Daniel Vaughn, Contributor at Texas Monthly - Encore

0:00To grow your business you have to market your business. That takes a plan, a strategy, and a team that knows how to implement it. That's what we do for our clients every day. Don't just throw money at different media and hope it works. Talk to us and let us show you what we can do for you. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. It's time for barbecue nation with JT. So fire up your grill, light the charcoal and get your smoker cooking. Now from the Turnip Go Burnet Studios in Portland, use JT. This is Anon Quar. Hey everybody, welcome to Marble Cue Nation from High and Top. The Turnip Go Burnet Studios in Portland, Oregon. I'm JT along with Camaro David, Commander Chris, and we'd like to welcome you to the show on the Sun Radio Networks again this week. We thank you very much for letting us into your headspace, as I like to say. Our guest this week, Daniel Vaughn, has got a title that I don't know of anybody else in the country that has one, which is the barbecue editor, editor, I should say it properly, for a, it's called Texas Monthly, but it's really a national magazine.

1:00So we're going to talk to Daniel in just a second here. And we'd like to thank some folks at Painted Hills Natural Beef Beef the way nature intended. You can check them out online at paintedhillsnaturalbeef.com. Daniel Vaughn, welcome to Marble Cue Nation. Oh well, thanks for having me on. I'm happy to be talking with you today. No problem. I've looked forward with it to this or actually quite a while. I just couldn't quite work in the time to you know, make contact with you and all that stuff. So now that we've done it, consider yourself invited to be a regular. Well, I'm spending plenty of time at home these days. Yes, yes, we all are. So you're a recovering architect by trade. How did you get to being a, you know, an editor for barbecue in a very prestigious magazine? Yeah, well, you know, some strange twists and turns for sure. Yeah, as you said, my education was an architecture. I moved to Dallas 20 years ago to become an architect and did that for 12 years.

2:06But, you know, coming to Texas, I really, like, within the first year I was subscribing to Texas Monthly and they have these barbecue issues that they put out. Well, now we put out these top 50 barbecue lists and, you know, it just really intrigued me. The idea that first of all that there was a state that had 50 barbecue joints good enough to, you know, to rank, to recommend people to go to originally from Ohio. And we, I don't even know if we had one back then that anybody could recommend. Sure. And, you know, this is the idea of that you could use these different restaurants as a reason to travel the state. And so, you know, I just started searching, started using that as a guide, going out to eat barbecue on the weekends, eventually started a blog called Full Custom Gospel Barbecue. Started that blog with my friend Sam Watkins and we went out on several road trips together. And then from there, it really was just, it just turned into an obsession.

3:10I wanted to be able to go to every new barbecue joint that opened. I live in Dallas, so I especially wanted to get to those in Dallas and Fort Worth. And eventually, D Magazine in Dallas asked me to put together a top barbecue list form in the area for a health and Fort Worth. And before then, I'd never really written for, well, I'd never written professionally for anyone. I'd never got paid to write anything, that's for sure. And it was flattering, but it was, you know, I really took it seriously. And I wanted to do like, I wanted to go to every place in Dallas and Fort Worth, I possibly could. And at that time, I think there was, I think it was around 180 different barbecue joints that I visited. You know, some of them I'd been to before the assignment, but I really wanted to take them all off my list. And, you know, that turned into a cover story. And, you know, from there, that gave me a little bit of clout. And as far as the journalism thing went and

4:14you know, I started working with Texas monthly. Some just doing, just doing a few, you know, short write-ups, mostly online stuff. Yeah. Had you ever, let me jump in here for a second, Daniel. Had you eaten much barbecue prior to coming to Texas? No, no, not at all. You know, I remember very vividly going to, between Ohio and New Orleans, going to college, making that drive and stopped in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and went to Dreamland barbecue with my parents. And that was, that was an eye-opening experience right there. Just going into a restaurant that at that time, the original Dreamland had only ribs and bread on the menu. And you didn't order the bread, it just came with the ribs. Right. You wanted anything else that were chips hanging on the wall. And so, yeah, I think we got a whole rack of ribs and they were massive spare ribs. And so we

