Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set

Chris´ plate

More Brisket and Sausage

Brisket and Sausage

The building looks like it’s been there forever. When we rolled up, you could smell the smoke coming off of the pit. That’s always a great smell to me. There is quite a lot of paraphernalia on the walls that’s been there a long while and has absorbed the the smoke. Most of it has a smokey yellow patina to it. The stove behind the counter looks as if it had been there since the 1920′s.

The day we were there, they had the combo plate on special, so that we indulged in it. I grabbed the brisket and sausage, while Chris grabbed the brisket and pork loin. The brisket had a great flavor and was pretty tender. It was a very lean brisket though. If there wasn’t sauce ladled over it, it would have been pretty dry. The sausage was a good grind, but it lacked in flavor. There was nothing about it, that would make me long for it. Chris’ pork loin was tender and moist, but lacked flavor as well. The plates come with mustard potato salad, large cut coleslaw, and pinto beans. The potato salad was good, it had some peppers in it that gave it a good flavor. I’m not a cole slaw fan to begin with, so I won’t even try to review it. The beans were good, I think they were cooked with some of the BBQ sauce to give them a little different flavor. The BBQ sauce itself was a little thin, but wasn’t fully stained so there was some of the puree that a bit chunky. It had a good flavor, and worked well to cover up the dryness of the brisket.

There was a nice couple (Bruce and his wife) from Lago Vista in line behind us, who also happen to be readers of the site. Chris had told them about our attempts to find the best BBQ in Texas. I talked with them quite a bit while we worked our way through the line. They had driven in just for this, and were about to make some BBQ deliveries to their kids on the way back out. How awesome would that be to have Franklin’s BBQ delivered to you instead of waiting in line?

Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set

The order

Turkey Slice

The awesomeness

Brisket deliciousness

One of the things that Chris and I noticed was that Franklin’s had added a wax paper addition to their menu for Turkey. That’s a great addition to their menu. While Aaron was cutting, I chatted with him a bit about the new operation there. He said that while they had three smokers now, they were really only using two fully. He said that they did it by changing the scheduling of when the meat was done. He said that they try to get their briskets done by 4:00am, and then put on the ribs. By doing that they doubled the amount of ribs they were able to serve compared to the old location. He also said that they’ve been able double all of their other meat production from the old trailer location. He also mentioned that they were up to about 30 briskets a day now. That seems like a lot, but with the kind of lines you see there, it only delays the sell out until about 1:00pm.

The brisket this time seemed to have a thicker bark on it. It may have been the cut, but I liked it. The slices that I had seemed to have a cavity that a lot of the rub had gotten into. So that flavor permeated the brisket a lot. Think of it like an injection into the meat. You can see some of it in the pictures. And like always, the meat was really tender and only needs a fork to eat it.

As for the turkey, it’s only been being served since Friday. So three days in to the new menu item, and it looks and tastes really good. He said that he’s still working on it and is making tweaks to it. It was quite moist when I first got it, but it dried out a bit towards the end of my meal. Not sure that there’s anything you can do about though. It carried a great flavor and the rub on the outside wasn’t over powering. There were a few bites that were a bit salty, but that’s to be expected. It’s something that I’ll order again I guarantee. Let’s hope that Aaron gets in dialed in to perfection before my next trip.

Great job again!

Some friends (Andy and Colette) bought me a ticket to the Gogol Bordello show at Stubb’s BBQ. They’ve raved about eating their ‘cue prior and during the concerts they’ve gone to. I now know why, it’s just a great lead in for the music. What’s better than hanging with your friends, grabbing some great food, and listening to some good music. One of these days I’ll make it down there for the Gospel Brunch.

I grew up in the Lubbock area and have had Stubb’s BBQ there and here in Austin. In all my trips, I’ve never actually had as good of BBQ there as I did this trip. Most of my other trips had left me wanting for better brisket, but I was totally satisfied with this. One the 2 meat plate that I ordered, the meat had a deep smoke flavor. Both the brisket and the turkey was moist, and the brisket was super tender to top it off. One of the things that I love, is when restaurants actually serve sweet tea. They had it and had it in big glasses which was even better.

