When I think about childhood, I immediately remember mom’s home cooking. When I think of comfort food, I don’t think of meatloaf and fried chicken like many other Americans – I think about Taiwanese street food. One of my favorites is a savory, flavor packed pork dish that’s quite simple to make at home.

Back in the motherland you can get Taiwanese pork rice (魯肉飯 / 滷肉飯 / lu rou fan) in any street market and in many Taiwanese style restaurants. I haven’t found it here in Austin, Texas so I have to make my own using mom’s recipe.

The ingredients are fairly standard and with the exception of fried shallots, you can find them in any American style supermarket. The shallots can be picked up at any Chinese grocery store such as MT supermarket.

This recipe can probably feed 6 people… you don’t need much pork because it’s so full of flavor.

Ingredients:

• 1.25 lb ground pork
• 1 bunch green onion
• 1 yellow / white onion
• 4 tbsp fried onion / shallots
• 2 table spoon Kikkoman soy sauce
• 6 table spoon water to dilute soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon rice vinegar to make it sweeter

(you can add a little more soy sauce, this mix tends to come out on the slightly less salty side – but you will be reducing this liquid later so it gets salty)

Preparation:

• Mix soy / water / rice vinegar (taste should be slightly sweet and not overly salty)
• cook white onions until translucent
• add in pork – stir and cook til not pink
• add in fried shallots / fried onions
• add in soy / water / rice vinegar mix
• add in green onions (i think you can do this after simmering too)
• stir then simmer with the cover on for 10 mins (the longer the better)
• put on top of a bowl of rice and eat

This mix can be frozen pretty easily and microwaved. It also does well in the refrigerator for a few days. I think the secret is getting it perfect is getting the sauce right and the type of shallots you use. This dish is very inexpensive so it’s great for foodies on a budget – (in Taiwan you can get a bowl of this for about a dollar).

Have you tried out the recipe? Let us know in the comments!

Happy Tasting,
Peter

For a city of its size, Austin is an unlikely destination for Korean food. However, when you consider that Samsung, the largest Korean company and one of the leading electronics manufacturers in the world, has a huge factory here that’s staffed by many Korean nationals, it comes as no surprise that there are an abundance of Korean businesses in Austin.

Korean food in Austin is located mostly in the central part of town on Lamar Blvd, although some markets and restaurants are located up north closer to Samsung (which is located on East Parmer Lane near I-35). There are a few Korean fusion restaurants and mobile food trucks downtown, but for the really authentic stuff you have to look north of 51st Street.

Korean food is quite distinct, full of flavor, usually pretty healthy, and often red and spicy. In restaurants, most Korean entrees are served with numerous accompanying side dishes known as banchan (one of the reasons I like Korean food so much). Despite it being widely available, I feel that it’s one of the least understood Asian cuisines in America. The purpose of this guide is to introduce more Austinites to this wonderful ethnic genre and to talk about some of the best places to find Korean food in the capital of Texas.

If you are new to the cuisine, you might be interested in a few quick primers on Korean food:

1. Wikipedia Article on Korean Food
2. Korean Tourism Board Intro to Korean Food
3. 10 Korean Foods you Have to Try

Austin, Texas Korean Restaurant and Food Guide 2012

While this is by no means a complete list of Korean food in Austin, these are among the better establishments that I enjoy. I’ve divided the list up into a few different categories: Traditional Korean restaurants, Chinese-Korean restaurants, Japanese / Korean combo restaurants, Korean Fusion restaurants, and Korean supermarkets.

You can also browse this interactive map below to find a Korean restaurant near you:

View View the Austin, Texas Korean Food Guide locations in a full sized Google map

Traditional Korean Restaurants:

