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. Franklin runs Franklin Barbecue in Austin.

Gallagher is an accountant at St. Joseph Catholic Church. He said his wife, Jenny, lived next door to the Franklin family in Bryan, where Aaron's father ran a barbecue place.

"I would have never guessed that he was going to be a barbecue mogul," Gallagher said of Franklin. "I always figured that if he was ever going to make it in something, it would be in the music industry. I guess he found something else he loved."

Before barbecue, Franklin played drums for a band called Those Peabodys.

The Barbecue Chronicles: Best of Texas BBQ Tour

Brisket, ribs and sausage at Louie Mueller Barbecue in Taylor. (Photo by Tom Fox/DMN)

By Gary Jacobson/Texas BBQ Posse

For a while now, members of the Texas BBQ Posse have strongly suspected that Dallas finally has a joint that can hang with the elite barbecue restaurants in the state.

Our recent Posse Favorites Tour confirmed that suspicion. We drove nearly 700 miles and ate at 10 top places over 48 hours. We scored brisket, pork ribs and sausage, the holy trinity of Texas barbecue, on a 10-point scale.

In the end, we compiled a list of the six top-scoring spots. Pecan Lodge at Dallas Farmers Market placed second overall, snugged tightly between Franklin Barbecue in Austin at No. 1 and Snow’s BBQ in Lexington at No. 3.

That’s stout company. Behind them in our top tier of six were Kreuz Market in Lockhart, Louie Mueller Barbecue in Taylor and Fargo’s Pit BBQ in Bryan.

Video: The Posse talks about their picks for the Best in Texas BBQ

The Posse judges dig into ribs, brisket and sausage at Kreuz Market in Lockhart. (Photo by Tom Fox/DMN)

One of the new additions to our reporting of the Best in Texas BBQ Tour was taking advantage of the new video studio at The Dallas Morning News. Some might say the Posse members in the video -- Gary Jacobson, Jim Rossman, Bruce Tomaso and me, Chris Wilkins -- have the perfect faces for radio. We don't disagree, but we had a great time filming these videos.

DMN photojournalist Nathan Hunsinger shot three videos of the Posse discussing the pursuit of great barbecue for dallasnews.com. The video shown below is our discussion of how we ranked the top six BBQ joints in Texas.

We also shot two other videos: How to plan your own Texas BBQ Tour and How the Texas BBQ Posse judges good BBQ. Enjoy!

Today in the Dallas Morning News: The BBQ Posse's Best of Texas picks

Here's a look at our three-page spread in today's Dallas Morning News travel section. The Best of Texas BBQ project was published in print and online on dallasnews.com and the DMN iPad app.

Dallas Morning News editor Bob Mong shared his thoughts on the Posse in his weekly note to the readers published in today's paper:

I can always stop by photo editor Chris Wilkins’ desk and catch up on the top visual journalism of the day.

Check out 360-degree panoramas of the best BBQ joints in Texas

Snow's BBQ, Lexington. Click on each photo to see a 360-degree panorama.

When planning started for our Best of Texas BBQ Tour, we wanted to come up with a unique way to let readers experience the best BBQ joints in Texas. Welcome to the BBQ panorama project, a way to take a virtual tour of each joint without leaving your easy chair.

Dallas Morning News staff photographer Tom Fox shot the panoramas using a specially-designed rig consisting of a tripod bracket that helped him to align and shoot six separate photos of each place, which were then stitched together using software that forms the full 360-degree panorama.

You can click on each photo on this blog post to go to the related panorama hosted on dallasnews.com. Once you're there, you can use your mouse or touchpad to navigate your way around each BBQ joint. This technology works even better on the iPad, where you can simply hold up the panorama in front of you and slowly turn in a circle as the image on the screen moves with you.

Also, thanks to Dallas Morning News multimedia producer David Guzman for his hard work putting these together. Enjoy!

Louie Mueller Barbecue, Taylor

Franklin Barbecue, Austin

Pecan Lodge, Dallas

Kreuz Market, Lockhart

Fargo's Pt BBQ, Bryan

Stanley's Famous Pit Bar-B-Q, Tyler

The Posse's best of the best BBQ joints in Texas: Franklin Barbecue in Austin, Pecan Lodge in Dallas and Snow's BBQ in Lexington

The faces behind our top six BBQ joints, clockwise from top left: Aaron Franklin of Franklin BBQ, Justin Fourton of Pecan Lodge, Tootsie Tomanetz of Snow's BBQ, Roy Perez of Kreuz Market, Wayne Mueller of Louie Mueller Barbecue, Belender Wells & Alan Caldwell of Fargo's Pit BBQ. (Photos by Tom Fox/DMN)  

The Dallas Morning News posted the results of the Posse's Best of Texas BBQ Tour today on its Web site. The results will appear on the paper's iPad's application this weekend and in the newspaper's travel section on Sunday.