5:16got this whole rack of ribs and it came with a half a loaf of bread. And I think we ordered a second plate too. It came on a platter and then you got everybody got paper plates. And that was like my first experience with, you know, a true barbecue joint. And up until then, you know, it was like riblets and apple beads. It's a very barbecue back in Ohio. Sure. Yeah, when I got to Texas, everything changed. And, you know, I haven't smoked. We're just good for the first time. And and really gaining an understanding of what Texas style barbecue is. And really the many versions of Texas style barbecue that there are around the state. Yeah, we're going to talk about that a little later in the show. But, you know, they've people have broken down the country into areas of barbecue. But I noticed you have actually taken the time to break out the regions in Texas. Yeah. We're different barbecue styles. Like I said, we're going to get to that in a minute. What did you think? And I actually have never asked anybody this question, but you're the man to ask it to. What did you think when they had a slice of white bread with barbecue? I'm sure from

6:20Ohio, you had never seen that. No, I hadn't. I mean, it didn't really take long to understand what it was really there for. And that was just soak up some of the barbecue sauce. Sure. With the ribs and the eat it. And I mean, I thought it was great. The idea that you know, you didn't didn't really waste anything on the plate because you had this white bread to stop it all up. And the fact too that they were serving it, you know, if you ordered like two racks of ribs, you can hold loaf of bread. And then you know, our rack of ribs got us a half loaf of bread. That was, you know, I was pretty funny. And since they just cut the loaves right in half, right in the plastic and just handed it to you. So yeah. It didn't, you know, from that on, it just seemed like that's the appropriate thing to eat at a barbecue joint. Oh, yeah. Well, I spent a lot of my adult life in another industry and I traveled in Texas frequently. And I remember I was in my early 20s, you know, maybe 24, 25, something like that. And went to Texas and they took me out

7:25for barbecue and there was this white bread. And I thought it was really odd until I saw what they were doing with it. And then it made perfect sense to me. And that, but you know, I'm, the Northwest kid, you know, I was a Yankee all through and we had never, never seen any of that. And our version of barbecue up there then up here then was well, stuff kind of semi burnt and lots of sauce on it. And that was our version of barbecue. And I think it was that way a lot across the country years ago. And of course, we've expanded greatly since then. But yeah, I remember the scene that slab of white bread on the plate. And, you know, waxed paper underneath type thing and that and going, what is that? You know, anyway. Yeah. Well, and if you go to some of the more old school places like Crites Market or Smitties, you can even get salty crackers along with it. Like just a whole sleigh of salty crackers. Yeah. If you want to talk about like real old school Texas barbecue there. Oh, yeah. That's a thing. Like I hear complaints about the white bread. And it's like, you know,

8:28what it's free. Like it doesn't light bread. It'd be nothing. Yeah. So, uh, yeah, they're not charging it too much of slice, you know. Yeah. Yeah. So sorry, it's not a brioche bun. But, you know, yeah, you don't have to pay a lot for it. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's, it's good. I just, I have little true confessions here and people I think probably have heard me say this on the show before. I've got a brother law lives in Houston. And they come up every year, spend a week or two with us. They work for the airlines so they can travel, you know, pretty inexpensively and all that. His favorite thing is MacriRibs. And I just give him the hardest time about that because here he is, lives in Texas, down out of Houston, lots of great barbecue around there and over in Katie and, you know, going north and all that stuff. And he likes the McDonald's MacriRibs. That's his idea of good barbecue. It just makes me gag. But anyway, yeah, you know, it was, uh, it was kind of funny when McDonald's announced that they were going

