Long Awaited Mouth-Watering Texas Monthly List Of '50 Best BBQ Joints' Out Now

AUSTIN, TX — It's official: Franklin Barbecue—outside of which customers stand in line for hours at a time each weekend to sink their teeth into the marvelously mouth-watering meats within—is one of the state's "50 Best BBQ Joints" in Texas. But, at the risk of sounding blasphemous, it's not the best in the Lone Star State.

Released on Monday, the rankings are in the June issue of Texas Monthly, the venerable state magazine chronicling life in the state. While "best of" lists are ultimately subjective affairs, these rankings emerge from exhaustive research from a crack magazine team of researchers helmed by the state's only full-time barbecue editor in the magazine industry, Daniel Vaughn.

So we'll just go ahead and call this definitive. The list is so exhaustively researched, it only emerges every four years. God only knows how much meat was consumed, how many antacid dosages were ingested or how many miles traveled to achieve this list. So, again, we'll just call it definitive and leave it to you, the reader, to make of it what you will.

With that said, here are the top 10 best BBQ in Texas, with the city of its location, according to the magazine:

1. Snow’s BBQ, Lexington

2. Franklin Barbecue, Austin
3. Cattleack Barbeque, Dallas
4. Bodacious Bar-B-Q, Longview
5. Louie Mueller Barbecue, Taylor
6. Tejas Chocolate Craftory, Tomball
7. CorkScrew BBQ, Spring
8. Micklethwait Craft Meats, Austin
9. Evie Mae’s Pit Barbeque, Wolfforth
10. Truth Barbeque, Brenham

Read more about the findings at TexasMonthly.com or wait until the June issue of the magazine hits newsstands. To achieve the rankings, the intrepid barbecue news crew of some two dozen staffers spent months eating their way across Texas to rank quality ‘cue from nice restaurants to food trucks, magazine officials noted. The magazine has used the rankings to cross-promote with an Austin-based maker of ice coolers and its own online store, according to the magazine.

And to celebrate “The 50 Best BBQ Joints” issue, Texas Monthly has released a limited number of early-bird tickets to the Texas Monthly BBQ Fest weekend. Hosted in Austin for the eighth consecutive year, this year’s festival rolls out a two-day line-up. Programming begins on Saturday, Nov. 4, with the Texas Monthly’s Brisket Brunch and a new educational event entitled Texas Monthly ‘Cue Course.

The festival itself will be staged on Sunday, Nov. 5, at the Long Center for the Performing Arts. The Early-Bird Ticket Sale will give barbecue lovers three days to purchase tickets at TexasMonthly.com/tmbbqfest. This sale kicks off at 10 a.m. on Monday, May 22, and ends Wednesday, May 24, at 10 p.m. General sales for the Texas Monthly BBQ Fest Weekend go on sale at 10 a.m. on Thursday, August 10th.

"This year’s list marks the fifth edition of the magazine’s “50 Best” rankings," magazine officials said. "Not only is the list an indispensable practical guide, it also chronicles Texas’s changing ‘cue scene. Barbecue is more urban than ever, and the joints are younger than ever, as a new generation of entrepreneurs joins the time-honored masters of the craft."

Vaughn adds that this year's list illustrates the growing number of venues for world-class barbecue.

"Previously we singled out four or five places as the best of the best," Vaughn said. "This year we made it a top ten—and half of those weren’t even in existence when we did the last list.”

In recent years, the state staple has gained respectability in the broader culinary arena, magazine officials noted. Texas barbecue has also gained status nationally. In 2015, Austin’s Aaron Franklin, the owner of Franklin Barbecue, was named Best Chef in the Southwest region at the annual James Beard Foundation Awards.

Texas Monthly food editor Patricia Sharpe suggested the prestigious honor demonstrates that barbecue making is a high culinary art: “The award shows that Texas-style smoked meats can attain the highest quality. Franklin is not just a pit master; he is a chef.”

Were this an Olympics event, Austin would waddle away with the gold medal. The city garnered seven BBQ joints among the top 50, more than any other city in Texas. In addition to 2nd-ranked Franklin Barbecue, half-a-dozen joints made the list: Freedmen’s; La Barbecue; Micklethwait Craft Meats; Stiles Switch BBQ & Brew; Terry Black's Barbecue; and Valentina’s Tex Mex BBQ.

Houston made a respectable showing, with four in the Top 50: Gatlin’s BBQ; Pinkerton’s Barbecue; The Pit Room; and Roegels Barbecue Co. Dallas earned three mention in the 50-best list, recognized for Cattleack Barbeque, Lockhart Smokehouse and Pecan Lodge. San Antonio had a pair of entries among the top 50, with 2M Smokehouse and The Granary ’Cue & Brew landing on the coveted list.

Smaller cities with one entry apiece managed to get on the list: Stillwater Barbeque, Abilene; Tyler’s Barbeque

Amarillo; Miller's Smokehouse, Belton; Truth Barbeque, Brenham; Vera’s Backyard B-B-Que, Brownsville; Fargo’s Pit BBQ, Bryan; Payne’s Bar-B-Q Shak, Burnet; BBQ on the Brazos, Cresson; Top 5 BBQ, DeSoto; 4-T’s Bar-B-Q, Forney; Heim Barbecue, Fort Worth; Baker Boys BBQ, Gonzales; Rio Grande Grill BBQ & Tex Mex, Harlingen; Blue Moon BBQ, Hearne; Heavy's Bar-B-Que, Hondo; Joseph’s Riverport Bar-B-Cue, Jefferson; Snow’s BBQ, Lexington; Cooper’s Old Time Pit Bar-B-Que, Llano; Kreuz Market, Lockhart; Bodacious Bar-B-Q, Longview; City Market, Luling; Smolik’s Smokehouse, Mathis; Hutchins BBQ, McKinney; The Smoking Oak, Mercedes; Killen's Barbecue, Pearland; Pody’s BBQ, Pecos; Hays Co. Bar-B-Que, San Marcos; CorkScrew BBQ, Spring; Louie Mueller Barbecue, Taylor; Tejas Chocolate Craftory, Tomball; Stanley’s Famous Pit BBQ, Tyler; Harris Bar-B-Que, Waxahachie; Flores Barbecue, Whitney; an and Evie Mae’s Pit Barbeque, Wolfforth.

>>> Just a photo of a Franklin Barbecue plate is enough to open the waterworks, making you cry tears of joy down your cheeks while reflexively salivating toward your chin area just at the mere sight of this slow-cooked wonder of the modern world. Photo: Franklin Barbecue/Facebook