The Serrano Cheese Spinach was really good, it was just a bit too spicy to actually finish it is all. When it hurts to eat something, I tend not to finish it. So if you are into spice, I would highly recommend it. The potato salad was a good chunky potato version, and I easily finished it off. I followed that up with some Pecan Pie a la mode. It wasn’t nearly as good as I was hoping for, it didn’t have a lot of flavor, it was too thin, and not enough pecans. Everyone else thought that their banana pudding was good, so I would probably recommend that instead (even though I can’t stand banana’s).

I ate so much I was pretty miserable most of the concert. Poor me, right? I wasn’t able to keep up with the pace of Gogol Bordello, but it was a really fun show. Not heard a lot of their music, but it was quite entertaining. This experience will make me come back to Stubb’s for some more ‘cue and concerts for sure.

I went with my friend Andy to pick up some Railroad BBQ for dinner this past Thursday. He’s talked about this place before, but I’ve not had the opportunity to go down there until now. We were just getting a to go order to feed everyone before we watch Tron: Legacy at this house.

When you drive up, you know this isn’t a large operation just because there wasn’t much parking available. Although the parking that was there was completely filled. It’s just a simple corrugated tin building with the kitchen on one end and the dining area on the other. Once we got inside we quickly found out what was filling the parking lot. There was about 20 people playing various instruments and singing in what appeared to be a regular jam session. Oddest thing was that they weren’t playing very loud at all, you could carry on conversation at normal levels. That just struck me as odd.

We ordered a pound of pretty much everything and quart of potato salad and banana pudding. The lady taking our order said it would be a while and gave us a couple of free drinks, that were very much appreciated.

Once we got our order back home we dug in. The brisket had a good smoke ring on it, and a good mesquite smoke flavor. The meat wasn’t as tender as I would have liked to see, but it wasn’t tough. You still needed a knife to cut through it though. The turkey had an awesome smoke flavor and was really moist. I think it was my favorite part of the meal. The sausage links that we got came in two’s. The blend was fine enough for me and it had a good casing on it. The sauce they served had a lot of smoke flavor to it, but it reminded me more of store bought KC Masterpiece or Kraft, as it was quite thick.

The potato salad was pretty good. It was chunky, and a bit sweeter than I was expecting. Still quite good. As for the banana pudding, I heard that it was good. I don’t like banana’s so I didn’t try it.

All in all it was solid barbeque, I wouldn’t turn it down if it were offered to me.

As for the food, the group didn’t want to splurge on the all you can eat plate ($18.95) when you can could accomplish the same goal with the 3-Meat plate ($11.95). I can’t blame them for that, that seems to be a hefty up charge for just about the same thing. Something that I was a little disappointed in was the bread, it was just plain white bread from a store. That was always one of the more enjoyable things from the other location.

I ordered Brisket, Sausage, and Turkey this trip. I hadn’t ever had the turkey in my recollection, so I gave it a shot. It was the highlight of the meal. It was moist, and there was a generous portion of it on the plate. The sausage was just as good as always. Fine ground and awesome with the Salt Lick BBQ sauce. The biggest disappointment of the night was the brisket. It didn’t have a very smokey flavor, the bark on the outside didn’t taste of anything, and it was wasn’t very tender. Now I know that I comparing it to some of the best brisket in the world now, but that’s where the bar is. It was pretty just standard fare brisket. The BBQ sauce as always was great and lifted up a floundering brisket to make the meal pretty enjoyable.

The service we got was a little spotty though. The waiter never brought refills, even though we asked twice. They sold out of both the black berry and peach cobblers before we could order dessert, so we ended up skipping that all together.

All in all this experience was good, but not great. It feels more like your neighborhood BBQ joint rather than an award winning drive out of your way to go to it joint.

The outside didn’t seem to match what I was anticipating on the inside. It was a wide open dining area, that was quite clean with a picnic tables and mesquite framed chairs. I was greeted by someone at the door and asked if I had been there before. They then opened the large steel door to a warming pit that all of the meat was served out of. Definitely a nice view, but I had my camera stowed away under a slew of presents so I didn’t get it out this trip.