• Cho Sun Galbi – This restaurant, named after a dynasty of Korea, used to be an Outback Steakhouse near Highland Mall but is now one of the nicer (and more expensive) Korean restaurants in Austin. Like the name of the restaurant suggests, they serve up pretty good galbi (marinated cross-cut beef ribs) here and it can be added to almost any order for just 4-5 dollars. Another dish that is good here is Naengmyeon (cold noodles), which is good on a hot, Texas summer day. If you want to try bizarre foods here, you can eat the Agujjim (fish and bean sprouts in a spicy sauce that they usually serve with sea squirt here)
• Shilla – Also located next to Highland Mall, and named after an ancient Korean dynasty, Shilla is a relatively high quality Korean restaurant with slightly higher prices. Shilla is also a good place to eat Korean BBQ beacuse the meat is cooked full service, right at your table. Other dishes that are good here include their Gaeran Jim (steamed egg and tofu dish) and Pajeon (seafood scallion pancake). The restaurant is a little hard to find because it’s on the back side of a shopping complex near the corner of East Highland Mall Blvd and Middle Fiskville Road.
• Together Restaurant – This is a Korean restaurant frequented almost exclusively by Koreans (which means it passes the authenticity test but communication might be a little difficult as 1/4th of the menu is in Korean with cryptic English translations). At this hole in the wall you’ll always find Korean TV on in the background, Korean Hite beer and soju flowing on the tables, and good Korean bar style food at almost any hour of the day. My favorite things to order here are the deep fried chicken, grilled mackerel, or stir fried spicy chicken. Lunch specials are good and inexpensive. You can also order get exotic dishes such as stir fried silkworms here. The woman that runs Together is very nice and I enjoy the banchan side dishes here a lot. Together is open all day, and it gets crowded late when people come in to drink.
• Korea House – an Austin institution that’s known for good Korean food and decent, inexpensive sushi. Chances are that if you’ve had Korean food in Austin, you’ve been here. This might be a good restaurant to start at if you are a novice to Korean cuisine, because they have good service, but it’s not the best Korean place around (notice that few Koreans eat here). Dishes I like at Korea House include the pork bulgogi (spicy), beef bulgogi, and jjamppong (spicy seafood soup). The staff is very friendly here and this is a good place to eat before catching a movie at the Alamo Drafthouse next door.
• Misung 888 – Like Together, 888 is another restaurant frequented mostly by Koreans that opens late. This smallish restaurant at the intersection of Lamar and Anderson lane has authentic fare and is a popular drinking destination for Koreans. Perhaps the most interesting item on the menu is the Korean version of escargot, Golbangee Muchim, or snails in a spicy red sauce over rice noodles. Their gamjatang (spicy pork soup) is also decent, but again this place is mostly known as a drinking destination instead of being known for good food.
• Manna Korean Restaurant – this is a no frills, inexpensive self-service eatery attached to the Han Yang Korean market that serves fast-food style Korean. Here, you order your at the counter, get your own tea and soup while you wait, and 10 minutes later they will call you to pick up your food on a plastic tray. The tradeoff is that most dishes are $6 but they skimp out a little bit on the quantity of meat. Decent dishes here include tofu jjigae (spicy soup) and kimchi fried rice.

Japanese / Korean Combo Restaurants

• Odaku – A mostly Japanese restaurant that happens to serve good Korean food in North Austin on Parmer Lane. The soondubu tofu bowl is good here and the banchan (numerous Korean side dishes that come with the main course) are good as well. On the Japanese menu, their pork katsu is quite good and filling (and it comes with banchan).
• Osaka Mansun – Another Japanese restaurant that happens to serve good Korean food, and possibly some of the best sushi and sashimi in town. If you are going to eat sushi, it’s fun to sit at the bar and watch the experts do their thing. If they have it in stock, the uni (sea urchin) sushi here is always fresh and delicious. Our favorite Korean dish here is the Maeuntang (spicy fish soup), which is big enough for two people.

Chinese – Korean Restaurants

• Hunan North – A Chinese-Korean restaurant in an older strip mall that specializes in two Korean dishes – Jajangmyeon (noodles mixed with a black soybean paste) and jjamppong (spicy seafood noodle soup). My favorite is the Jjampong but if you can’t handle spicy food, you might want to skip. The other Chinese-Korean dish that’s pretty good is a sweet fried chicken dish called Kkanpunggi. All of the Korean / Chinese fusion dishes are on one page of the menu, the rest is completely Chinese. You can learn more about Chinese-Korean food on Wikipedia.

Korean Supermarkets – restaurants aren’t the only places to get Korean food. At supermarkets you can get excellent banchan (side dishes) such as kimchi, dried anchovies, and seasoned beansprouts. Also, there are many Korean snacks and drinks that are worth checking out.

• Hana World – the newest and largest Korean market in Austin. Located on West Parmer Lane about a mile from Samsung, this brand new market will host a small food court with 4 Asian restaurants. They have a wide selection of Asian produce, a large meat and seafood counter, and many snacks and drinks. They have opened a prepared foods section too and they make good, savory Kimbap (pickled radish and egg sushi roll). Also, this is a good place to buy thin sliced shabu shabu meats. Hana World is owned by the same family as New Oriental Market.
• Han Yang Market – Located on Lamar Blvd and Airport Blvd next to Austin Karaoke, this market is just a 1 minute drive from the New Oriental Market and is about the same size, but a little bit newer. They sell several kinds of banchan here as well in addition to prepared foods such as Tteokbokki (rice cakes and fish cake in red sauce) and Japchae (sweet potato noodles in sesame sauce).
• Mom’s Taste – A little known shop that sells hand made fresh banchan, like mom used to make. If you get a few different banchan they will last for a week if you eat them as side dishes and have another protein as a main dish. This is a cheap option for getting home style Korean food that you can eat at home. Good dishes here include Myulchi Bokum (stir fried spicy anchovies), kimchi, Jangjolim (soy sauce eggs) , Jokbal (sliced pig knickle with garlic and pepper) and Kkaennip (seasoned shiso \ perilla leaves).
• New Oriental Market – *** NOW CLOSED as of early 2012 – has moved to Hana World *** an older, medium sized market on Airport Blvd near Lamar Blvd. They used to have a great self service restaurant in the back (in my opinion better than Manna Restaurant at Han Yang Market) but that restaurant will soon move to Hana World on Parmer Lane. I used to like their Kalguksu (hand cut noodles in clear broth with veggies and seafood) – hopefully that dish appears when the restaurants at Hana World open.