It was an exceedingly close finish. With 30 being the best possible score, less than a point separated the top three joints -- Franklin Barbecue in Austin, Pecan Lodge in Dallas and Snow's BBQ in Lexington.

Over 48 hours we ate at 10 top places. Six judges from the Posse rated the brisket, pork ribs and sausage at each on a scale of 1 to 10. We averaged the scores for each meat and then added them to determine the overall winner.

Running into the BBQ Snob is a good sign

Daniel Vaughn, aka: The BBQ Snob, at Snow's BBQ in Lexington. (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)

Running into your “barbecue friends” out in the wild is really a pleasant surprise.

Twice this year I’ve run into Daniel Vaughn, a barbecue blogger and author who’s tireless pursuit of great smoked meat has benefitted us all.

I’m never surprised to run into Daniel at a restaurant, because if I see him, I know I’m in for some good barbecue.

Portraits of the great pitmasters, from Best of Texas BBQ tour

Herschel Tomanetz, Snow's BBQ, Lexington. (Photo ©Daniel Goncalves)

Check out this amazing set of portraits by Dallas-based editorial and commercial photographer Daniel Goncalves, featuring the pitmasters behind the BBQ we ate last week on our Best of Texas BBQ tour. Daniel and his wife Magda recently moved to the area from Jacksonville, Florida.

His love for both photography and barbecue led him to get in touch the Posse, which is mainly made of photographers, writers and editors from The Dallas Morning News. We invited Daniel to come along and help us document the trip, while eating the best BBQ that Texas has to offer. You can see more of his work at www.fotobia.com.

The BBQ Chronicles: Houston, we have a barbecue problem

The eight stops on the Texas BBQ Posse's Gulf Coast BBQ Tour.  (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)     

Houston is a wasteland for good barbecue, but Galveston and Bryan aren’t.

The main mission on the BBQ Posse’s recent 35-hour, 700-mile barbecue tour to the Texas Gulf Coast and back was to find good smoked meat in Houston.

We didn’t.

But an hour south, on Galveston Island, we met Leon O’Neal and learned again about the true power of barbecue.

O’Neal, who runs Leon’s World Finest In & Out Bar-B-Que House at Broadway and 55th, told us about the cleanup after Hurricane Ike in 2008.

He lost everything in his kitchen, he said, speaking from inside his old smokehouse where the storm’s surge had been 7 feet deep.

“The water didn’t do nothing to this pit,” he said, motioning toward a rusted, 18-foot tank-style smoker.

So he cleaned it, fired it up and started cooking barbecue for repair crews working on his joint and other places in the neighborhood. Soon, he said, people smelled the smoke, and he had cars lined up around the block.

“Everybody just wanted something normal again,” said O’Neal, who might be the most stylish barbecue proprietor we’ve encountered on our tours.

Leon O'Neal sits in his old smoker room at Leon's World's Finest In & Out Barbeque.  (Photo ©Chris Wilkins)  

Aged 70 plus a couple years, he wore a white T-shirt, beige shorts, red apron and black, shiny shoes, with a white mustache, soul patch and a straw hat.

His homemade Downtown Link was worth the trip by itself. The sausage had a nice initial kick and a lingering, changing aftertaste, like a good wine.

“Every now and then, you come across something special,” Posse co-founder Chris Wilkins said.
We asked Leon what was in the sausage. You could tell that he got that question a lot, and he wasn’t really intent on giving up any secrets.

He said it was a meatloaf mix that he developed with his butcher. Whatever. It was the tastiest meatloaf, stuffed in sausage casing, we’ve ever eaten.

Leon has a new pit now, a gas-fired Ole Hickory. We were happy to see that it has a huge firebox for wood, and O’Neal keeps it loaded with nothing but “pure oak.”

Wilkins, a photo editor at The Dallas Morning News, sets the itineraries for all of our barbecue tours. This was our 11th and first to the Houston area.

Over the past couple years, we’ve traveled about 4,000 miles looking for great barbecue and interesting joints in Texas.

We had high hopes for Houston because some of our planned stops had received very good reviews from respected blogger and self-proclaimed BBQ Snob Daniel Vaughn as well as Houston food writers.

The Posse, however, was underwhelmed. Adapting a phrase from Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington, “That’s how barbecue go.”

Our order of sliced brisket, pork ribs and smoked chicken at Gatlin's BBQ.  (Photo ©Chris Wilkins)    

At Gatlin’s BBQ, the top-rated Houston joint just a few miles from downtown, we sampled the brisket, pork ribs and chicken.

“It’s a lot of OK,” Posse member Jim Rossman said.

