Lambert’s BBQ Brisket Sandwich
I had a craving for BBQ today and with my new office location Lambert’s is just a couple of blocks away. I was in the mood for a BBQ Sandwich so that’s what I ordered along with my side of Mac and Cheese. Sorry no pictures, only had the iPhone with me and not a lot of light in there.
Lambert’s is one of those places that serves cornbread before the meal. They are served as little mini-muffin size with real butter. They are a jalapeno based cornbread with pieces of real corn in them. They are quite tasty. The only problem is that they are served cold. The butter doesn’t melt, and a lot the goodness is lost in my opinion.
On the main attraction though. I’ve been to Lambert’s several times before, but this is the first time that I’ve actually ordered something other than the traditional brisket and pulled pork plate I always lean towards. The plate was called the BBQ Beef Chopped Brisket Sandwich. Sounds like a tasty mouthful. The bun was I believe your standard fare sesame seed bun, but they went to the effort of toasting it, which was a nice surprise. There was a pretty sizable quantity of meat on the sandwich as well. It was an $8 sandwich, the cheapest thing on the menu if I recall correctly. But that’s what I wanted. The meats wasn’t overly saucy, and it was a fairly large cut chopped brisket. Not the fine ground stuff a lot of places server. This was real sliced brisket that had been chopped. It was topped off with a bit of finely chopped relish.
The sandwich had a great flavor and great consistency. There was one piece in the sandwich that wasn’t cut enough to get in one bite and ended up on the plate. Lambert’s has a hot sauce on every table that is quite tasty, it’s a little more vinegar based than the regular sauce but is still a thick sauce. If you want add a bit of spice to your meat I would highly recommend it, it’s not going to “burn” you, but it just adds a little something extra. So I put a generous helping of it on the meat and applied the top half of the bun. I do like to add some regular sauce to pretty much each bite. Lambert’s sauce is well done. Not too sweet, not vinegary, and not to peppery.
If you like Mac and Cheese order it, it’s for you. There is plenty of melted cheese in the dish, and a nice crusted American cheese layer on top. I almost felt that it was too cheesy if there can be such a thing. I think a bit of gratin would have been nice, but it stands up well on it’s own.
The only draw back to coming here at lunch is the price. Today’s adventure was reasonably affordable for downtown, but if I order what I normally do it would have been well over $20. As it was with tip and everything it was about $14. I thought it was a pretty good value based quality and quantity of food that I got. I definitely recommend it to people, but beware that you will be paying downtown prices for BBQ. It’s well executed, and quite tasty.
The Shed BBQ – Grand Opening
The Shed BBQ
1816 E 6th Street
Austin, TX 78702
In the parking lot of Rabbit’s Lounge.
At a SXSW Recovery party the Sunday following SXSW, I was introduced to Brett by our mutual friend Joe. He’s the owner of the The Shed BBQ. Joe mentioned that I ran the EatsBBQ.com website and reviewed BBQ joints. After a few pleasantries and the exchange of a few ideas on what makes BBQ great, he asked me to come by and check out the The Shed on their Grand Opening. This was my first invite to try a BBQ place since I’ve been working on EatsBBQ.com, so I had to take up the offer. So Thursday after our softball game, Mike and I headed up there. It was dark and I didn’t have my camera handy to take pictures, sorry. This location is the first in Texas for the Shed, they are mainly based in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Florida.
The Shed is pretty much what it’s namesake implies, it’s a mobile BBQ Trailer and Smoker. It’s newly built, but with it’s corrugated tin exterior and general setup they are really trying to invoke “the shed” look. It’s located in the parking lot of Rabbit’s Lounge on 6th and Chicon. Their menu is a bit limited, as they only serve BBQ sandwiches it seems right now. Pulled Pork, Pulled Brisket, and Chicken. The have a plate combination that comes with 2 sides. You have a choice of Macaroni Salad, Potato Salad, Baked Beans, and Coleslaw. I was told that this is Mississippi style BBQ, which I can say that I’m not totally familiar with.
I tried the Pulled Pork Sandwich, which was recommended as “what we are known for”, with Potato Salad and Baked Beans. I mean that’s about a classic of a combination as you can have. The first observation I had was that the sandwich was stacked full of meat. Big thumbs up! I like that they are trying to give you your money’s worth. As Mike pointed out, the buns were your run of the mill buns. He pointed out that it would have been nice to have a kolache style bun for sandwich, which I totally agreed with. The pulled pork was very tender and moist, as it should be. None of the dry stringy stuff here. I didn’t get a strong sense of a smoke flavor from it, which was a little disappointing. The meat was topped with a really sweet BBQ Sauce, sort of a brown sugar/molassesy flavor. It worked really well with the Pulled Pork. I’m didn’t have a chance to try it, but I think it would probably overpower the brisket, as it was a really strong flavor.
The baked beans were quite good as well. You don’t typically see baked beans in this area served with BBQ. Being a fan of baked beans in general I thought it worked. They definitely had some of the BBQ sauce mixed in, so they had a really sweet taste to them.
Brett brought out a sampling of the coleslaw for Mike and I to try. I just want to preface this by saying, I’m not a coleslaw fan. It was sort of forgettable to me. It had a bit of a sweet and peppery flavor to me, but all in all it was just coleslaw.
I also sampled some of Mike’s Macaroni Salad. It’s another thing that you don’t see offered at BBQ places in this area. It was pretty good, and will require some more research to really make a judgment on it. I mean it was one bite, not enough to really make an opinion on. Mike seemed to really like it though.
The highlight of the meal and biggest surprise was the Potato Salad. It was should have been billed at Loaded Baked Potato Salad on the whiteboard out front. The first bite had a strange delicious flavor to it that I wasn’t expecting. After asking Brett about it, it was Sour Cream. That’s when he spilled the beans about what it was. The bacon bits really accented it well, I mean who doesn’t like bacon. It was dark while we were eating, so I couldn’t tell if had chives or cheese in it (I would assume so, but I could be mistaken), but it wasn’t enough for me to taste. I think this side is a must when you come here.
The prices were a little more expensive than I would have anticipated for a sandwich, but still a good value given the amount of food you get. It was all that I could do to get it all down. This is good little spot to get some BBQ sandwiches, grab a few beers at Rabbit’s Lounge, and enjoy it with your friends.