Korean Fusion Food

• Koriente – A small restaurant in the middle of downtown that has been around forever. Despite the name, by no means is the most authentic restaurant in town but it does have some very healthy items and a lot of loyal customers. Rice and noodle bowls here are inexpensive and if you are downtown and are craving Asian food, this is a decent choice.
• Burger Tex UT – Another Austin institution that serves primarily American style burgers, but they do have a Korean Bulgogi (marinated beef strip) burger on the menu that earned the honor of one of the top 50 burgers in Texas from Texas Monthly Magazine.
• Chilantro – One of the original food trucks in the mobile food craze that took off in 2008-2009, Chilantro is a late night fan favorite. Stop by their truck after a night at the bars and you might have to wait in a long line for their Korean tacos, burritos, and kimchi fries. I’ve eaten their whole menu, and my favorite items are the beef bulgogi and tofu tacos. The pork taco is also good, but a bit spicy. Chilantro also serves a bulgogi burger like Burger Tex.
• Coreanos – Coreanos is another Mexican / Korean fusion truck in Austin known for their tacos, burritos, and fries covered in meat, spicy sauce, and cheese. There’s a bit of debate over which Korean food truck is the best in Austin, as both Coreanos and Chilantro consistently receive high marks on review sites.

There you have it, my own personal overview of Korean restaurants in the Austin, Texas area. If you want to see other food guides in the Austin area, go to the 2012 Austin Food Bloggers City Guide roundup.

Happy Tasting!
Peter

Because Austin is smack in the middle of Texas, there are many destinations nearby for day trips or overnight visits. There’s something for you within a 1-2 hour drive, whether an outdoor adventure or a relaxing evening sipping wine at a bed and breakfast.

In this Texas Hill Country edition of the Austin Food Bloggers 2012 City Guide, we’re going to explore hidden gems to the West of Austin in the Texas Hill Country.

View Texas Hill Country Hidden Gems near Austin, Texas in a full size Google map

Whether you are out in the Texas Hill Country to visit Hamilton Pool or Enchanted Rock or going to the Hill Country just for the food, make sure you stop by these great establishments in various cities near Austin:

Dripping Springs – Only 30 minutes away from Austin

• Creek Road Cafe – Excellent American food close to Austin in a cozy environment at an affordable price. The last time I was dining here, someone at the neighboring table exclaimed, “this is the best soup I’ve ever had.” At the same time, I was eating perhaps the best chicken salad sandwich that I’ve ever had. The Crab cake salad (which seems to be a popular dish in the Hill Country) is also excellent. (pictures from our trip there)
• Duchman Winery - a beautiful Tuscan style Vineyard with award winning wines and an Italian restaurant on premise run by the Mandola family. The Duchman Winery is was founded in 2004 and the huge, beautiful building it’s housed in still looks brand new.   Duchman is equally well suited as a place to stop by for a wine tasting and a cheese plate or host a wedding in their events center. (pictures from our trip there)

Fredericksburg – Bed and Breakfast and Winery Destination 1.5 hours from Austin

• Clear River Pecan Company – A red, retro 50′s diner in a somewhat hard to find spot in Main St. Fredericksburg with excellent homemade ice cream. All of the flavors are good, but the real standout flavor to me is the seasonal Lavender Ice Cream, which was made using the local Hill Country lavender. Other good flavors include Amaretto, Peach & Pecan and Dutch Chocolate. Clear River also serves decent sandwiches like muffalettas and rubens too, which makes this spot good for a quick lunch on a budget.
• Sunset Grill – Although this hidden gem is attached to a somewhat uncharming, older motel, you shouldn’t judge this book by it’s cover. Once you get past the exterior of the Sunset Grill you are greeted by a friendly staff, modern decor, posters that have a beach theme, and fresh local food with a refinement that you wouldn’t expect in a small town cafe. This is an excellent brunch spot for eggs Benedict, crab cakes, and surprisingly good calamari with chipotle aioli. (pictures from our trip there)
• Alamo Springs Cafe – This way off the beaten path hole in the wall has the honor of having the #3 best burger in all of Texas per Texas Monthly Magazine. The food lives up to the hype but this is not a place to go if you are on a diet – its for fans of Man v. Food (they even have a 6 burger in 30 minute challenge). Alamo Springs Cafe is known for decadent half pound burgers drowning in butter, gigantic deep fried onion rings, and an avocado wrapped in beef and cheese then deep fried. Oddly enough though you can order fancy imported beers and a roasted garlic appetizer with goat brie here too. One small quirk – I definitely recommend this place for lunch because – there are almost no street lights within 15 minutes of this place and cellphone data coverage is very spotty. I don’t think I would have found this place if not for OnStar turn by turn navigation, which connects via satellite and not the cellphone system. (pictures from our trip there)
• Fredericksburg Bewery – Excellent award winning beer brewed in the restaurant along with decent bar food. Most people come for mostly for the beer but the sausages, scotch eggs, and pecan pie are alright. Sometimes there is a wait to get in – if there is you can pass the time by taking a stroll around charming downtown Fredericksburg. My favorite brew here is the Enchanted Rock Red Ale.
• Becker Vineyards – One of the biggest and most respected wineries in the Hill Country. This place has a huge tasting room, a very extensive wine list, and a long bar served by very helpful bartenders. If you are only going to check out one winery in the Hill Country, this is the one to go to. If you do the tasting, seek out the nice French man named Henri with the cool mustache (and sometimes grapes on his head), as he’s extremely knowledgeable and heavy on the pours. Becker also sells sausage and cheeses in addition to wine so you can take a bottle out on the porch and enjoy a glass after you finish your tasting.