I ordered a sampling of everything but the smoked chicken. Brisket, pork loin, 1 baby back rib, and 1/4 link of sausage were what I got. It turned out to be a more than I could eat of course.

They had quite a few sides available for sale. There were several that caught my eye (specifically the tater tot casserole), but I wasn’t there for the sides. I was even more tempted when I reached the desserts, but I was a good boy this time. They also served up free beans, onions, pickles, jalapenos, sauce, and bread on a different island.

The brisket was very moist and tender. It ended up up being more shredded brisket when I took my fork to it. It was good, but it didn’t seem to have a lot of smoke flavor in it. It seemed to be the theme of the meal, just not enough smoke flavor coming through in the meats. The pork loin had a great peppery crust on the outside of it that had some great flavor, but I think it may have been the victim of the warming pit. It ended up really dry, and you had to dip it in sauce to eat it, which was a blessing and a curse. The sauce was a thin vinegary sweet sauce, I liked it a lot. As for the rib, it was properly tender but not falling off the bone. It was done just right. I was really sort of disappointed with the sausage that I got. It seemed to me that it was just prepackaged German sausage and warmed up. Not much smoke flavor to speak of at all, but it was moist and cooked well.

I would also like to mention that the owners, Tom and Kristin Ashmore were quite friendly and welcoming to place.

All in all I think Opie’s a good BBQ joint, but with so many other excellent choices in the Hill Country they just don’t measure up to the elite. If you are in the area, it’s above your average BBQ joint and you should stop in.

It was great to finally put a face with a name for Daniel (BBQ Snob). The problem with meeting a whole lot of people at once is that that you tend to forget people’s names. I apologize in advance for this, I’ll leave it with groups. We met the people who run Texas BBQ Posse, Houston Foodie, Don O.’s Texas BBQ Blog. It would have been nice to meet Drew with Man Up Texas BBQ / The Q Card, but he had to man his booth at the cook off.

So on to the ulterior motive for meeting everyone. Louie Mueller BBQ.

Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set

Colette and Andy outside Louie Mueller´s

Louie Mueller´s BBQ

Wall of Business Cards

Brisket, Spare ribs, Chipotle Sausage

Colette and Andy about to dig in.

Meat Selection at Louie Mueller´s

Spare Ribs

Brisket, Sausage, and Pork Loin

Taylor is only about 40 minutes away from where I live so it’s not a long haul to get there. I’ve heard from friends and other that Louie Mueller’s was one of the places that I needed to stop in at. Of all the places that we’ve visited so far, this place has the most authentic look and feel of any of the joints. It’s in the downtown area of Taylor and takes up 2 store fronts, one for dining and the other for the meat counter / food prep and a smaller dining area. They are huge in size, and have 20ft ceilings with skylights that have heavy smoke film on them. There is no air conditioning, big fans roar in the corners of the place to circulate the air. There is years and years of a deep smoke penetrating the walls and it just reeks of hard work, passion, and love of BBQ. I would expect that this is the same feel that I would have gotten if I had walked in the 1950′s. There is a wall of business cards that line one wall that are browned with time and smoke. It gives it a distinct look and personality.

When we got in line it wasn’t all that long. Mostly the other BBQ blogger with their Digital SLR camera’s in tow. Also just wanted to point out that someone from the back came out and told me that they really liked my Texas Tech hat, that’s a big plus when you are in Longhorn country. When you get to the front of the line, you are greeted with a small chunk of brisket to help you make your decision on ordering. I tried to get a sampling of all the meat they sold per pound. So I got a 1/4 lb. brisket, 1/4 lb. pork loin, 1/4 lb. turkey, and 2 spare ribs. A pretty good sampling I think. I also got a side of potato salad along with pickles, onions, and bread.

The brisket looked delicious, nice bark, nice smoke ring, moistly glistening. So I started in on it. The rub on it was overly black peppered in my opinion. The black pepper flavor masked most of the smoke flavoring. The meat wasn’t as tender as I was expecting. Due to the seat selection that we had next to one of the giant fans, I’m pretty sure the brisket dried out prematurely. The center of it was moist, but the edges were a bit dry. I’m willing to forgive that though because when I first started on it, it was moist. Nothing that the thin vinegar based BBQ dipping sauce couldn’t help cure.

