House Park BBQ
Chris and I made our way to House Park BBQ on Friday. It’s taken us a while to get there because we never remember to have cash on us and it’s only at lunch. So we planned ahead a little and made sure that we had both things in order.
Photos by Ray Pierce - click on the images to go to the Flickr set
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.
Stubb’s ‘cue and Gogol Bordello
Stubb’s Bar-B-Q
801 Red River
Austin, TX
78702
http://stubbsaustin.com/
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.
Railroad BBQ in Machaca
Railroad BBQ
727 FM 1626
Manchaca, Texas 78652
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.