Sisterdale – 1.5 hours from Austin

• Sister Creek Vineyards – An out of the way winery about 25 miles from Fredericksburg with award winning wine, a self guided tour, cheap tastings, and very tasty muscat. The winery is located in a rustic, picturesque restored cotton gin. Worth the drive out there if you’ve never been for sure! (pictures from our trip there)

Marble Falls / Horseshoe Bay – About 1 hour from Austin

• Ginger and Spice – This far out of the way Thai restaurant is surprisingly excellent and the owners are super friendly. The green curry is really spicy and flavorful and the basil fried rice is delicious. Although I haven’t been there many times, I might go out on a limb and say this place is better than any Thai restaurant in Austin. Definitely worth a visit if you happen to be out in Marble Falls. I would go more often but it’s a bit far from Austin.
• Blue Bonnet Cafe – If you want some old fashioned southern cooking this is the place for you. The Bonnet Cafe is known for chicken fried steak, an always crowded restaurant, and especially for their 16 flavors of handmade pie. While other items on their menu are a bit hit and miss, some people drive a long way just to get the pie.
• Sweet Berry Farm – This family friendly destination makes for a great seasonal day trip to Marble Falls. In the spring this farm has berry picking, in the summer there is a corn maze, and in the fall there’s a pumpkin patch. They sell jams and foods made from their produce and kids can go on hayrides or visit the animals on the farm.

Well, that’s it! Have a great time in the Hill Country enjoying the sights, the food, and the wine. If you need any more ideas for day trips around Austin, there’s a great show called the Daytripper with Chet Gartner.

If you go out to the Hill Country and try one of these spots, let us know in the comments!

Happy Tasting,
Peter

Ever since I cut the cord on cable TV about a year ago, I’ve been enjoying Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Instant Watch for their wide selection of movies, TV shows, and more recently, their wealth of documentaries about food and the food industry.

As foodies, we tend to have a niche within the food world that we are drawn towards. Some foodies love pigging out on BBQ, some enjoy the finer foods in life, some are all about eating local, while other foodies are about vegetarian or gluten free living.

While we might know a lot about our particular area, I find it fascinating to learn about other foodies’ interests and deepen my knowledge on a particular food subject.

So here we go, 3 documentaries that I’ve watched recently worth sharing:

How Beer Saved the World

A light-hearted, yet very serious documentary about the history of beer and how humankind’s love of beer helped produce some of man’s greatest inventions such as writing, math, the wheel, modern medicine, and industrial factory production.

As fantastic as the claims are in the documentary, they are backed up by evidence from serious historians and scientists who have traced human history and the development of technology as they relate to the love of beer.

Available on DVD – Netflix – Vimeo

Dive! Living off America’s Waste

Have you ever eaten food out of a dumpster? This movie is about food waste in America through the personal experiences of one dumpster diver who lives off discarded food from high end grocery stores.

The documentary explores the dumpster diving culture, examines our food waste by the numbers, goes behind the scenes at American food banks and soup kitchens, and touches on the world hunger, food shortages, and the amount of foodstuff that goes into producing our American meat based diets.

Available on DVD – Netflix

Forks Over Knives

This documentary examines world health as related to the food we consume with a focus on cancer. This film presents a wealth of scientific evidence supporting plant based diets for health.

The documentary that highlights the work of and relationships between scientists from all over the world from the USA, China, India, the Philippines, and Hawaii who all came to the same conclusion. Also, “Forks over Knives” shares personal stories of the practitioners of healthy diets, one of whom is a firefighter in Austin, Texas who’s station is right down the street from my old condo!

Available on DVD – Hulu – Netflix

If you are looking to go vegetarian or vegan, then this documentary is for you. Even if you love meat, this one provides good motivation to eat healthier and reduce your animal protein intake.

This film’s website has links to recipes and blogs, including the Austin-based “Engine 2 Diet” blog.
Engine 2 Diet Blog Recipes
Forks Over Knives Links and Blogs

I hope you enjoy these movies as much as I did – you are certain to learn something by watching them and discover more about food around the world.

