Holding their own
NYC barbecue joints don’t rival Texas’, but they’re worthwhile
The headline popped up on my computer screen as I was perusing news websites Sunday morning:
“Why is Brooklyn barbecue taking over the world?”
Certainly a provocative statement meant to get attention and clicks to the “Munchies” website, the food blog of Vice Media.
The article argued that the current boom in Americanstyle barbecue joints opening all over the world was inspired by a barbecue joint from Brooklyn, N.Y., called Fette Sau.
Again, a provocative argument. But also inaccurate.
Though the author mentions two barbecue-style restaurants in South and Central America and one in Spain as examples, in my own experience traveling the world researching the diaspora of Texas barbecue traditions and techniques, I have never encountered any mention of Brooklyn barbecue.
Indeed, barbecue joints such as The Beast in Paris and Texas Joe’s in London universally mention Texas icons Franklin Barbecue or Louie Mueller Barbecue as their inspiration.
In my international travels to document American-style barbecue, I’ve never heard anyone say, “We were inspired by Fette Sau.”
The article was accompanied by a photograph of a rather desultory tray of barbecue. Further inspection of the article showed that it was originally published back in 2014.
I wrote the piece off as “clickbait” — a provocative article with specious arguments meant to drive traffic and advertising dollars to a website.
But then it went “viral.” Users on Twitter and Facebook — many from barbecue strongholds including Texas and North Carolina — began mocking the article. None other than our own Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz tweeted out jokes about the idea of Brooklyn barbecue taking over the world.
Regrettably, much of the social-media mob’s ire was directed not at the article but at Brooklyn barbecue itself. They associated the sad picture of barbecue in the article with all of Brooklyn barbecue. For the Munchies website, this article turned into something of a deal with the devil — they got lots of clicks for their advertisers, but Brooklyn barbecue took a big hit to its reputation.
And yes, Brooklyn barbecue has an otherwise excellent reputation among barbecue fans. In a column last March titled “NYC a ’cue capital? For now, fuhgeddaboudit,” I argued that there are, indeed, great barbecue joints in Brooklyn, but there are just not enough of them to make Brooklyn a real contender for a top barbecue city.
My heart sank as the Twitter mob spewed invective throughout the week. I imagined my friends Billy Durney of Hometown Bar-B-Que and Izzy Eidelman of Izzy’s Smokehouse — two of Brooklyn’s best barbecue joints — were reading the same things. Billy and Izzy are two of the toughest guys I know, but they had to be irked by the negative press about their beloved borough and the barbecue they make there.
Closer to home, I called up pitmaster John Avila of El Burro & the Bull barbecue restaurant here in Houston. Avila, a veteran of Franklin Barbecue in Austin, moved to Brooklyn in 2013 and helped open Morgan’s Brooklyn Barbecue that same year. He had a front-row seat to the early days of Brooklyn barbecue.
I asked Avila what advice he’d give to his former colleagues in Brooklyn to weather the criticism.
“Just keep grinding,” Avila said. “Guys like Mark Roper at Morgan’s and Matt Fisher at Fletcher’s know Texas barbecue. They respect the tradition. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”
Back in 2014, when I started exploring Brooklyn barbecue, it was a lonely task to tell Texans that there was legitimate barbecue in Brooklyn. But I’ve spent enough time with pitmasters such as Durney and Eidelman to know that they respect and celebrate the great traditions of Texas barbecue.
It’s unlikely that a Brooklyn pitmaster would claim his barbecue is more influential than Texas’. It’s not. But it is great barbecue. And I can unreservedly recommend that any Texan visiting New York should make the trip across the East River and check it out.
Brooklyn barbecue may not be taking over the world, but it is legitimate barbecue. And it offers a taste of home for any homesick Texans visiting the Big Apple.