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From the Posse's view, Pecan Lodge holds all the cards in negotiations with Dallas Farmers Market

Meats on the smoker at Pecan Lodge in the Dallas Farmers Market. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) Posse member and Dallas Morning News assistant metro editor Bruce Tomaso gives us more details on the sweeping changes at the Dallas Farmers Market and how that might affect Pecan Lodge's decision on moving to a new location. OK, let’s be honest: In the $64 million makeover of the Dallas Farmers Market, there’s only one thing that barbecue aficionados care about: What’s gonna happen to Pecan Lodge? That’s the $64,000 question. Our two-cent answer: No one knows. Owners Diane and Justin Fourton have…

Joints - 06/21/2013

Updated: Some thoughts on Pecan Lodge and a potential new location

The lunch line queues up at Pecan Lodge in the Dallas Farmers Market. (Photo ©Daniel Goncalves/Fotobia.com) UPDATE: we received a Tweet from Pecan Lodge: @texasbbqposse @jimrossman: Thx for your thoughts. Adding 2nd cash register in next few wks. Already hv 2 cutters in kitchen. Doing our best. So the BBQ blogosphere seems to be full up on stories about Pecan Lodge and whether or not it'll remain at the Dallas Farmer's Market. The City of Dallas sold the property and there are plans to redo Shed 2, which apparently include tearing it up while a new sewer line is installed. Not…

Joints - 06/20/2013

Why I love and hate -- at the same time -- Tim Byres' new cookbook, Smoke

Filets with Tim Byres' BBQ Beef Coffee Cure (Photo by Gary Jacobson) My friend, Martha Gooding, says if you get one good recipe out of a cookbook, the book is worth the price. By that measure, Tim Byres' new cookbook, Smoke, is a tremendous bargain. I got two great recipes, and if you stay to the end of this post you'll get one of them: Byres' BBQ Beef Coffee Cure. So far I've used it twice, on New York strip steaks and filets. It's wonderful. Hope to try it soon on brisket. The other great recipe is for homemade sour…

Cooking - 06/20/2013

Posse winner talks about growing up with Aaron Franklin and the future of barbecue in Texas

Aaron Franklin, right, and his bandmates in Those Peabodys. (Photo courtesy of Post-Parlo Records) Please pardon our tardiness, we're a bit late with this post. Neil Gallagher of Bryan won last month's Texas barbecue giveaway offered by FoodyDirect in partnership with the Posse. FoodyDirect, an online food marketplace, randomly selected his name from among more than 200 entries. When I contacted Gallagher, 35, to congratulate him, the conversation ranged widely, from his win to even pondering the future of barbecue in Texas. He said he grew up in Bryan with Aaron Franklin, now the reigning barbecue baron of the state.…

Joints - 06/18/2013

Lots of gorilla dust in the Texas barbecue world…Why?

Customers wait in line at Louie Mueller Barbecue in Taylor. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) I don't know if Ross Perot likes barbecue. He's Texan, so probably. But it doesn't really matter. He had the perfect term for what's happening now in some parts of the Texas barbecue world. Gorilla dust. Whenever Ross saw sideshows obscure real issues, whenever he saw posturing and anemic attempts at intimidation, he called it "gorilla dust." For him, cutting through b.s. was the only way to do business. That approach helped make him a business legend. During the past week or so, as I've…

Joints / People - 06/15/2013

6 things the Posse learned from its DFW Top 7 BBQ Tour

Lockhart Smokehouse, Dallas, Texas. (Photo ©Daniel Gonclaves/Fotobia.com) 1. Pecan Lodge, without a doubt, is the best joint in DFW. We already knew this, but it was reinforced as we toured the 7 area places that made Texas Monthly's new Top 50 list. There isn't a weak spot in pitmaster Justin Fourton's smoked meat lineup. 2. Bartley's BBQ in Grapevine and Cousin's Barbecue in Fort Worth don't belong among the Top 50, for food or atmosphere. 3. Call ahead to Meshack's to make sure it's open. We didn't and we paid the price when the place was closed. We wound up eating…

Joints - 06/12/2013

Longoria's definitely belongs on Texas Monthly's new Top 50 list; not so Cousin's

