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Central Texas Barbecue Guide - Playing favorites

Who serves up the best barbecue in town? That depends on whom you ask

By Dale Rice
AMERICAN-STATESMAN RESTAURANT CRITIC
Wednesday, June 07, 2006

In much of Texas, it's the culinary equivalent of Friday night football. There are competing loyalties. Reputations to be maintained.

There is one difference, though: These fires get stoked more than one day a week.

Here, barbecue is more than a one-night stand. How about a sausage wrap for breakfast. Brisket for lunch. Ribs for dinner. With homemade sides piled on. Eight days a week, as the sign at Black's boasts.

East of Austin, there are two points on the map with dueling barbecue joints where barbecue doesn't merely converge, it collides. In Taylor, with three spots, and in Lockhart, where there are four, barbecue is the cuisine of choice. And, as with high school football, there's no shortage of team loyalty.

Lockhart

It was a simple question, but it might have been easier to ask about the man's politics or his religion.

"What's the best barbecue spot in town?"

It's not like there are 50 places from which to choose in Lockhart, the Caldwell County seat about 30 miles southeast of Austin on U.S. 183. But brand loyalty is as sticky as a well-sauced rib, and this storeowner wasn't about to wipe his hands clean on that question.

"I can't tell you that," he replied, seemingly shocked that we would ask.

Pressed further, he acknowledged that when he wants "to be bad" — which he defined as including sausage on his plate — he heads to Smitty's or Kreuz's, the local joints owned by dueling siblings. But, he quickly added, Chisholm Trail and Black's are good, too.

Even most of those who have a favorite joint refrain from criticizing the other spots. A variety of interviews with customers entering or leaving barbecue places also showed that food isn't always the determining factor.

"They all have good barbecue," said Randy Russell, a business owner from nearby Maxwell who had driven over to Lockhart for lunch. "The difference is how you want to eat your food: Do you want to eat with utensils or not?"

Kreuz Market and Smitty's Market are famous for their no-forks approach to smoked meat, which is served on butcher paper. That translates to a finger-lickin', somewhat messy process for eating a meal (there are plastic spoons and knives, if needed). Chisholm Trail and Black's provide the full range of utensils.

"That's one of the reasons I come here," Russell said. "Black's will serve you with forks and plates, rather than butcher paper. You can come and go without a mess."

For a business owner with limited time for lunch, that's an important consideration, he said.

The absence of a certain condiment can influence decisions as much as a lack of forks.

"They've got good barbecue sauce here; Kreuz's doesn't have barbecue sauce," said Teri Stratman, who was returning home to Shiner with her husband, Chuck, after the state softball tournament in Austin.

For Chuck, though, it's all about meat and tradition at Black's, which claims to be the oldest, continuously operated, family-owned barbecue joint in Texas. It opened in 1932 and is the only barbecue spot that's not on the main highway through town.

"I stop here because they've got really good brisket — probably the best you can get anywhere," he said. "I've been coming here since I was a kid, like 45 years. My parents and I would stop here on our way back from Austin."

Family links play out across town at Chisholm Trail, too.

DaeTron Head and his grandfather, Glynn Head, stopped for lunch at this joint on the south side of town. DaeTron, who will be in the 10th grade in the fall and was wearing a Lockhart Lions T-shirt, knew exactly why they had chosen Chisholm Trail: "great taste." And how does that manifest itself?

"Barbecued beef on a bun or the pork ribs," he said without hesitation. "And let's not forget the hash browns."

Greg Guenther eats two or three times a week at Chisholm Trail, which also features an array of cold salads and hot side dishes to accompany the meat, and he has a broader view of the place.

"This is the best," he said. "No. 1 is the prices. You can feed a family of four for under 20 bucks. It's also consistent. Everything is always the same."

What about the meat?

"I come here for their barbecued chicken. It's not too dry, not too juicy. It's just right."

But Guenther is quick to share the praise: "They have great barbecue at Kreuz's. I love his pork chops and shoulder roast, but I like to have sides with mine."

Kreuz's offers cheese, pickles, onions and beans — a rather limited menu of side dishes compared with some barbecue joints. But that was more than enough for Sheba Macias of El Paso. She and her husband, in Austin for the Republic of Texas Biker Rally, drove out to Kreuz's on her brother-in-law's advice. They loved it.

"The brisket is excellent," she said. "The pork chops were real good, too. I even gnawed on the bone. You know they're real good when you need to chew on the bone."

Kreuz Market in one sense is the newest kid on the block, located in a large building that's only a few years old. The restaurant had been in the center of town in a building launched nearly a century ago by the Kreuz family and later taken over by the late Edgar "Smitty" Schmidt. However, in a well-publicized feud, Schmidt's son and daughter had a falling out a few years back. Rick Schmidt built the new spot and took the Kreuz name with him. His sister, Nina Schmidt Sells, then opened Smitty's in the old location.

But that's an old story now. It's a new story that prompted another pair of travelers, Oscar and Joye Hinojosa of Harlingen to drop by for lunch. USA Today had listed Kreuz's as one of the top barbecue spots in the country, and that got their attention.

