Kreuz Market and Smitty's Market in Lockhart, Texas
We're in Texas, so you *knew* there was going to be a barbecue post, right? Well this is it.
We did a lunch run out to Lockhart Texas, a small town about 40 minutes South of Austin which is one of the hubs of Central Texas barbecue.
First up was Kreuz Market. The aroma in the parking lot hit us as soon as we got of the car - lovely, savory, smoky goodness.
The meat (other than the sausages) is sold by the pound. You don't need to order a full pound, though, so you can try a variety. Since there were only two of us and we were going to eat lunch at two BBQ joints in one day, we tried to keep our portions reasonable and didn't get to try it all.
We ordered a quarter pound of brisket, a hot sausage and a pork chop (no sides - we only had stomach room for the main event). They toss it on butcher paper with some slices of white bread and plastic knives (see the "no forks" rule in the picture above).
The sausage was very good, and the pork chop had a great smoky flavor. It's hard to see in the photo, but the pork chop had a nice pink tinge to it above the smoke ring.
The standout, though, was the brisket. Fantastic! I've never tasted brisket even close to that good. Amazing meaty taste, and the fat melted in your mouth (check the picture at the top of the post for a close-up of the fat on the Kreuz brisket).
Here's a shot of the barbecue pits at Kreuz:
And the woodpile outside that keeps them running:
Ready for more, we drove down the road a few blocks to Smitty's Market.
Smitty's is a smaller, more cosy place than Kreuz.
This time we ordered brisket and sausage.
I thought that the sausage was not as good as Kreuz - less flavor and a more soft texture. As for the the brisket? No contest - it wasn't in the same league as the slices we had at Kruez. Nowhere near the same intense, smoky flavor.
I'm guessing that there are potentially a lot of factors at work here - what piece of meat you get, what part of the piece of meat you get, what kind of day the guy manning the pits is having, etc. At Kreuz, we got slices off of the small end of a piece of meat that had just come out of the pit, so I'd be surprised if that didn't have at least something to do with it. I wish we had the luxury of being able to come back regularly to research more...
Overall, a truly delicious and enjoyable experience.
Kreuz Market
619 N. Colorado St.
Lockhart, TX
(512) 398-2361
Smitty's Market
208 South Commerce
Lockhart, TX
(512) 398-9344
6 comments:
Awesome Mike! I've been told that Lockhart is the "Capitol of Texas BBQ". Isn't there some kind of family feud story behind Smitty's and Kreuz?
Yeah - I'm not sure what the details are, but it seems that something happened in 1999. That's when Smitty's started at the original Kreuz location, and Kreuz moved to their new location.
From this month's Texas Magazine's article on BBQ:
"Smitty’s began around 1900 as Kreuz Market, a German butcher shop that sold fresh meat during the week and smoked whatever was left over on the weekend. The Kreuz name endured even after Edgar “Smitty” Schmidt bought the business, in 1948. It was still in use in 1999, when a dust-up among the late Edgar’s three children caused his son Rick to take the Kreuz name to a new building down the road. Fortunately, daughter Nina Schmidt Sells and her son, John Fullilove, kept the fires burning and reopened under the current name."
Thanks for the additional info, chascates.
I live about 30 min from here, and the story as I heard it was that when the dad died he left the building to one kid, and the actual business to another... so they would have to work together. Well, there were disagreements on how/what/when to serve, so the owner of the building drove up the rent until the owner of the business was forced to move. Supposedly they still don't talk, and people in the town totally took sides and will refuse to patronize the competing business!
I WENT TO BOTH PLACES NOVEMBER 2008 WITH MY STEP DADWHO IS 78.....HE WENT TO SMITTYS AS A KID.....WE HAD A SAUSAGE AND BRISKET AT BOTH PLACES.BOTH WERE FANTASTIC...............I PREFERED SMITTYS SAUSAGE..THAT PARTICULAR DAY.........LOVED THE TORTILLAS AT KREUZ"S
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