Meats sit on the smoker at Longoria's BBQ in Everman. (Photo©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) Longoria's BBQ in Everman turns out some pretty stout ribs, but the star of the menu is the brisket sausage, no doubt about it. "Brisket sausage, I don't think life gets better than that," Posse member Magda Michna Goncalves said during the final day of our "DFW Top 7 BBQ Tour" after she tasted Longoria's specialty. To be proper, we should probably refer to Magda as Dr. Michna Goncalves. Among its members, the Posse numbers several JDs, and we just picked up a reverend, but Magda…

Joints - 06/11/2013

'Bikes, Blues, and Barbecues,' about a father and son bicycle tour through Texas, now available as an e-book

Robby Landauer rides between Lockhart and Bastrop, on the way to Giddings. This was the longest day of their tour. You may remember the father and son -- Tim and Robby Landauer -- who made the bicycle barbecue tour through the Central Texas heartland. We published an item about them in March after Robby sent us a copy of an unpublished manuscript he had written about the trip titled "Bikes, Blues, and Barbecues: Me, my dad and our three favorite things." Now, Robby Landauer has turned his manuscript into an e-book, available both through Amazon and Google Play. "You don't need…

People - 06/10/2013

First Look at Jambo's BBQ: Great start for the new place from pit builder and competition pro Jamie Geer

Dining room at the newly-opened Jambo's BBQ Shack in Rendon. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) Jamie Geer of Burleson is a big-time barbecue competitor and has been called the da Vinci of barbecue pit builders with his sleek-looking and good-cooking line of Jambo smokers. Now, he is trying his hand at running a barbecue joint, called Jambo's BBQ Shack and Catering, located in Rendon, not far from his home. We visited Saturday, the end of Jambo's first week in business. "It's been crazy," Geer said as he cut orders for a steady line of lunch customers. We sampled his brisket,…

Joints - 06/08/2013

Photo essay of Hutchins BBQ in McKinney, by the Posse's Daniel Goncalves

Hutchins BBQ in McKinney, newcomer on the Texas Monthly Top 50 list. (Photos ©Daniel Goncalves/Fotobia.com) Here's another great set of images from Dallas-based editorial and commercial photographer Daniel Goncalves, who joined up with the Posse early this year after moving to Dallas with wife Magda in late 2012. Daniel is helping us document the current DFW 7 BBQ Tour, where we are hitting all seven area BBQ joints from the Texas Monthly Top 50 list, each during lunch time on consecutive days. We've previously published several series of his classic pitmaster portraits, which is an ongoing project for Daniel. Click…

Joints / People - 06/08/2013

Bartley's BBQ popular with the locals, not so much with the Posse.

Bartley's BBQ is located in a strip mall on E. Northwest Hwy. in Grapevine. (Photo©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) Friday brought the Texas BBQ Posse to Grapevine to eat at Bartley’s BBQ, a joint that none of us had heard of before it made the 2013 Texas Monthly Top 50 list. After one visit, we’re wondering how they made the list. It was crowded and the line remained a steady 15-20 during the lunch hour. Service is cafeteria line-style with self-serve sides that were mostly very good. As for the meat, we sampled the brisket, pork loin, pork ribs, turkey, hot…

Joints - 06/07/2013

A bell-ringer of a meal at Pecan Lodge during Day 4 of the Posse's Dallas-Fort Worth barbecue tour

In return for being first in line at Pecan Lodge, Chris Wilkins rings the bell as lunch service begins. (Photo ©Jim Rossman) Where to begin to tell the story of Day 4 of the Posse's week long-tour of the best joints in Dallas-Fort Worth? How about with Posse co-founder Chris Wilkins getting to ring the dinner bell for the start of service at Pecan Lodge. Wilkins earned the honor by arriving at Shed 2 at the Dallas Farmers Market at 9:15 a.m., a full hour and 45 minutes before Pecan Lodge opened, and 45 minutes before the shed itself opened.…