The turkey I had was outstanding. Turkey is such a finicky thing to smoke, so I’m truly impressed with it. It wasn’t nearly as pepper flavored as the brisket, but was seasoned quite well. It was extremely moist as well. The smoke flavor really came through in it. I’d recommend that to anyone.

Next I tried the pork loin. It was forgettable. No deep smoke flavor, it wasn’t tender, and it didn’t have a lot of flavor.

I tried two different types of ribs while I was there. I ordered the spare ribs. Lots of meat on them. They have the right amount of tenderness to them. They weren’t falling off the bone, so you could still handle them appropriately, and a little tug on the meat and it came off. I also had some of Andy’s baby back ribs. Almost the same as the spare ribs, just a smaller package.

They also had some nice beef sausages to select from. Andy and Colette ordered one of all 3 types. Chipotle, Jalapeno, and Original. Flavorwise, the Chipotle won for me. The Jalapeno was good and there were distinct piece of jalapeno in it. I was a bit too stuff by the time the Original made the rounds, so I didn’t sample it.

The potato salad was more like a homemade potato salad to me, with its fine grain potato pieces. It was made with mustard, but it was a mild flavor in it. Quite nice, I really enjoyed it.

While we were there, one of the guys dropped by our table and let us try one of his creations. Dr. Pepper BBQ Sauce Ice Cream. It was interesting to try, but I don’t think it’s ready for mainstream America just yet.

After reading up on Franklin BBQ on several of the BBQ blogs that I follow (Man Up Texas BBQ, Full Custom Gospel BBQ, and Urban Spoon) I felt that I needed to give it a try. It’s been a Talk of the Town topic on Urban Spoon for a while now. Some of the Eats BBQ crew had it on their wish list, and it was only about 10 minutes from our offices in downtown Austin. So we Mike, Chris, Justin, and Ray (me) loaded up and ventured over.

When we arrived around 11:45am there was already around a 15 person deep line. That’s a really good sign in my book. It took us around 15-20 minutes to get through the queue. Not too fast, but not too slow either. They’ve done the best that they can to provide shade and fans with misters to keep people cool. Of course there’s a gap between the awning and the ordering area, but the line sort of just broke apart there to keep everyone in the shade.

Franklin BBQ has a pretty tight little setup. They serve the food out of a convert travel trailer, the smoker is on a trailer behind that with a roof and is screened in. They use the old empty filling station next to it for their bathrooms. One of the more memorable signage’s I’ve seen is the The Franklin BBQ logo, it has a very vintage unique look to it. They even have an iron version of it on the smoker trailer. The picnic tables either have an awning or umbrella over them to provide as much shade as possible. They also have mister fans going, but it’s still all outside.

So on to the food. We decided to pool our money and just order a tasting of everything that they had. Here’s the order:

1 lb Moist Brisket
1/2 lb Lean Brisket
1/2 lb Pulled Pork
8 Pork Ribs
side of potato salad
side of beans
side of coleslaw
1 Key Lime Tart
1 Lemon Chess Tart
1 Pecan Tart
4 drinks

For 4 people it ended up $62. Not bad at $15.50 a piece, but not exactly cheap either.

Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set

The line at 11:45

Franklin Barbecue

The Setup

Franklin Barbecue´s Pit Trailer.

Ordering area

The meat pile

Succulent ribs

Brisket crust

Pulled pork

Brisket and Ribs

The tarts

The line up

Soon to be transparent table

Two meat plate at Franklin BBQ

My selection at Franklin BBQ today

I started off with the pork ribs. They were difficult to get on to my butcher paper because they were so tender. The meat was separating from the bone just picking it up. There was a light rub on the them that was black pepper based but had a saltiness about it. It wasn’t overly peppery as some other place do, but it was just the right amount. There was a great flavor with just the meat alone, but it was even better with the vinegary bbq sauce that they had. They were some of the best ribs that I’ve had in a long while.