Please let us know what you think about the movies in the comments!

Happy Tasting,
Peter

As the non-cooking Tasting Bud, I put myself in a precarious situation when I inadvertently volunteered to supervise the craft services department for a feature film production.  We filmed for 21 days over the course of the hottest month of summer 2010, and each of those days, I fed and watered anywhere between 50 and 125 cast, crew, and extras.  Costco, both Austin locations, became my best friends, and I spent more than the GDP of a small country on ice and water.  Did I mention it was hot?

Over the course of the shoot, I learned what not to do when making, storing, and reheating homemade mac and cheese to feed 75.  I also learned you can’t go wrong with providing a constant supply of chewy granola bars, fruit snacks, and anything resembling candy to a hardworking cast and crew.  Final lesson: anything but breakfast tacos at 4am is an exceedingly bad idea.

The craft services official transport was my Mini Cooper, aka the Catering Van. After we wrapped each day, one of my fantastic PAs and I would play Tetris: organizing boxes of snacks, utensils, condiments, a giant coffee urn, 5-gallon water jugs, hand sanitizer, bug spray, and whatever random items were left by crafty at the end of the day.

I still have a box in my garage containing the following: retainer, box cutter, half pack menthol cigarettes, sunblock, baseball cap, corkscrew, bike tire pump, and gym shorts.*

At the end of the shoot, I left the film set with some pretty great memories, equally great friends, and the desire to never, ever again try to feed that many people.  Ever.

Check out our film, AUSTIN HIGH, this weekend at Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar:

http://do512.com/event/2011/12/17/austin-high

And cure your holiday hangover with a second hit on Dec. 27 at Alamo Drafthouse Ritz:

http://do512.com/event/2011/12/27/austin-high

* AUSTIN HIGH crew: if any of this sounds familiar, call me!

The Simpsons are cultural icons that have been a part of American and world pop culture for 20 years. During this time the show has featured played host to countless celebrities, politicians, and tentacled aliens and have parodied many cultural phenomenon in their 20+ year run.

With a show this popular, you know you’ve made it when the Simpsons make fun of you, and last week the Simpsons’s was all about poking fun at foodies! If you like food and haven’t seen the episode “The Food Wife” yet, you should watch this hilarious show about the food blog that Marge, Bart, and Lisa called “The 3 Mouthkateers”

The humor is dead on in the episode, and I thought to myself – some of these writers have to be big time foodies. This hunch was confirmed by this great interview with Simpsons executive producer Matt Selman, who is somewhat a foodie himself.

The episode is full of amazing quotes and one of the most hilarious parody songs I’ve ever heard that covers everything from food, celebrity chefs, to blogging and checking the page views, page views, page views…. (watch the credits and you’ll see what I’m talking about).

You have to watch this episode for yourself, which is available right now on Hulu for everybody for the next couple of weeks if you click on this link.

What was your favorite quote from the show? Mine has to be the one at 8:02 by snobby foodies about discovering Korean food before the Koreans or Bart’s review at 10:25 that says “An ostrich burger with buffalo mozzarella? It’s like a zoo exploded in my mouth!”

With the title of the “BBQ Capital of Texas”, you know that Lockhart, Texas’s brisket, sausage, and ribs are going to be special. But with 4 famous BBQ restaurants within a mile of each other, which one should you go to?

For us, the answer was all of them! This weekend, myself and 8 friends spent the greater part of a day discovering not only which Lockhart Bar-B-Que restaurant (Kruez Market, Smitty’s Market, Black’s, or Chisholm Trail) has the best grub, we broke the rankings down by meat type in each establishment and have a suggested itinerary for you if you want to make the same meat eating journey.

To figure out which restaurant we liked the best, I created a scorecard that asked everyone to rate the brisket and sausage in each restaurant on a scale of 1 to 10.

Before we get to the scoring and winners – I definitely recommend having at least 4 people in your group if you want to do the self guided Lockhart BBQ tour – that way you can turn the tasting into a social event and you can split both the cost of eating at every restaurant and pace yourself by sharing one portion among many people so your stomach doesn’t explode before the challenge is over. Walking between each restaurant isn’t a bad idea either to aide in digestion

I acknowledge that everyone has different tastes, so if you really care I included the makeup of our tasting group at the very end of this article.

Lockhart, Texas Brisket Comparison

Brisket is the king of Texas BBQ so we’ll spend most of this blog post talking about brisket!

The winner of our brisket challenge was described as “flavorful, tasty, moist, and fatty” by some and “amazingly marbled” and “fatty HEAVEN” by others on our tour. There were audible “WOWs” and “SO GOODs” heard around our table after the first bite, and most of us could tell just by looking at the winning meat (look at how juicy, tender, and marbled it looks) that we were in for a delicious treat. If you haven’t guessed it already based on the picture above – the winner of our Lockhart brisket challenege with their extra moist brisket is the legendary Kruez Market.

