The Big Smoke

Where there’s smoke, there’s barbecue in Central Texas. SHANE MITCHELL heads to the finest pits for breakfast tacos, Sunday barbacoa and a whole lot of brisket.

- Shane Mitchell

Tourists start lining up outside Franklin Barbecue in East Austin before dawn. The restaurant provides camp chairs for the wait, which can take up to half the day as a line stretches around the teal-and-white low-rise building. Some customers pack their own coolers. Others bring their dogs. Pitmaster Aaron Franklin has tapped into a universal craving for smoked meats, and his franchise includes cookbooks, a music festival, side hustles with other local chefs, a pending line of backyard barbecue pits and a television show (my favourite episode: Pickin’ Beef). He’s camera-ready and smokes a quality brisket.

But this first morning in Central Texas I’m searching for a breakfast taco, and I drive past Franklin on my way to a food truck deep in South Austin. On an unpaved roadside lot surrounded by auto-repair shops and hair salons, Valentina’s Tex Mex BBQ also has a line, but those standing in it are on their way to work, and concentrating on the menu-board rather than posting selfies. Owner Miguel Vidal named one of his pits Chino after the lead singer of alt-metal band Deftones. The firebox glows with resinous mesquite coals. A sign on the trailer reads “hecho con amor”. Another lauds the collaboration with a sixth-generation rancher.

The day’s special is a smoked-sausage machaca taco, but I’m here for The Real Deal Holyfield. (Based on a nickname for the heavyweight champ, it’s also slang for being legit.) Hand-rolled flour tortillas are layered with a fried egg, potatoes, beans, bacon, tomato-serrano salsa, and a choice of smoked brisket or pulled pork. Indecision can be dangerous on a barbecue line, so I ask for one of each. A guy wearing a “thin blue line” gimme cap sits down at the next table with a plate rib as big as a tomahawk and my eyes pop. He invites me over for a bite, and we trade notes about where to go for lunch.