Johnny Doyle cooks on a gas rotisserie, but he’d do it differently if he could. He takes pride in the barbecue he puts out in his nearly forty-year-old Denison restaurant, so when a pit fire destroyed his Oylers, he wanted to replace them. “[J&R Manufacturing] told me it would be
Last week I went searching for good barbecue in Oklahoma. I wasn’t looking just for barbecue joints in the state, but was instead trying to find a defining factor of how barbecue in Oklahoma is unique to that state. With my wife’s family still living in Oklahoma City, I’d canvassed the
Photo by Nicolas McWhirterOwner/Pitmaster: Virgie’s Bar-B-Que; Opened 2005Age: 49Smoker: Wood-Fired Offset SmokerWood: Post OakOn Virgie’s website they have a brief description of their restaurant, but what has stuck with me was their promise of a “barbecure.” It’s a
A accolade from two years back brought me to this renovated Sonic on the east side of San Antonio. A local media outlet (I don’t recall which one) wrote that Ed’s Smok-N-Q served the best brisket in the city. That claim in San Antonio doesn’t carry quite the weight as the same
Arguably the most beloved figure in Texas barbecue is Tootsie Tomanetz, a septuagenarian pitmaster who’s been tending the fires at Snow’s BBQ since it opened in 2003. She was first discovered by Texas Monthly in 2008, stooped over the hot smoker on the outskirts of Lexington,
The fifth season of BBQ Pitmasters will premiere tonight on Destination America at 8:00pm Central. Georgia smoked ham will be the focus, but next week the show is full of Texans. “Lone Star Smoke War,” will air on Saturday, April 19 at 8:00pm Central and will feature three teams
If 2013 was the year of the new barbecue joint, 2014 will be the year of barbecue expansion. Some legendary Texas barbecue stalwarts who for decades were happy to be one-offs are looking to write their sequels. Southside Market (1882), in Elgin,
Owner/Pitmaster: Mama E’s BBQ & Home Cooking, opened 2006Age: 61Smoker: Wood-fired offset smokerWood: Pecan, Oak, PearErnestine Edmond has cooked most of her life. She learned about killing and processing chickens from her mother, and her mother-in-law taught her about cleaning a fresh hog. She’s never looked at chitterlings the
Bresaola A beef eye of round, salt-cured and aged for several months.Coppa Marbled pork neck muscle, salt-cured and aged for several months.Lardo Pork back fat rubbed with salt and aromatics and aged for several months.Lonzino A whole pork loin, salt-cured and aged for several months.Mortadella A finely
At Prause Meat Market in La Grange, there is a green paper sign right next to the barbecue counter. It reads “Sorry We Do NOT Make Sandwiches.” It’s a reminder to customers that this is a meat market where meat—smoked or raw—is sold by the pound. If you want a
Owner/Pitmaster: Mac’s Bar-B-Que; Opened 1955 (1982 in current location)Age: 60Smoker: Indirect Heat Wood-Fired PitWood: HickoryThe McDonalds have been a fixture in the Dallas barbecue scene since 1949. Mac’s has moved around a bit, but Billy McDonald has no plans to leave his current spot on Main Street just outside Deep Ellum. He sat
Michael Twitty was cold, and his pig wasn’t much warmer. He was six hours into an eight hour cook, and the February winds were whipping across the top of the hill at the French Legation in Austin. A makeshift pit about the size
A few years ago a group of barbecue aficionados met up for a pow-wow at Louie Mueller Barbecue in Taylor. We wanted to share stories and some great smoked meats, and one of the attendees brought in some contraband dessert. It was homemade ice cream made with Dr Pepper flavored
What you know about the history of smoked brisket in Texas is probably wrong. People have been eating brisket since the first pits were dug in the earth, but only by a sort of default: it was standard practice to cook whole animals for the big community celebrations, which means
Editor’s note: The name of this joint has been changed to DBQ since this article was published.Kyle Lewallen started his barbecue catering company while still a junior at Texas A&M. A few years later he bought a food trailer and parked it just a block away from campus. He couldn’t
The director of Foodways Texas, Marvin Bendele, asked me to come and lead a couple of panel discussions at the organization’s annual Camp Brisket, held last weekend at the Rosenthal Meat Center on Texas A&M’s campus. And even though I was presented
Pitmaster: City Market in Luling, opened 1958Age: 67Smoker: Wood-fired brick pit and a gas-fired rotisserie smokerWood: Post OakIf you’ve been to City Market in Luling, chances are you’ve seen the hard-hat clad Joe Capello. If their doors are open, then he’s probably there working the pit like he’s done for the last few
Alan Caldwell, the pitmaster at Fargo’s Pit BBQ in Bryan, has been making great barbecue for fourteen years. And for all of those fourteen years, he has denied people access to his pit room. When he denied my first request to take a look at his pit, in 2010, he
If I had it my way, City Market in Schulenburg would have a warning sign on their barbecue menu: “Pit in use only on Saturday, microwaves the rest of the week.” You see, first and foremost this is a meat market. Making sausage (including weiners) is their biggest business, on
Photo by Nicholas McWhirterOwner/Co-Pitmaster: Bob’s Bar-B-Que, opened 1980Age: 74Smoker: Wood-fired offset smokerWood: HickoryHenderson, Texas is a small town of about 13,000 between Tyler and Nacogdoches in East Texas. This is where Bob Allen was born and raised, and where he aims to stay. He’s seen a lot of
For more than a quarter century, Roy Perez has been tending the fires at Kreuz Market and posing for photos with barbecue aficionados. It’s given him a lot of time to think.
