Acres Homes is still a Houston barbecue hotspot
In the grand sweep of Houston barbecue history, Fifth, Fourth and Third Wards are considered the “barbecue wards” where the city’s smokedmeat traditions took root in the late 1800s.
But another neighborhood has had an outsized influence on Houston’s contemporary barbecue scene. Acres Homes, bound by Pinemont to the south, North Shepherd to the east, West Gulfbank to the north and T.C. Jester to the west, is where Houston’s craft-barbecue tradition began.
Craft barbecue is, of course, the trend originating in Central Texas about a decade ago representing a return to traditional smoking techniques, specifically the use of all-wood pits and high-quality ingredients. This is in contrast to the several decades prior in which automated, gas-fueled pits and cheap cuts of meat introduced questionable “modern advances” that arguably lowered the standards of the state’s great barbecue traditions.
There is some irony in a style of barbecue originating in Central Texas taking root in Acres Homes.
As one of the oldest traditionally African-American communities in Houston, there is a long history of East Texas-style barbecue here, mainly derived from the smoked-meat traditions of the Southern United States.
Acres Homes was developed during World War I as a neighborhood that combined the urban benefits of being close to downtown with large lots that allowed for agricultural activities such as farming and raising livestock.
To that end, land in the neighborhood was sold by the acre rather than a smaller house-lot, resulting in the name “Acres Homes.”
Acres Homes has long been known for “shade tree” barbecue in which local residents set up a tent and barbecue trailer along the side of the road under the cool shade of a tree to serve smoked meats to neighbors. Even to this day, driving along West Montgomery Road on weekends, you will often find trailers and tents in empty parking lots selling barbecue.
Two of these shade-tree operations would make the jump to brick-and-mortar restaurants in the 1970s — Burns BBQ, helmed by pitmaster Roy Burns, and Williams Smokehouse, owned by Willie and Hattie Williams.
Both of these restaurants served classic East Texas-style barbecue with a focus on pork dishes — especially big, meaty spareribs — as well as Beaumontstyle beef links, smoked boudin and chopped-beef sandwiches.
Tragically, Williams Smokehouse burned down in 2007, and Roy Burns passed away in 2009.
However, a new generation of Acres Homes pitmasters arrived in 2007 when local resident Clarence Pierson quit his office job and opened Pierson & Co. Bar-B-Que on T.C. Jester. Pierson was the first Houston pitmaster to embrace the growing craft-barbecue movement by commissioning an all-wood
barbecue smoker from nearby pit maker David Klose (who also worked with Burns) and combining the beef-centric traditions of Central Texas barbecue with the pork-centric traditions of East Texas.
Though Pierson retired in 2011 for health reasons, his uniqueto-Houston combination of Central and East Texas barbecue styles lives on in contemporary craft-barbecue joints such as Gatlin’s BBQ in Oak Forest, Ray’s BBQ Shack in Third Ward and Brooks’ Place BBQ in Cypress.
Today, Acres Homes’ bestknown barbecue joint is the resurrected Burns Original BBQ, reopened in 2012 by Burns’ grandsons, Cory and Carl Crawford. It’s still an all-in-the-family affair with Burns’ sons Steve and Gary and daughter Kathy Braden still working as managers and pitmasters.
There are few experiences in Houston barbecue I enjoy more than arriving at Burns, standing in line with neighbors and tourists alike (Burns has become a barbecue destination for visitors to the city), ordering a colossal chopped-beef sandwich and link of boudin and settling in at a picnic table on the patio in front.
It’s a delicious reminder that Burns Original BBQ retains and embraces the unique traditions of the East Texas-style barbecue for which Acres Homes is known, while incorporating creative dishes and high-quality ingredients inspired by craft barbecue.