9:29to do them, you know, launch the MacriRibs across the country. Uh, I think there was like a couple of months ago. Uh, it almost seemed like performative, but all these pit masters started ordering it and taking photos of it across Texas. I'm like, yeah, I like a MacriRib. And I just, I didn't get it. Like, I mean, I've, I've eaten MacriRibs and certainly, you know, as a, as a barbecue journal, just you gotta eat it all. And who knows? Maybe there's a story there. But in the end, it just tastes like barbecue sauce and like textured barbecue sauce. Yeah. And yeah, yeah. I'm the view. I'm, I'm not a fan of the MacriRibs. Yeah. If I'm going to McDonald's, like, I'd rather just get it like a big Mac. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. No, I just think that it's, it's, um, if I want press meat, I'll eat spam or something, you know, yeah. But you know, I wrote an article a while back, which was really about the idea that the MacriRibs sort of embodies, which is that for, um, and I think you were talking about earlier, just this,

10:30like if I had barbecue sauce on, it's kind of burnt. It was barbecue. And, and the idea that if, uh, you can barbecue something by adding barbecue sauce to it, all of a sudden, it's barbecue. Mm-hmm. You know, barbecue chicken sandwich, just being roasted chicken with, uh, or boiled chicken. Who knows? With the barbecue sauce mixed in all of a sudden, it's barbecue. That's, that's what the MacriRib is to me. You know, it's just, there's nothing barbecue about it until they don't tend to barbecue sauce. No, that's not barbecue enough for me. It always reminds me of like, you know, when they paint, uh, when they're getting fenders painted for cars on the mass production lines, they dip it. You know, there's robotic arms and they dip it. And that's what I envisioned the MacriRib being is they just take this kind of pressed meat, whatever it is. I'm sure it's pork in there, but there may be other things would never sure. And they, they dip it in there, and then they push it on down the line. That's the vision I have of it. So, yes, yes, it's, um, it's, if that's your idea of barbecue folks, you may be listening to the

11:34wrong show. I'm just going to put it that way right now. But you're more than welcome to stay. And, learn something here from our guest, Daniel Lawn from Texas Monthly. Daniel and I are going to be back in just a couple minutes here on barbecue nation on the Sun Radio Network. Please stay with us. Ready for a new ride? Choose from over a thousand vehicles at Westinkea. Gas, electric or hybrid. Find it at Oregon's all-time leader in Kia sales. Everyone wins at Westin. Sales leader claim based on Westin Kia sales of new kias from January, 1994 to July, 2026 as reported by Kia Corporation. Hey everybody, it's Jeff here. I want to tell you about something really cool. Heritage steel cookware. I just got mine. Uh, I do a lot of cooking and it's got five ply construction stay cool handles. It's titanium strengthened. It's got all the great stuff. Just go to heritage steel.us and find out more. You'll love it. I guarantee it.

12:43This is an encore welcome back to barbecue nation here on the Sun Radio Network. I'm JT. Today we're talking with Daniel Vaughan. We're Texas Monthly. Daniel has the great title and probably an honor I've been thinking to be the barbecue editor at Texas Monthly. And if you've never seen the magazine, look it up. Um, and I would, you know, subscribe to it. It's really a great great magazine. If you'd like to email us, it's very simple. You can just go to barbecue nation, BBQ nation's JT dot com. And there's a little icon there. You can send me an email on or you can do it to my other handle, which is what I use on TV. It's the cowboy cook dot com and just info at the cowboy cook dot com. We're also on Facebook and Twitter and a bazillion platforms out there and social media and podcasting. So there you go. Like I said, we're talking with Daniel Vaughan the day the barbecue editor from Texas Monthly. Did you think when you started Daniel that uh,

13:44this would turn into what it has for you, meaning that you kind of started a blog and you, and your buddy, we're kind of doing some road trips and blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and that's all great. But it's turned into a full time job for you. Yeah, certainly not. I never envisioned that it was going to turn into a full time job when I started blogging about it. I really just did it originally to keep track of the places that I'd been and so I could make sure to return to the ones I like and not return to the ones I didn't. So that was the initial idea. You know, once it started taking up too many of my nights and weekends, my, my wife certainly had some questions about whether I was ever going to actually try and make money off this. And if it was ever going to be end up being worth all the hours that I spent, just doing it for free. Sure. So when I was offered the job, I, I called her and you know, I was incredibly happy and really just ecstatic about the idea that Texas Monthly was working on a