Travis Mayes at his walk-up window.Pitmaster: Meshack’s Bar-Be-Que, opened 2009Age: 64Smoker: Wood-fired Brick Smoker w/ gas assistWood: PecanIt was a Monday morning and Meshack’s was closed like normal. Travis and I had arranged this time to meet since the tasks to get ready for Tuesday were pretty slow-paced. There
In this age of barbecue’s expansion and experimentation we see cuts of meat enter the smoker that have never previously been even figments of barbecue culture. But, there’s one protein that has gone largely ignored in real life, but has a rich history in art and film – human flesh.
If you live in Austin, chances are you wouldn’t pass by Larrie’s Smokehouse in Bastrop. Billy’s, Cartwright’s and Fittie’s along busy four-lane Highway 71 may be familiar, but Larrie’s sits on the north side of town along tree-lined Highway 95. Coming south from Elgin the sign is hard to miss.
The Texas Trinity combo plate—beef, ribs, and sausage—is probably the most commonly served dish at Texas barbecue joints, and usually, the beef brisket gets all the glory. But we should shine a little more light on pork ribs, which are often a joint’s better tasting meat (it’s difficult to perfectly
If you’re headed south on Highway 77 you won’t see the sign for Harris Bar-B-Que, but it doesn’t matter. A huge, black offset smoker will likely be blowing smoke across the road just south of downtown Waxahachie. Kelvin Harris used this smoker when he was darting around Cedar Hill and
Sifting through old Texas newspapers, I found the first mention of commercial smoked meat from the Brenham Weekly Banner, which announced that a Bastrop butcher "keeps on hand at his stall a ready stock of barbecued meats and cooked sausages."
Since 1960, A.N. Bewley Fabricators has been bending, slicing and welding steel for high-quality barbecue pits that can easily cost $20,000.
Owner/Pitmaster: Fargo’s Pit BBQ, opened 2000Age: 50Smoker: Wood-fired offset pitWood: Oak with a bit more mixed inAs we sat at a table inside Fargo’s Pit BBQ in Bryan, I asked owner and pitmaster Alan Caldwell if I could see his pit. He said no. In total I probably asked
Photo by Nicholas McWhirterOwner: Stanley’s Famous Pit Barbecue since 2006Age: 36Smoker: Gas-fired rotisserie for ribs, offset wood-fired smoker for everything else.Wood: PecanNick Pencis was once the pitmaster at Stanley’s Famous Pit Barbecue in Tyler. He tried his best, but knew he had a real pitmaster when he hired Jonathan
The beef short rib has become the ultimate carnivore trophy, but they're a costly menu item to produce.
In the business world, verbal partnerships are notoriously fraught with discord, and Kenny Hatfield, the pitmaster at Hatfield’s BBQ and Blackjacks Beer Garden in Rockport, Texas, recently learned this firsthand. Earlier this year, just six months after opening the restaurant with two friends, he was celebrating the news that his
Can you get the same quality barbecue from a gas-fired rotisserie?
How to "hold your meat" and make a brisket taste fresh for hours.
From packer cuts to Certified Angus Beef, all you wanted to know about that succulent, juicy, tender, and tasty brisket you tear through at your favorite barbecue joint.
Answers to your questions about our Top 50 Barbecue Joints list, including why Smitty's didn't make the list.
Mark your calendar, and start your fasting now. The Texas Monthly BBQ Festival is on . . .
Robert Sietsema, the Village Voice's food critic, thinks New York can now be considered a "'cue capital." Isn't that cute?
Daniel Vaughn's top picks for where to get good BBQ in NYC. (And a few places one should avoid.)
The fourth installment from Daniel Vaughn, whose tastebuds took him to Brisketlab in New York City.
The third installment from Daniel Vaughn, who visited Fatty 'Cue, the restaurant that serves up a style of barbecue unique to the Big Apple.
The second installment of BBQ Snob's trip to New York City, where he braved no fewer than six restaurants to find some of the city's best pastrami.
Daniel Vaughn, a.k.a. the BBQ Snob, finds out if the acclaimed New York City barbecue joint lives up to the hype.
I guess if you have mesquite grilled steaks on the menu in addition to the mesquite smoked barbecue, you feel the need to serve an amuse bouche. A steaming mug of their “world famous” pinto bean soup came to the table along with our drinks. The beans
The sign outside reads “World Famous” and Louis McMillan won’t hesitate to tell you how good his barbecue is. He was about done for the day, so we admittedly got the tail end of the days offering, but this wasn’t praiseworthy.Sausage was barely warmed through, and
