The Texas Monthly BBQ Fest won’t be held in Austin this year, but will instead decamp to Dallas, where it will be hosted virtually by yours truly in my backyard. Make plans to join us.

A new season of Chef’s Table on Netflix is dedicated to barbecue, and pitmaster Tootsie Tomanetz of Snow’s BBQ in Lexington will be featured. The seventh season debuts on September 2.

The food additive MSG gets a bad rap, but Charleston pitmaster Rodney Scott says you should give it a try. “I unapologetically use MSG in my seasoning rub,” he told Today. “It is a flavor maker!”

Octavius “Tay” Nelson, owner of Bobby’s BBQ outside Greenville, South Carolina, learned how to barbecue from Aaron Franklin’s YouTube videos. The restaurant is focused on Texas-style brisket.

Barbecue restaurant Smoke & Barrel will open in Hong Kong in October. They’ll be smoking like we do in Texas, which they erroneously refer to as the “birthplace of barbecue.” (Barbecue has a long and complex history, with early origins in the Caribbean and the Carolinas.)

The Reaves brothers are carrying on their dad’s barbecue legacy at Smokey John’s BBQ in Dallas:

Flores Tortillas, made with smoked brisket fat in Whitney, are now available for shipping.

In Tyler, Stanley’s Famous Pit Bar-B-Q has been officially designated as a historic landmark.

Bud Kennedy of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram talked with Derrick Walker of Smoke-A-Holics BBQ in an interview about building his barbecue business.

A Dallas barbecue stalwart has closed permanently:

“Sausage is the star at Lonestar,” says the Houston Chronicle‘s J. C. Reid of the north Houston barbecue joint run by former University of Houston receiver Kevin Mason.

The folks behind the failed Corky’s BBQ location in Katy are opening a new Cajun restaurant called Acadian Coast in the spot where they originally planned to house another Corky’s BBQ outpost.

The Leader in Houston loved the brisket from Pinkerton’s BBQ, especially with its mustard-based barbecue sauce.

Ronnie Killen of Killen’s BBQ fame has opened a new restaurant, Killen’s at 101 Heights, in Houston. It features homestyle cooking and a few barbecue dishes as well.

No barbecue joint should make you this angry:

The Elgin Future Farmers of America (FFA) had a trailer-mounted barbecue pit stolen. It has since been recovered, but the search for a suspect is ongoing.

Sphere Realty announced via Facebook that John Mueller will be cooking barbecue at a new restaurant in Jarrell, just north of Georgetown.

The new location of Stiles Switch BBQ in Cedar Park will open on Friday. Like the Switch in Dripping Springs, this will have the same menu as the original Stiles Switch in Austin.

Smokin Beauty opens next week in Austin featuring banh mi sandwiches filled with smoked brisket, sausage, or pork belly.

The Austin Country Club touts its barbecue menu, but Louie Mueller Barbecue is the star of this video:

Justin Pearson, grandson of Lockhart’s Chisholm Trail BBQ founder Floyd Wilhelm, runs San Marcos BBQ in San Marcos. He’s planning a second location.

BBQ Holdings, which owns Famous Dave’s barbecue restaurants, posted a loss of more than $6 million in the last quarter, compared with a profit of $1 million during the same quarter last year.

The New York Times likes these Texas-style beef ribs from South Carolina:

Jessica B. Harris wrote about the crucial role African Americans had in developing American barbecue as we know it.

The Southern Foodways Alliance shared a poem by Jason McCall, all about a polarizing style of barbecue sauce from Alabama.

The Washington Post tells how an accused murderer named Barbecue succeeded in “uniting the warring gangs of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, into a powerful new confederation.”

Lab-grown Texas BBQ? We’re just getting comfortable with pellet smokers around here: