne Lynch, P. Terry's, Pâté Letelier, Second Bar + Kitchen, The Salt Lick, Torchy's Tacos, Woodshed

Moments after Tim Love’s late-afternoon announcement on Jan. 31 that he would open his long-awaited Fort Worth restaurant, Woodshed, that evening–a day earlier than anticipated–the indoor-outdoor smokehouse with a worldly menu of wood-fired foods was instantly swamped with hungry, thirsty patrons. Situated on the banks of the Trinity River, close to TCU and the Cultural District, Woodshed is Love’s fourth Cowtown restaurant. Stacks of pecan, hickory, mesquite, and oak keep the smokers, stoves, and heaters going and the air fragrant, and plenty of adult beverages keep the crowds lively. We asked him to fill us in on some of the fine points.

Q: Have you figured out what to call this style of cuisine yet?

A: No, I still don’t know! Y’all are supposed to do that, coin a phrase. It’s not barbecue like we think of barbecue. Some people have suggested global barbecue, but it’s more than that. I like to call it my backporch food, because it’s stuff I’ve been doing at home for family and friends for a long time.

Q: How did you start cooking with so many different kinds of wood?

A: I’ve done it since we opened Lonesome Dove, but I really started doing it when I began cooking on the road so much, probably five or six years ago. I knew I was formulating something, the next restaurant, but I wasn’t sure what for a while. I just knew I loved cooking without electricity.

Q: What’s been the biggest challenge in producing this menu?

A: Getting the ingredients I want. We have bought out North America’s supply of baby artichokes in the past week! We went through 22 cases in our first four days. And our green bean dish has miso flakes, and I realized we were going to have make our own because there’s not enough to buy here.

Q: What in the meat world has been the most fun to do?

A: Perfecting the beef shin has been a real process. We’ve probably done 250 versions over the past six or seven months, trying to get it just right. We’ve smoked it and braised it and have done I don’t know how many variations. The guys at [the meat processing supplier] thought I was just crazy. But working with the whole animal is really fun. You learn so much every time out.

Q: What do you think has been the biggest surprise for guests at Woodshed?

A: I’m selling the hell out of the bulgogi with kimchi; people are really warming up to it, probably because it’s inexpensive. Some people tell me they don’t know what it is but they love it.

Q: How are those big-ticket items doing? Are people understanding that the $90 bistecca florentina with crispy potatoes is for the whole table?

A: It’s starting to catch on. It’s up to the servers to sell it, explain it. People are coming in and sticking their toe in, ordering smaller, inexpensive things, then they’re coming back and going for the bigger stuff. It’s getting better by the day.

Q: How is that Skinny Chicken Sandwich (grilled camp bread with seasoned, fried chicken skin, fresh mayo, watercress and shaved red onion) selling?

A: Girls order it because they think it’s a skinless chicken breast and then they say,’Ohmigod, I ate chicken skin?’ But the guys dig it! It’s so good.

Q: Are people liking the wines on tap and the craft beer, or are they still sticking to their Miller Lite?

A: Since we opened [six days ago], we’ve gone through 18 kegs of craft beer, plus five kegs of wine. It’s really exciting. The distributors are thrilled.

Q: What are you going to eat tonight?

A: It’s pig night. I’ll have cracklings on homemade tortillas.

Q: What’s exciting you most about the Austin Food & Wine Festival this year [Tim is one of the principals involved in working with Food & Wine magazine and others to bring this new regional festival to Texas; dates are April 27-29]?

A: It’s probably the coolest event I’ve ever done, and I do a lot. I’ll be teaching a hands-on class for 200 people. It’s how to grill a steak and teaches you everything from lighting the perfect fire to creating the perfect bite of steak. There’s cold white wine to drink during class–I always grill with a glass of cold white in my hand–and guests will get to take home about $200 worth of goodies from my new kitchenware line from Sur La Table. It’s so exciting to be involved with this.

Find the Woodshed at 3201 Riverfront Dr., Fort Worth, TX 76107, 817-877-4545.      Posted by June Naylor.

Tagged: Austin Food and Wine Festival, Tim Love, Woodshed