14:45contract to make me the barbecue editor and she's just like, well, how much does it pay? It's like, well, not nearly what I make now, but who cares? I'm going to be barbecue. Well, maybe we need to sit down and talk about this. Why is do that? Yeah, why is do that? It worked out okay. But yeah, I'm, you know, seven, I'm in my eight year now doing it. And you know, when I, even when I signed on with Texas Monthly, like, you know, I, I didn't know what the world of Texas barbecue would look like in 2021 and would there still be an interest in that subject with, would restaurants still be opening? Would it still be as popular as it was back then? And you know, for, for eight years, I've been asked, like, is this the peak? Have we hit the peak? Are we, are we headed down the, down the other side of barbie, Texas barbecue is popular? You know, every year, it's just not yet. I don't, Daniel, I don't think we will.

15:48Really, I mean, I don't think it's going to become the national food, so to speak. But I don't think we will because if you look at the number of people that the estimates of people that barbecue at home, when the situation is relatively normal, meaning no COVID, no, all the junk that went with that, barbecue businesses seem to do well overall. If they're, if they've got a good product. And, yes. And, you know, if they're a smart operator, they keep the costs in line and they can do really well. So I don't see it going away. I don't see it, you know, maybe that might happen someday with the barbecue competitions or something. I hope it doesn't, but it might, I can see it maybe going that way, but not in the day-to-day life of people. I think barbecue is here to stay for a long time. Yes, yeah. Well, I mean, I certainly don't see, I don't see any time in the near future

16:50where the flame is going to die out, excuse the pun. But, you know, one of the things that's great about being the barbecue editor at Texas Monthly specifically is that as barbecue expands across the country and hits all these cities that don't themselves have their own barbecue tradition, it seems by and large that they're adopting a Texas style of barbecue cooking, which is always nice to see. Yeah, oh yeah. I, you know, we've got it up here now. Of course, I know you've been up here. Yes. And, but we've got quite a few barbecue restaurants around and they're the ones that are managed well are doing quite well. And some of them have even survived COVID quite well in the Portland and Seattle areas. I know that because I know the owners and, you know, they had to make a lot of adjustments, but they stuck it out and and I think they're going to be just fine. Let's talk a minute before we go to break. We've got about three and a half minutes here, Daniel.

17:50What are your parameters when you go to a barbecue restaurant? And I'm pretty sure it was easier when you were first getting started and maybe people didn't know who you were. And now when you walk in, I'm sure people that pay attention know who you are. But what are your parameters when you're writing something about a particular barbecue pit? You know, what do you, what do you look for? Well, I mean, first off, these days with a with a mask and sunglasses, it's a little bit easier to maybe go incognito. So there's some benefits there. But now I'd say really that though the biggest change hasn't been whether people recognize me or not, it's simply been how much more I've got to focus on as far as the menu goes. You know, it's just that the menus are so huge these days that it's not like just going in and getting your brisket ribs and sausage and calling it a day, right? Now, you know, we got a place to just open up down the street from me called Oaks and they have

18:53a pastry chef. They've got like literally have a dozen different desserts like Crème Broullet, which they fire off like the order. So, you know, it's it is harder and harder these days to be able to go in for going for a meal and get for one meal and get a good idea about what this place is doing. But I mean, really, it all boils down to generally brisket, right? How good is the brisket? But also, you try to get some idea of what that what that place, what the owners, what the pit master values, what the community values about that place. You know, sometimes that's not the place brisket. Now, sometimes this place is known specifically for their smoke chickener. Maybe they're just known for those ribs or they make specialty sausage that everybody comes in for. So, I try to get an understanding of that as well. You know, also understanding that from a health code standpoint, like there is there is no other type of food that you could cook that you go back in a kitchen that