Next I delved into heaven the brisket. I know that the words that I write here won’t do it justice, but I’ll try. Aaron Franklin served us, and he was quite generous with his cuts. There was about an inch of fat on the top of the brisket and due to that he gave us a little more than what we had ordered. That fat translated into one of the most moist and tender piece of brisket that I’ve ever had. There was a great flavored, nice and thick peppery bark on the outside of the brisket. It was one of those things that you know that he’s worked on for years to get it just right. The flavor by itself was tremendous. But then you add the dark bbq sauce (think coffee and molasses infused bbq sauce) that they have to it, and it just makes it that much better. I believe that it was smoked over oak, which gave it a bit of a different flavor than your typical mesquite.

The pulled pork was beyond tender. It was served more in the manner of how chopped brisket would be. It was really finely separated into small strands of meat. It had a definite salty flavor to it, but once you added a little bit of sauce it countered it quite well. It would make a great sandwich, but we didn’t eat it as such. To me this was probably the weakest of the meats that we had, and it was still outstanding.

The intention was to get some sausage as well, but we apparently were overwhelmed by the little tasting tidbits they were handing out at the window and forgot to order it. We’ll try it next time.

As for the sides, they were fairly forgettable. The beans had a good flavor, but they are beans. They are what they are. The potato salad was overly mustard flavored, not bad, but forgettable. The coleslaw was more or less just red cabbage with little flavor to it. If you are coming here for the sides, your priorities are all wrong anyway. Stick to the meat.

As a treat to finish off the meal we had one of each of the tarts that they had from Cake and Spoon. We tried Key Lime, Lemon chess, and Texas Pecan tarts. One of the great things about them is that they are all homemade crusts. The Key Lime tart and graham cracker crust we delish and my favorite of the day. The Lemon Chess tart was a close second. The pecan was good, but the other two out shown it. Their website doesn’t list those tarts on their website, so they may be special for Franklin BBQ.

All in all this set a new level for the bar. We’ve went on several hour plus trips to get BBQ that wasn’t as good as Franklin’s. It was probably the best BBQ that I’ve had, but I’ve only been here once. Consistency is part of the game as well so when I go back I’m just hoping that I don’t have to go back on my words. If you are in Austin area, try this place out. You won’t be disappointed.

When you walk in it’s not your typical BBQ place. There aren’t pits anywhere to be found. Before you lose total interest, know that they actually smoke the meat in Taylor, TX. So there is some cred there, just not the full allotment. It looks like a restaurant that’s in an office complex. Walls are clean and untarnished by smoke, there are windows and they let a lot of light in, and their are pictures of BBQ pits, pitmasters, and meat on the walls. Very atypical of the every other BBQ place you’ve seen.

Even with the decor not what I was used to, I bellied up to the counter and placed my order. 2 meat plate with sausage and brisket, sweet corn, and potato salad. The rest of crew ordered and I think we got every kind of meat they had available. So there was a sampling of everything. One of the bright spots of day was the serving size. It was very large. In the downtown area you just get accustomed to paying a lot or small serving sizes. So nice surprise.

Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set

Turkey and Chopped Brisket

Brisket and Ribs

Brisket and Sausage

The brisket was well smoked and had a good flavor. It wasn’t as tender as I would have liked, but not bad none the less. It seemed to be a pretty lean cut of meat, and I suppose that is what lead to it. The sausage was a medium ground packed sausage. It was well above average. Not as good as Meyer’s sausage, but good. They serve it with a sweet BBQ sauce. Not as sweet as the Salt Lick though. From trying the other guys plates, we also found out that they do a mean smoked turkey. Next time that I go I will probably order it.

As for the sides, they had large serving sizes as well. The corn that I had was very good and seemed pretty fresh. The potato salad wasn’t as good as I was hoping for. It was like Rudy’s Potato salad, just not as good.

I was very pleased with the results of the lunch. Especially since it wasn’t overly expensive either. I spent under $15 for all of that and was more than I should have eaten. It’s not got the history of some of the out lying BBQ joints, but it puts up a decent fight. So in my opinion this was a very good value and would recommend it for anyone in the downtown area.