Because of our amazing experience at Kreuz, we all agreed that a good brisket should be nice and moist (look at the amount of juice leaking onto the paper in the picture above!), is best when hot, and should have a good meat to fat ratio – which our winner nailed on the head. Kreuz Market’s brisket also had a great, salty crust on the outside that added huge flavor, not unlike beefy bacon.

Coming in a very close 2nd place was Black’s BBQ brisket, which also gave us the “wow” sensation when we took our first bite. Black’s BBQ tasted amazing and had a similar great fat to meat ratio like Kruez, but the brisket we got was a bit crispier, more caramelized, and smokier on the outside and on the inside it was less moist (only a little bit of juice leaking on to the paper in the picture). The comments recorded from the tasters were “love it!”, “amazing”, and “very tasty, fatty, but not as fatty as Kreuz”.

The scores between Black’s and Kreuz were so close that it’s almost a matter of personal preference – The fat was cooked down a good deal in Black’s brisket so you get a more concentrated flavor inside. If you love burnt ends on a brisket Black’s would be the place for you, but there’s something to be said for the super juicy cut of meat we got at Kreuz. Another difference at Black’s is the fact that they make BBQ sauce (Kreuz has a no sauce policy). Everyone in our group liked Black’s sauce which I describe as a homemade, better tasting A1 sauce.

Surprisingly Smitty’s Market, which serves very similar brisket to Kreuz due to a family feud that resulted in two different BBQ joints serving up almost identical cuisine, did not deliver for us this time. Despite asking for the moistest brisket they had, our food was surprisingly dry. The brisket had great taste like Kreuz, but without the right meat-fat ratio, juiciness, or marbled texture of their rivals. We didn’t get the same WOW flavor explosion in our mouths when we took a first bite… more like a collective MEH. Maybe we went on a bad day or maybe the quality there has fallen off, but everyone in our group was disappointed especially after just eating at Kreuz.

Finally, Chisholm Trail’s brisket came in 4th place, but this isn’t really a bad thing. Their brisket was still quite good, but when going up against Black’s and Kreuz it gets overshadowed (big fish in a small pond). Their brisket is moist and flavorful (although some patches were a bit dry) but for some reason it doesn’t taste like Chisholm Trail puts the dedication, time and effort into producing their brisket that the other places do.

For those from Austin who are familiar with BBQ, I would put their brisket a notch above Rudy or the Salt Lick, Ruby’s, or County Line, but I think their meat is a bit on the salty side.

That said, the one very obvious thing Chisholm trail has going for it is extreme value! You can get a whole plate of meat plus 3 sides for about 6 bucks. Cold Lonestar beers in a bottle are only 80 cents each. I don’t even think you can get them for that price in the supermarket here in Austin! Of the 20 or so options for sides, we tried the fried okra, which was excellent and the black eyed peas were tasty as well. Chisholm trail also has a homemade sauce unlike some of the other places which tastes like a better, homemade Heinz 57 sauce.

Lockhart, Texas Sausage Comparison

We were obsessed with the brisket in Lockhart at each restaurant – while it tasted good, sadly I felt the sausage was merely complimentary or playing backup to the lead singer / rockstar that is brisket. There were far fewer audible “wows” from the group when eating sausage and this was reflected in lower overall scores, but the group did find a couple that it really liked.

Most of the eaters on our trip loved the Jalapeno cheese sausage from Kreuz Market which was described as “very good”, “mmm”, full of great “jalapeno flavor”, and the “perfect compliment to brisket”. Kreuz’s sausage was bursting with juice and moisture just like the brisket was, and perhaps for that reason, Kreuz Market’s sausage took the #1 spot on our tour of Lockhart BBQ restaurants.

2nd place went to the Jalapeno cheese sausage from Black’s BBQ which was described as “very good”, “spicy”, and hotter than the other Lockhart BBQ places. The general sentiment was that we were all pleasantly surprised that Black’s could deliver the goods, especially after having the good stuff from Kreutz. I personally liked the flavor of the sausage from Black’s a little better, but it definitely wasn’t as moist as Kreuz.

Again, we were universally disappointed by Smitty’s, which was described as “kinda bland”, “not flavorful”, and lacking in moisture and “crumbly” despite having a recipe that’s very similar to the one at Kreuz.

Sadly my personal favorite sausage of the tour at Chisholm Trail was not a hit among my friends. Their sausage has a thicker and tougher skin, but was very moist and bursting with flavor inside. My tasting buddies thought the flavor was too much like breakfast sausage and did not enjoy the thickness of the skin or the flaky / loose nature of the meat inside. Chisholm Trail BBQ’s sausage is flavored pretty heavily with pepper and was a tad on the salty side. I thought the Chisholm Trail sausage was very similar to what I got in Argentina on my last trip and one taster compared it to Scottish Haggis.

Personally, I wouldn’t go out of my way to drive to Lockhart just to get sausage (the brisket is the star) since we already have some decent options in Austin but the 5-6 people who loved Kreuz and Black’s jalapeno cheese sausage would probably disagree with me on this point.