19:58look like a pit room and be okay with it, right? Right. But it's but if it's barbecue, it's like, okay, this pit room looks just right. There's a group of over there on the corner. Yeah. We got smoke everywhere and like, yeah, this the smells right. Yeah. They got smudges on their aprons or their shirts or whatever. Yeah. It's all looking good. Then you know, you're in the right spot. Hey, we're going to return here on barbecue nation with Daniel Lawn from Texas monthly right after these messages. Please stay with us. Hey, everybody. It's JT and I have eaten, if you've ever looked at me, you know that. But I have eaten seafood all over the world and I can tell you there's no place better than here in Oregon and our Dungeonous crab. If you want to learn more about Oregon Dungeonous crab, just go to Oregon Dungeonous.org and find out how to cook it, how to catch it, where to buy it, and the sustainability of what they're doing there in the Oregon Crab Commission. Check it out.

21:09This is an unquote welcome back to barbecue nation here on the Sun Radio Network. We'd like to thank you for listening today. I'm JT and we've got Daniel Lawn from Texas monthly magazine. Daniel is the editor of the barbecue. Is the official title barbecue editor? Yeah, it was a great day when I got my first box of business cards. That's the barbecue editor right on there. That was an amazing site. There you go. Oh, I forgot here. We don't think our friends at Painter Hills natural beef for supporting our show beef the way nature intended and also the way grandpa used to make it if you had a grandpa that raised beef and there are friends at Gunter Wilhelm knives. I've got some and they work great. So try them. Look them up online at Gunter Wilhelms.com. When you're traveling around looking at the different restaurants and stuff, you meet a lot of characters. I mean, I have in my life and I'm not a professional writer like you are to do what you do. Tell us about some of the unique characters you've met in your

22:12travels around Texas. I know you could probably spend all day talking about them, but maybe narrow it down a little bit. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, one of the most, one of the most famous yet incredibly interesting pit masters is Tutsi Tomonets. It's snow is barbecue. So snow is barbecue is only open on Saturday mornings. They open at 8 a.m. and they're usually sold out by noon. It's incredibly popular and their pit master is Tutsi Tomonets and she's 85 years old now. So she still works for the school district during the week and she comes and cooks at snow's barbecue to serve it up on Saturdays. If you've seen a chef's table on Netflix, they have a barbecue series, a short barbecue series with some great pit masters and Tutsi's one of them. And I mean, her story is an amazing one and you know, so few female pit masters in Texas and to have one that's 85 years old and still going strong is always amazing to see.

23:15I've never met her Daniel, but I've read about her and I saw a little bit of that next Netflix thing. Seems like a great lady, but I wouldn't mess with her. She perked. Oh no. No, for sure. Yeah, she's a yeah, she's got more strength than you to expect from any 85 year old one. Oh, sure. Absolutely. What do you go ahead? I'm sorry. And then yeah, well, and down in Houston, a guy just connected with immediately was Ray Bush. It raised barbecue shack down there and he had been in law enforcement before and he retired and decided to open up a barbecue joint and the barbecue is incredible. And he does this this boot and they do homemade boot and but he also does this one called a muddy water boot and it's made with crawfish and shrimp and some of the most unique stuff, but just sitting at the at the bar at Ray's even some

24:16in some his sausage and ribs and fried catfish. Oh, and have on a chat with him is I mean, that's that's good eating and good conversation right there. Man, I know it's not barbecue, but I love fried catfish. I just love it. Well, I did a whole series on surf and turf, or surf and turf barbecue. Yeah. And I guess it's it's not really surf with its catfish, right? It's not exactly from the ocean, but close enough. And there are a lot of a lot of places around Texas that do a lot of barbecue joints that do great catfish and you know, being able to pair a good piece of fried catfish up with some good ribs or sausage or brisket. It's always a bonus. I know way back when I think it was like the second time I went to Texas, which was, you know, 45 years ago or something. Uh, guy said, come on, we're going to go have lunch. We'll have some mud bugs. And I went what? And he says, well, have some mud bugs. Well, once I saw him, I knew what they were because I grew up