As they drove through town looking for Kreuz's, they discovered something else.

"We were shocked to see there are a lot of barbecue places in Lockhart," Joye said.

In the middle of town, where the parking lot also fronts on U.S. 183, several members of the crew working on a new Robert Rodriguez movie in nearby Luling had just finished lunch at Smitty's Market. They've checked out a number of the barbecue joints in the area and were back at Smitty's for more.

"It's the killer pork chop," Orlando Mora said. "It's center cut and it's thick. The smoke is where it's at. It's the best."

Ten years ago, John Lewis worked on a movie filmed in Lockhart, "Waiting for Guffman." "The director, Christopher Guest, loved this place," he said. Noting that he was aware of the family split and change in management in the interim, Lewis added, "They still have the same quality."

And he still comes back for the same thing at Smitty's: "I don't get out here very often, but when I make the trip, I have the pork chop."

Those favorite items are one reason barbecue aficionados return to Lockhart. Between the four joints, the city has just about every aspect of smoked meat covered.

Taylor

Louie Mueller keeps good company.

One of the world's leading authorities on barbecue, Steven Raichlen, named the longtime joint one of the 25 best spots in the world in his book, "The Barbecue! Bible." Only one other Texas place, Sonny Bryan's in Dallas, made the list.

With that kind of acclaim, you'd expect Louie Mueller to dominate barbecue in this small town at the junction of Texas 95 and U.S. 79, 15 miles east of Round Rock. Based on Saturday lunch observations, it does.

A little after noon on a recent weekend, there were no cars in front of Rudy Mikeska's — another famed name in Texas barbecue lore — but in the next block a dozen were parked in the lot next to Mueller's.

Idalia Wiseman of Round Rock had just climbed out of her sport-utility vehicle with three other companions. She had a quick — and firm — explanation for why they had driven here for lunch: "They run out of barbecue. What does that tell you?"

One of her companions, making her first visit to Mueller's, said, "I've heard so much about it." Then she added, "We just got back from Chicago, and what do we want? Barbecue."

In the tall-ceilinged, screened dining room on the side of the old building that's so steeped in smoke even the business cards tacked to the wall have turned brown, the Jordan family was relaxing after lunch.

"It's the best barbecue around. We try to come every Saturday," said Jack Jordan, who has been eating at Mueller's for nearly 40 years since he first arrived in town as a coach. "The coaches would come every Friday for lunch," he said. "I've eaten here pretty often ever since."

"And when the out-of-towners are here, we have to come," said his wife, Barbara.

They were dining with son Robbie, a teacher and coach in Mansfield, and son Matt, a medical student, and his wife, Kelley, a teacher.

"We've looked all over Houston and there's nothing close," Kelley said. "A lot of it is atmosphere. You can't beat it."

Back inside, taking a break from his computer (Mueller's has wireless Internet capacity), Taylor resident John Landis said, "You'd be hard-pressed to find better barbecue anywhere. Bobby learned from his dad pretty well."

Bobby Mueller took over from his father in the 1970s and has maintained the joint's reputation. But that doesn't mean he's locked in some old formula. A spicy chipotle sausage was added to the menu less than a year ago.

Landis, however, emphasized something else: "This is not the only barbecue joint in town," he said. "Taylor Café is under the bridge, and I like their pork ribs."

Gosh. Another barbecue joint just blocks away.

A quick drive down the street and around the corner revealed another busy — and nearly hidden — spot, the small, rustic Taylor Café at 101 N. Main St., where Vencil Mares has been plying his craft for more than 50 years. Mares, who's in his 80s, still works the two-counter joint each day, turning out brisket and ribs that can give the big boys some competition. Maybe that's why he's won awards and been mentioned in more than one national publication.

"It's the best barbecue," said Brad Toups, a Taylor resident who brought friends for lunch. "It's the best I've had anywhere."

Tony Connell, who's from Round Rock, brought his date, Linda Kay Finn, who lives in Taylor, to the cafe. He had been there a number of times, but this was her first visit.

"He picked me up and this is where he wanted to go," she said.

"I like the atmosphere and the food's good," he said.

"You feel like you're eating barbecue when you're in one of these places," she said. "It's an old-time atmosphere."

Back to Mikeska's again, and this time there are folks leaving the place.

Donnie Futrell stopped at Mikeska's — which is widely known for its barbecue catering business — on his way home to Elysian Fields near the Louisiana border after the state baseball tournament, just as he did five years ago, the last time his home team was in the tournament.

"I like the sliced beef myself," he said. Then he pointed to his carload of passengers and added, "They ate some of everything."

For Charles Votaw of Taylor, Mikeska's is his barbecue restaurant of choice.

"I like the flavor of the barbecue itself," he said. "If I don't have time to make it at home, this is the next best place right here."

That's the way it goes across Texas. Folks support their favorite spots the same way they support their hometown teams.

drice@statesman.com; 445-3859