Lockhart, Texas – Best Pork Ribs

While we didn’t officially score ribs on a 1 to 10 scale to judge the best pork ribs in Lockhart, we had a clear winner. The pork rib at Smitty’s topped our list and gained the following comments: “pork rib was the best”, “pork rib 8 of 10″, “best one I’ve ever had!”, “pork ribs were really good!”, and “awesome! juicy and sweet… delicious 9 out of 10″.

So, even without the official 1 to 10 score, you can be sure that it would have scored pretty high and it tasted great.

The ribs at Smitty’s, like our other meat favorites were moist on the inside yet caramelized enough on the outside to give an extra punch of flavor. The ribs were also well seasoned and not overly salty (like the ones at Chisholm Trail). Like all of the other great BBQ we had on our adventure, the ribs from Smitty’s elicited wows from the group.

I’m glad that Smitty’s took home the crown for at least one of the best meats in our tasting, because I went there 4-5 years ago and remember the brisket and sausage being much better then.

Lockhart, Texas – Recommended Tour and Conclusion

In conclusion, I definitely recommend grabbing some friends and heading to Lockhart for a day trip. Don’t eat breakfast and come hungry! You may have had Texas BBQ before, but Lockhart is pretty much the epicenter of “real” Texas BBQ so this is where the good stuff is – you are missing out if you have never been.

The town itself is worth seeing as they have a beautiful courthouse in the middle of town and the interiors of each restaurant scream small town Texas.

The whole tour took about 4 hours total but we walked from restaurant to restaurant to work off some calories and make extra space. Lines weren’t that bad for us because we showed up before the 12:15 rush at Chisholm trail and we went to the other restaurants a little off lunch hour peak.

Here are our rankings once again:

Brisket in Lockhart, Texas:
Kreuz Market – 1st
Black’s BBQ – a close 2nd
Smitty’s Market – 3rd
Chisholm Trail – 4th

Sausage in Lockhart, Texas:
Kreuz Market – 1st
Black’s BBQ – 2nd
Smitty’s Market – 3rd
Chisholm Trail – 4th

Pork Ribs in Lockhart, Texas:
Smitty’s – 1st

Definitely go to Lockhart for the brisket at Kreuz and Black’s and for the pork rib at Smitty’s. While the sausage is really good in Lockhart, I don’t think it blows away other places in Austin like the brisket does.

Eating Lockhart BBQ overall is an experience: Lockhard is a different kind of Texas than Austin and the food is better for the most part, especially the brisket. I would say the only place that can hang with Lockhart BBQ in Austin is Franklin BBQ, but there’s a crazy 2 hour line to get any food there. All of the brisket we ate in Lockhart is better than Rudy’s but several people said they like the Salt Lick sausage better than sausage in Lockhart (partly because of the Salt Lick sauce).

If you want to do your own tour of Lockhart, here’s my suggested route:

Suggested Tourist BBQ Tour of Lockhart

1. Come Hungry and pace yourself! Don’t try to eat everything.
2. Start @ Kreuz to get extra moist Brisket and jalapeno ceese sausage
3. Drive to Black’s to get their brisket (and sausage if you really want some).
4. Walk (to digest) over to Smitty’s to get their awesome pork ribs.

Optional:
If you want to celebrate the completion of your tour with a cheap beer or take some food home for the road, Chisholm Trail is the place to do that at the end. 12 oz Lonestar bottles were only 80 cents! Also, a to go plate with 3 sides & 3 meats (enough food for 1 person for lunch and dinner) is only $7.50

That wraps up our overview – For a more in depth look at the history of the BBQ joints in Lockhart, including a detailed overview of the Kreuz / Smitty’s family feud, check out the excellent Episode 203 of “The Daytripper with Chet Garner” in Lockhart, TX. Chet won’t pass judgement on the BBQ establishments in Lockhart, but we did that for him.

As always thanks for reading, leave your thoughts in the comments, and happy tasting
Peter

Additional Notes for Food Geeks:

*** Info about our tasting panel ***
Our group consisted of a diverse group of experienced BBQ eaters. For the most part we are all between 25-35, we had 6 males and 3 females, and we are long time Austin residents (almost all have lived here for more than 5 years) so we’ve eaten lots of BBQ in the past. We have diverse palates, as most of us have traveled extensively and we are originally from many different parts of the country and the world including Texas, Seattle, LA, Canada, Atlanta, and Korea. Our one outlier was a guy from San Francisco just in town for the weekend who thought “it all tastes good!”. Our friend from SF kept rating each restaurant a 10 until he found a better place later on our tour so he had to go back and re-rate his old scores a couple of times

The order that we ate in was first Chisholm Trail BBQ, then Kruez, Smitty’s, and finally Black’s BBQ last. Some in the group suggested that we might have been biased based on the order, especially when going from Kreuz to Smitty’s as they have almost the same recipes so we had a direct comparison. That said we all felt confident that the rankings would be the same no matter what order we went in.