25:19on a cricket our family ranch and we always caught fried heads, you know, and did you catch him and cook him and eat him? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Made the my dad hated it because by the time he, you know, from work, the kids were up from the creek. We had a big pot going and it all smelled like pickling spice and stuff. We had newspapers on the on the kitchen table with these fried heads dumped out there and we were eating them and damn near made him gag. But anyway, we loved him. And, um, and so they took me to this little place. I think it was called like Elaine's and it's not Elaine's in New York City, folks. It's Elaine's like in a abandoned gas station that they fixed up for a restaurant and he went in there and, and uh, Stevie opened, ordered me a order of mud bugs and then we had whatever was the lunch special and it was great. It was just great. Yeah. Yeah. I guess that'd be quite a surprise if you, if you didn't know that, that term for him. Yeah. Absolutely. When you, um, when you meet these characters and stuff,

26:27and you love tootsies famous. I mean, she's in the Hall of Fame, I think now and all that. But, yes. Um, when you meet some of these other folks along the way, how do their stories influence you as a writer? Well, um, it's not really the individual story so much as the fact that as I've written my style of writing has changed pretty dramatically. Uh-huh. When I started off, um, certainly when I was blogging, it was all about the food. And when I started the Texas Monthly, there was much bigger focus on specifically the food, you know, sort of standard restaurant review you go in for the atmosphere and, um, how it's the service and how it's the, um, you know, how it's the entree and the dessert and this and that, right? And I still cover that, but just not in as much detail. Um, and I don't really like to write about a place anymore unless I get part of the story of the people who run it or own it or started it or the pit master who runs the pits. Their stories are really what I think interest readers more

27:33and they're really what interests me more as well is, um, you know, where do these people come from? Why do they start cooking barbecue? And everybody's story is different. You know, there's, you get the idea that, uh, in Texas, these old school places that it's always like, well, my dad taught me. That's going to be your story over and over and over and these days, it's rarely, is that the story. Um, rarely is it that it's just a simple like pass down from father to son. So here and how everyone got involved in barbecue and, uh, and why they were crazy enough to open up a restaurant and try and serve it to people too. So that is, uh, that's been the focus of the stories that I've been writing over the last couple of years now that, uh, is, is just what's changed in my own style of writing. I noticed that, um, I was looking at one of the stories you wrote last night about a young man who had, uh, was it, I'm going to get the name wrong because I actually didn't write it down. I was just reading some of your stuff again. And I was at buddhanes.

28:38And then he had worked there and then he had had some personal problems and then he came back and he's working for, uh, um, is he working for Aaron? Are he's working for somebody down there? Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Um, so you're talking about it at bodacious barbecue. Bodacious. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. So bodacious barbecue up in long view. Um, you know, that was, uh, one of my favorite spots. Um, and so it, you know, it was one of my favorite spots. I spent a lot of time eating there and, and when, uh, Jordan Jackson was the pit master there and I spent a lot of time getting to know him and, uh, then he just sort of disappeared and didn't really know what happened to him. The guy who had worked for him had, uh, we worked under him, took over things at the pits and then Jordan showed up a few months later, um, in, not in long view, but, uh, a whole long way away in Austin, Texas at the pit room at Franklin barbecue. And yeah. So I talked to him, um, you know,

29:42on a personal level, uh, about the struggles he went through and it took a few months, uh, really before he was comfortable having me tell that story to the public and understandable. It's a, kind of a situation that he's in the middle of, but, um, but now he's, he's clean and sober and, uh, got through his rehab and, uh, Aaron Franklin gave him a chance to look in the pit room there. Uh, he's, he's flourishing now and really turned his life around. Yeah, I love those kind of stories too. I really do. And I, regardless of the aspect of barbecue, I just think they're really great human interest stories like, um, let's share something with the audience here, Daniel. When I first called you a couple of weeks ago, you were driving down the road with a tricky leg in your passenger seat. And I, and I told you a story, which I won't repeat here because people have heard it before about my experience with, um, C world in San Antonio and a tricky leg that floated away in a flash flood. Um, first of all, tell us how good was that tricky leg when you ate it?