Joints - 06/07/2013

Lockhart Smokehouse renews our faith in DFWs Top 7 Tour

Assistant pitmaster Damien Avila takes lunch orders at Lockhart Smokehouse (Photo©Daniel Goncalves/Fotobia.com) After Tuesday's debacle in Garland we set our sights on Lockhart Smokehouse for lunch Wednesday and we're proud to say the meat did not disappoint (save for one spare rib that was a bit tough). The Posse rolled into Oak Cliff on the third of seven stops on our weeklong tour of Texas Monthly's 7 DFW joints that made the 2013 Top 50 list. While the joint was not quite as full as we saw it during our Memorial Day week live chat, it was a steady crowd and…

Joints - 06/06/2013

A short meditation on baseball and barbecue disappointment, serious barbecue disappointment

The sad sight of an empty parking lot at MeShack's Bar-B-Que on a Tuesday at 11:30am. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins) As any baseball fan knows, life is all about hitting curve balls. Constant curve balls. And so it goes with barbecue, too. The Posse re-discovered that important lesson Tuesday, the second day of its week-long "DFW Top 7 BBQ Tour," our plan to hit all of the area joints that made Texas Monthly's new Top 50 list. What started so grandly at Hutchins BBQ in McKinney on Monday, however, derailed badly in Garland. "The train went off the tracks and down…

Joints - 06/05/2013

Hutchins BBQ in McKinney sets the bar high for the Posse's DFW Top 7 Tour

Hutchins BBQ in McKinney has some of the best prices in the DFW area. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) We kicked off the Posse's "DFW Top 7 BBQ Tour" Monday at Hutchins BBQ in McKinney and we came away agreeing unanimously that the smoked meat bar had been set very high for the rest of the week. "If I lived up here I'd probably eat here once a week," Posse co-founder Chris Wilkins said of Hutchins. "I can't believe how this place has stayed under the radar." The brisket and ribs were outstanding and the turkey was good. The only…

Joints - 06/04/2013

Posse visits Texas Monthly's "DFW 7" top BBQ joints this week

After Texas Monthly announced their Top 50 BBQ list in mid-May, we thought one of the biggest surprises was the inclusion of seven DFW-area barbecue restaurants on the list. The last Texas Monthly list in 2008 had three places in DFW: Baker's Ribs in Dallas, Cousin's Barbecue in Ft. Worth and Big Daddy's Roadhouse BBQ in Lavon. Cousin's is the only holdover on the new list. As a group, we have been numerous times to Pecan Lodge, Lockhart Smokehouse, Longoria's BBQ and Meshack's Bar-B-Que Shack. However, we've never visited Bartley's BBQ, Cousin's Barbecue or Hutchins BBQ on a BBQ tour. Thus planning…

Joints - 06/02/2013

Texas Monthly Top 50 BBQ first timers - Miller's Smokehouse in Belton

Brisket sits on the pit at Miller's Smokehouse. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse) You never forget your first time. That applies to visiting great barbecue joints as well. Our first trip 14 months ago to Miller's Smokehouse in Belton was one of those unforgettable journeys. The visit was so inspiring that I couldn't wait to get home and write about Miller's. The lede was as follows: "Every now and then you hit the motherlode on the Texas BBQ trail. For every 20 mediocre BBQ joints, there's one good one. For every 50 good ones, there's one great one. You can add…

Joints - 05/23/2013

Texas Monthly Top 50 BBQ first timers - Joseph's Riverport Barbecue in Jefferson

The opening spread to Texas Monthly's Top 50 BBQ list. (Photos by Wyatt McSpadden/Texas Monthly) During the past four years, we've eaten a lot of great barbecue and met an equal number of notable folks running BBQ joints around the state. A meal is almost always followed by a pit tour while swapping tales about the Texas BBQ trail. They always have a story to tell. At some point the conversation almost always turns to Texas Monthly magazine and the holy grail of endorsements, their Top 50 BBQ list. Faces would light up at the possibility of landing on the…

Joints - 05/22/2013

Dallas BBQ history made at Daniel Vaughn's book party with the first briskets ever cooked in Big D by Aaron Franklin