The Liberty and Grackle ESK locations feature larger portions that likely require utensils, but the new Shangri-La location is all about the Bao, which are small, portable Asian Buns that are perfect for eating with your hands.

The menu(Link to Menu) at East Side King Shangri-La keeps it simple with only five $3 items. Each order includes a single bun that comes wrapped in paper (unlike the buns at other ESK locations, which come unwrapped and in pairs). The small portions and the low price make it easy to mix and match flavors.

All of the items are sausage based, so don’t expect anything like the Liberty location’s Poor Qui’s buns, which are chock full of pork belly meat. Each item has unique combinations of ingredients (kimchee with chicharrones anyone?) that work quite well with each other, keeping with the Asian food with a twist theme from the other ESK trailers.

We got invited to the soft opening event of the Shangri-La event where they were serving up their menu(Link to Menu) free of charge for friends of the trailer, so we tried one of everything! Below you’ll find a picture, a description, and some commentary on every item at East Side King Shangri-La location:

1) Gyu Bao – Beef chopped sausage topped with curry cabbage, tonkatsu sauce, kewpie mayo, potato crisps, green onion.

This is my favorite one, but I’m a sucker for Asian curries and kewpie mayo (try it with Fries some day). The potato crisps are similar to ruffles and they bring a great texture and saltiness to the Bao. The sausage is grilled and quite firm in consistency.

2) Bao Boy – pork chopped sausage with kimchee, bacon, Grilled pineapple, gochujang, karashi mayo, chicharrones, green onion

The Bao Boy is my second favorite dish. It too is seemingly all over the place, mixing Korean, mexican and Japanese flavors, but again the flavors work together in harmony. I really liked how the chicharrones added a crispiness to the bun. Also, my Korean companion stated that the kimchee was good, a big compliment!

3) Mr Chicken – Chicken chopped sausage topped with basil, mint, cilantro, onion, ESK sweet chili sauce, crispy shallots.

The 3rd item on the menu is also my third favorite dish. You might think this Bao is too sweet until you taste the shallots, which make this dish for me – so make sure to get some in each bite. The chicken sausage is quite tasty and firm.

4) Veggie Curry – Veggie Chopped sausage topped with curry cabbage, tonkatsu sauce, kewpie mayo, potato crisps, and green onion. This is a good option for vegetarians, but it’s not my thing. The Veggie Curry Bao is the same as the Gyu Bao except you replace the beef sausage with some form of veggie sausage, which as we all know just isn’t the same.

5) Spicy edamame – Togarashi spiced grilled whole soybeans in the shell

The edamame is really spicy, 4 on a scale of 5. Mysteriously enough though I kept going back for more even though I was on fire. This is great bar food – nice and salty to balance out alcohol.

If you are wondering about size, each bao is about the size of a small fist and you’ll probably need 2-3 to feel full. I would say try to get all of the ingredients in each bite so you can get the intended affect. I can say that the Bao go really well with alcohol, as I was drinking a Dale’s Pale Ale along with mine.

Overall everything was really tasty and there was plenty of seating in the Shangri-La outdoor patio. I have a feeling this place will become popular once it officially opens. I’m guessing that once they hit their stride, the food should also come out faster than the Liberty location (which has been packed since being featured on Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations).

If you couldn’t tell already, the newest iteration of ESK has my approval and at $3 per sandwich, the food is accessible to everyone. I’m excited to see what everyone else thinks – If you try the new ESK out leave us a comment with your opinions!

Happy Tasting!
Peter

Happy Cinco de Mayo! Let’s celebrate with sombreros, Mexican beers, and a first from the TastingBuds! Yes, we are entering the age of new media with 720p HD video!

The following post is a video review of a new product that I heard about on the Diggnation show. The guys on the show liked the Limebrero, a hybrid fruit juicer / funnel that fits a standard beer bottle, so I thought I would give it a try.

I chatted with the Limebrero guys on Twitter asking if I could do a review for our food blog, and a few days later they not only sent me a Limebrero for review, they also included another product called the Lime Funnel.

Did the Limebrero work as advertised? Is this gadget actually more convenient than the old fashioned way of squeezing a lime into your favorite Mexican beverage (Dos XX in this case)?

To find out, either watch the short 2 minute video review, or

The Verdict:
Overall the Limebrero worked as promised. I could envision myself busting it out every time I needed to squeeze lemon or lime juice into a Corona or Dos XX. Heck, you could probably even squeeze orange juice into a Blue Moon.

The Lime Funnel however, wasn’t a big hit with me. True, it was a little more convenient than the normal way of shoving a lime into a beer bottle, but my hands still got messy. I think the benefits were outweighed by the inconvenience of having to track another gadget.

So, Limebrero = YES. It’s worth the $5.95 and it’s a fun toy to play with (who doesn’t want their beer to wear a hat?). It will be a hit at parties and something to talk about.

The lime funnel though, pass.

For more information about the Limebrero and Lime Funnel, go to the official Limebrero site.

Happy tasting!
Peter