30:48It was a good turkey leg. Yeah. We've got this sort of trend going on in Texas now, these stuffed turgulets, which aren't so much stuffed as they are just smothered, um, and so these massive turkey legs and people are putting all kinds of stuff on them, whether it's mac and cheese or, I mean, there's places doing like shrimp alfredo. Um, there's, um, there's a guy, uh, turkey leg hut is certainly the most famous of them down in Houston, but there's a guy over in Fort Worth now that smoked a hallex barbecue. And on Tuesdays, he's, uh, doing stuff for the legs only on Tuesdays, but when he does, he's got, uh, he's stuffed some with dirty rice. He's got one of them stuffed with, um, stuffed with a shrimp alfredo sauce, um, just all kinds of different combinations of things. And it's just amazing to see this trend that really started like only about four or five years ago is now something that's really popping up in a lot of these different barbecue joints and really outside of barbecue as well. So the, uh, smoked turkey leg is certainly a hot item these days. I know for a plate of ribs,

31:54I'm a four napkin guy. How many napkins do you go through eating a turkey leg? Well, see, that's the thing is not many because these turkey legs, these people, um, they're not like the what you'd get at the festivals, right, uh, which you, you know, they've got to be, there's almost a way to cook them at festivals so that they're a little less than super tender, right? So that you can actually walk around with the thing. But at these places, they're cooking them till they're incredibly tender. Some of them like a turkey leg paradise here in Dallas. It's, uh, um, if it, if it doesn't fall off the bone, it's free. We're going to take a break. Daniel and I'll be back in a few minutes here on barbecue nation. Stay with us. Ready for a new ride? Choose from over a thousand vehicles of Westin Kia. Gas, electric or hybrid. Find it at Oregon's all-time leader in Kia sales. Everyone wins at Westin. Sales leader claim based on Westin Kia sales. A new Kia is from January 1994 to July 2026 as reported by Kia Corporation.

33:01Hey everybody, JT here. I want to tell you about the Hammerstall knives. Hammerstall combines German steel with beautiful and functioning designs. They're part of the Heritage Steel Group, which also does their pots and pans. So go to HeritageSteel.us. Check out the Hammerstall knives. If you're really into cooking, I think you're really going to like them. This is an encore. Hey, welcome back to you, barbecue nation. I'm JT. We're talking with Daniel Bond, today from Texas Monthly and Great Magazine Daniel writes great articles about barbecue and characters and barbecue and all that. And like I said, he's a recovering architect. I only say that Daniel because when I talk to lawyers, I always call them recovering lawyers too, or attorneys. Yes. Well, there's plenty of those who own barbecue joints these days too. I'm sure there are. I'm sure there are. They don't always feel like they're pleading their case or something. I don't know. You wrote something too. And I normally stay out of politics on this show.

34:10It's been my kind of steadfast rule. But you're you've got a senator down there, John Cornyn. And in his brisket, I didn't even read it all because I was just wanted you to tell the story about it because you basically said leave the guy alone. Let him enjoy his brisket piece. I'm paraphrasing one line. You wrote, tell us about that. Well, all right. So, yeah, Senator John Cornyn, he posted on Christmas Eve a photo that was immediately shared all over Twitter. And it was a photo of his family's traditional brisket. And he didn't really say much more about it. Just posted a photo of, let's just say a less than appetizing looking brisket. The lighting was bad. It looked like it was covered in ketchup. It had been sliced and then and then put in the oven. And it just didn't look great.

35:15Right. Right. And especially for the barbecue crowd who's used to just staring at like luscious photos of brisket day and day out. It was a bit of a visual shock, should I say. And so, you know, I thought I'd have a little fun with it. And, you know, as I said in the article, like if it's truly a family tradition, like most main courses that remain a family tradition aren't terrible, right? Sure. Yeah, sure. Like, you know, Aunt Sally might bring her terrible salad or whatever every holiday. And you're not going to say much about it. But the main course, like it's got to be good. And so I got in touch with one of his folks, people and tried to get the recipe and didn't, wasn't successful in getting the recipe. But I was really wanting to create the version that he did at my own house and get some idea of what that, you know, everybody saw what it looked like. I wanted to get an idea what really tasted like.