Aaron Franklin, center, works the serving line while Justin Fourton works his smoker "Lurlene." (Jim Rossman photo) Friday was a historic night in Dallas barbecue. The book party for Daniel Vaughn's Prophets of Smoked Meat at the home of Steve and Anne Stodghill brought together four of Texas' best pitmasters: Aaron Franklin of Franklin Barbecue in Austin, Justin Fourton of Pecan Lodge in Dallas, Tim Byres of Smoke in Dallas and Will Fleischman of Lockhart Smokehouse in Dallas. Steve Stodghill, a principal at the Fish and Richardson law firm, represents Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. Daniel Vaughn signing books (@harryhunsicker…

People - 05/18/2013

New Dallas Joint: CattleAck BBQ

From left: Todd David, David Mills, Misty David and Lauren Parajon (all photos by Jim Rossman) In the wake of the Texas Monthly Top 50 list which was released this week, there’s been an abnormal amount of BBQ chatter on Twitter. It was in a Tweet I saw mention of CattleAck BBQ in Dallas. I was intrigued, as I’ve at least heard of most joints in Dallas and this one was under my radar. A jump to their Twitter feed @cattleackbbq led me to their website www.cattleackbbq.com. What I found was a BBQ catering business that four weeks ago started opening…

Joints - 05/17/2013

Where's Vera's? ... and other Posse reactions to Texas Monthly's new Top 50 BBQ joints

In case you missed it, Texas Monthly's new Top 50 list of the best BBQ joints in the state is at the end of this post. The magazine will reveal its Top 4 on Thursday. Why only 4? We're hearing No. 5 had consistency problems and was dropped at the last minute. Now, for some Posse reaction to the new Top 50: -- The most interesting omission was Vera's Backyard Bar-B-Que in Brownsville. New Texas Monthly BBQ editor Daniel Vaughn put Vera's in his Top 5 in the state in his book, The Prophets of Smoked Meat. But maybe whole…

Joints - 05/16/2013

A review: In Barbecue Crossroads, Robb Walsh shows how to write a road trip book

Author Robb Walsh doesn't think much of the best-of barbecue lists compiled by bloggers and journalists. But we won't hold that against him. The former food writer at the Houston Press, whose Barbecue Crossroads was just issued by the University of Texas Press, admits he was once there himself. Besides, Crossroads is a fine book. As a barbecue road trip account, it's everything that Daniel Vaughn's The Prophets of Smoked Meat isn't. "Take off your jacket, honey, make yourself comfortable," Thelma Williams of Thelma's in Houston tells a New York companion of Walsh's during their visit to her place. Thelma…

People - 05/14/2013

True confessions of a BBQ vegan

Wearing my favorite BBQ t-shirt from Stanley's while dining at our favorite vegan joint, The Loving Hut in Addison. I've been a blogger for the past ten years, writing mainly about photojournalism and barbecue. I even helped start the now-defunct Dallas Morning News fantasy football blog in the early 2000's. Because I have a confession to make, this may be the toughest post I've ever had to write. For six long weeks in February and March of this year, I walked in the shoes of the enemy. The co-founder of the Texas BBQ Posse became a vegan. I'm the same guy who…

People - 05/07/2013

The Barbecue Chronicles: Austin is the new Lockhart BBQ Tour

The Texas BBQ Posse dives into a spread of sausage, brisket, ribs and turkey at La Barbecue in Austin. (Photo by Tom Fox/DMN) Story by Gary Jacobson It would be easy to get carried away by what’s happening in Austin barbecue. Amid a fertile startup environment, young pitmasters are creating a smoked-meat renaissance, using only wood-fired pits and adopting old-school ways to cook for a new generation. A case could even be made that Austin has replaced Lockhart as the capital of Texas barbecue. We’ll leave that big-think stuff for another time. This is a story about…

Roadtrips - 05/07/2013

A review: Daniel Vaughn's book on Texas BBQ seems more about bad barbecue than good

The Posse has been a strong supporter of Daniel Vaughn, self pro-claimed BBQ Snob, champion blogger and new BBQ editor of Texas Monthly magazine. Once, long before he got his new gig, we even discussed how an alliance of aggressive bloggers -- him and us -- might actually be able to displace the magazine he now works for as the bible of Texas barbecue. So, this review is painful in the blogger brotherhood. I expected his new book, The Prophets of Smoked Meat, to be a celebration of great Texas barbecue because there is plenty to cheer, including an…

People - 05/06/2013

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