“If this is the best Houston has to offer,” there’s no doubt that Dallas-area joints have it beat, Wilkins said.

Pulitzer-winning photographer Smiley Pool, who sandwiched a tour of duty at The News between stints working at the Houston Chronicle, joined the Posse on this stop.

In Houston, Pool observed, “everyone says that if you want good barbecue, you pile in a car and take a two-hour drive.” He referred to the great joints in Central Texas.

Ouch.

In Dallas, we have the Pecan Lodge, which the Posse ranks among the top 10 in the state. And there’s Meshack’s in Garland, another excellent place.

Houston wasn’t the only disappointment. Our first stop was New Zion Missionary Baptist Church Barbecue in Huntsville.

The joint has received rave, almost reverential, reviews, but we thought we were served re-warmed meat from the day before.

“It was like a bubble burst,” said Posse member Phil Lamb, an attorney. “Boy, the romance is gone from that place.”

Tom Rossman enters Fargo's Pit BBQ, in their old location in Bryan.  (Photo ©Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse)       

A joint that didn’t disappoint was Fargo’s Pit BBQ in Bryan. The Posse thinks it’s one of the top two or three places in the state, right up there with Franklin BBQ in Austin.

Fargo’s is a takeout place, so, sitting on our own chairs on the sidewalk out front, we sampled brisket, ribs, chicken and sausage. Everything was good, a rare consistency that defines a great joint.

“Mmmmm, that’s good,” Rossman said, licking his fingers again. “It’s a good meal when you can finish like that.”

Yes, it was. We just wish we could say that about any joint in Houston.

Houston BBQ tour itinerary

FRIDAY June 1
8:30 a.m.: Leave Dallas
11 a.m.: New Zion Missionary Baptist Church Barbecue, 2601 Montgomery Road, Huntsville; 936-294-0884; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday-Saturday
1 p.m.: Fargo’s Pit BBQ, 720 N. Texas Ave., Bryan; 979-778-3662; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday
2:30 p.m.: Mallett Brothers Barbeque, 9339 Texas Highway 6, Navasota; 936-825-9440; 11 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday-Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday
7 p.m.: Pizzitola’s Bar-B-Cue, 1703 Shepherd Drive, Houston; 713-227-2283; 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday-Saturday
(Stay overnight in Houston)

SATURDAY June 2
10 a.m.: Galveston Beach for fishing and sun
11 a.m.: Leon’s World Finest In & Out Bar-B-Que, 5427 Broadway St., Galveston; 409-744-9363; 11 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday
1 p.m.: Gatlin’s BBQ, 1221 W. 19th St., Houston; 713-869-4227; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday
2:30 p.m.: Virgie’s Real Pit BBQ, 5535 Gessner Drive, Houston; 713-466-6525; 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Wednesday-Friday, 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Saturday
3:45 p.m.: Byron’s Gourmet Bar-B-Q, 2101 W. Little York, Houston; 713-290-0870; 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Monday, Wednesday-Saturday
4:15 p.m.: Leave for Dallas; arrive home at 8:15 p.m.

BBQ posse
The Texas BBQ Posse began in November 2009 when six friends took their first barbecue road trip to Central Texas.

Keep up with their travels:
Blog: texasbbqposse.com
Facebook: facebook.com/TexasBBQPosse
Twitter: @texasbbqposse

The Texas BBQ Posse sets up camp in the shade next to Fargo's Pit BBQ in Bryan on June 1, 2012, during the Posse's recent Gulf Coast BBQ Tour. Left to right, Chris Wilkins, Gary Jacobson, Phil Lamb, Tom Rossman and Jim Rossman.     

Unlocking at least one secret to what makes Fargo's Pit BBQ so good

Alan Caldwell, owner and pitmaster at Fargo's Pit BBQ in Bryan, has been very protective of the cooking secrets that help make his joint one of the top two or three in Texas.

In the past, he has refused to tell the Posse and BBQ Snob Daniel Vaughn the kind of pit he uses or the kind of wood he burns.

"You still refusing to show anyone your pit?" he was asked during our weekend barbecue tour that covered 700 miles and took us to the Texas Gulf Coast.

"That's my secret," he said. "Let's talk about something else."

After we had eaten and Caldwell came out from behind the counter to talk, he seemed to mellow a bit.

He said he cooks with a brick pit that he had built on site.

"I like it because it will just seal in that flavor," Caldwell said of his smoker.

And, without being specific, he said he uses a mixture of wood.

Before we drove to our next stop, we did sneak a look through a gap in his fence. Outside his smokehouse was a big stack of oak.

Was that for real? Or, just a prop to fool BBQ snoops like us?

Only Caldwell knows for sure.


Photos ©Jim Rossman, bottom, & Chris Wilkins/Texas BBQ Posse