36:17And so I went around, snooping around his Instagram, found some older photos of the brisket process that for this particular brisket that they seem to cook at least once a year. And just tried to find a recipe that matched up with as closely as possible. But, you know, whether it's covered in barbecue sauce or not, it seemed like the worst offense for this particular recipe was his directions to trim all visible fats. And so it basically, you're trying to cook a brisket flat with no fat in it. And that's just, that's just not a way to, good way to get the brisket. So, I did it at home. I did my best. I wasn't trying to do a bad version of it. I wasn't, you know, I wasn't trying to mail it in just so I could get a funny story to write. But I tried at home as close to the method that he posted. And it's not going to become a family tradition.

37:23I understand. I saw some pictures of it. And didn't it do this in an oven? Yes, yeah. It's a fully oven baked. So the process is you cook it for three hours. And then you cook it covered for three hours. You refrigerated overnight. Then you remove all the fat off of the brisket. You strain out all the liquid to save only the liquid and strain out any fat. And so you discard all the fat. Slice the brisket covered in barbecue sauce and put it back in the oven for an hour and a half. And yeah, I think it's already sliced brisket back in oven with no fat to help it. There's not a not a recipe for juicy brisket. No, it's not. We've got just a few minutes left here before and Daniel's going to stick around for after hours. So that's going to be fun. What do you think is the biggest influence on Texas barbecue? Now you've covered more and

38:27more Texas barbecue joints than anybody in the world on the face of the earth, I think. And so, you know, we talked about regions and I pushed it out a little bit. So we're going to talk about the Texas regions in after hours. But there's got to be somewhere kind of a centerist influence on Texas barbecue. Is it the historical perspective of, you know, maybe the Mexican influence, the Spanish influence, what is it? Well, and that's why it is so important to talk about the different regions of Texas barbecue because as you said, when people talk about different barbecue regions, they like to they like to just fill everything down into like a short sound bite about each one. Sure. So you get somebody talking about North Carolina or South Carolina or Memphis, Kansas City, and then they're like, okay, and this is Texas barbecue. Well, there's no one answer for what Texas barbecue is, right? Texas is a huge state with a lot of different styles. And so there's also not one answer as far as where the tradition of Texas barbecue came from.

39:33So I mean, if you look into East Texas, I mean, the enslaved population in East Texas was huge around the time of the Civil War. So, you know, and a lot of those enslaved were cooking barbecue for their plantations. So their skills, their skills translated to after slavery to really when restaurants began, barbecue restaurants began in Texas in the 1880s and 1890s. So you see that influence pretty heavily in East Texas, Southeast Texas as well, down in the Houston, Boma area. If you're in central Texas, you know, it really is the place where meat market style barbecue emerged as the as the most popular way of cooking. And that style was really about selling raw meat and then using any of those leftovers to make barbecue. And you know, you put something that's been sitting on an under refrigerated shelf for a few days, put that kind of meat,

40:36put plenty of salt and pepper on it and put it into a smoker and you might be able to mask that off flavor. And you know, if you're going to grind it up and add a bunch of slices and put it into a casing, then smoke it, you might be able to hide even more. So those smoke sausage traditions are really important in central Texas. I don't think there's a whole lot of other places in the country where sausage takes on such an important role in the barbecue style of central Texas barbecue. But then you get into South Texas and talking Cabrito and Barbacoa, fajitas, smoked fajitas, fajitas, cooked or cold. So all those things that's very much Mexican influence and influence from, you know, influence from Mexico sure, but also influence from parts of Texas that the parts of Texas that used to be Mexico. So, you know, the influences change across the state is the reason that those styles change all over the state as well. Daniel Lawn,

41:36thank you for being with us today. Daniel is going to stick around for the after hours in some of our markets. Excuse me, you got hour two coming up. And if not, we'll join you again next week for Barbacoa Nation right here on the Sun Radio Network. Take care everybody.