Now, I know what you're thinking. What about to Chris' daily barbecue trip blogs? Is the trip still going on? Is Chris still wandering around somewhere in the West Texas desert, trying to find his way back to civilization? Or has he given in completely to his Texaphile proclivities and just moved to Austin permanently?
Well, to answer most of those questions — No, none of those have happened. I'm mostly just undisciplined, and prone to pick up and put down projects at random. But the good news is I have been dead set on finishing these journals because I do want to finish sharing about this trip, not only for all you incredible readers but for my own memories as well.
So, dear reader, I hope you will forgive the long delay. I hope you will understand I am, like everyone else on this little blue sphere, just doing the best I can and want to achieve some sort of closure on this journey!
For our Day 4, we visit LBJ's famed "Texas White House," and top by a legendary barbecue pit stop out in the wilds of the Texas Hill Country!
Day 4
Itinerary
LBJ Ranch
You didn't really think this trip would end without some more boring history stops did you? The more I have learned about President Lyndon B. Johnson, the more complicated my feelings have become about him. He was, on the one hand, very corrupt, having amassed massive influence mostly by being able to use money to help get political allies elected and keep them in power. On the other hand, he did take that power and influence in order to launch, and accomplish, one of the most ambitious presidencies since probably FDR.
But undergirded so much of his life is the fact that LBJ was born in a tiny little west Texas frontier town called Stonewall, into a family with an idyllic politician father. The family had risen and fallen with the fortunes of the harsh west Texas plains — which initially yielded frontiersmen willing to take the risk great fortune in the livestock they could raise and sell up north for incredibly inflated prices. Unfortunately, those rewards were short-lived as the cattle grazed the land bare, and the price of cattle fell sharply.
Thus, LBJ's worldview was shaped by a family who once knew great fortune, but now knew only great squalor. If you want to learn more about him (and the west Texas grass that played an enormous role in who LBJ would become) I highly recommend Robert Caro's "The Path to Power."
All of this to say, that's what brings us out to LBJ's birthplace, all the way out in Stonewall, Texas. If you ever want to understand what historians mean when they talk about the "frontier," just head west from Austin. Outside the city, rolling, gentle hills give way to the flat and fickle wilderness. You hit Johnson City (where the Johnsons would later move) and keep going until you get to Stonewall.
Here you'll find a church, a one room school house, and the vast, vast LBJ ranch that later became his "Texas White House." Whether it was an abiding sense of rootedness, or a matter of ego, Johnson insisted on spending about as much time at his ranch as he did in the White House. So much so that he had an airstrip constructed so that he, and other important visitors, could make the short flight from Austin to do business at his Texas White House.
If you plan to make the trip out here, there is a guided audio tour (download the National Parks app from your app store of choice) that will take you around the entire facility.
At the end of the tour is a small facility, where you can see the presidential plane LBJ would fly into Stonewall with from Austin. There is also a small museum as well.
Oh, and fun fact! LBJ made the ranch a working ranch, which it still is to this day! So we saw cows that are the same breed and lineage as the days when LBJ frequented the ranch.
Back in Johnson City, there is a park dedicated to his "boyhood home," as the Johnson's lived there for some years. I don't know that it's really worth stopping by. But it's here where we saw our first longhorn cows!
On the whole, I don't think the LBJ ranch ranks on my "Top 10 Must-Sees" on our trip. I came here because I have a National Parks Passport and am on a singular quest to gather as many National Park stamps as possible. It did give me an understanding of just how open and wild and vast the Texas frontier was then and still is today, so in that sense it helped me understand LBJ better as I work through his biography.
However, I wouldn't say I learned a great deal that I couldn't have learned at other sites, like his presidential library, and not have to make this long haul out into the country.
They did mention that the ranch is a killer stargazing spot. All the way out here, you definitely see why it would be. So if you do go, and you have much nicer weather than we did, make sure to make a plan that involves stargazing. I bet it's amazing!
Salt Lick BBQ
Luckily, LBJ's giant ranch is not the only thing that brings us out to the Texas hill country today. On the way back, we're hitting up perhaps the most iconic Central Texas BBQ joint — Salt Lick BBQ.
If you take a moment and imagine a roadside BBQ pit stop at the gateway between Austin and the rest of Texas, the image that comes to mind is probably quite similar to Salt Lick BBQ. Planted in the foothills of Driftwood, Texas, about 30 minutes outside of Austin, this place has been dishing up the best country BBQ since 1967.
At another time, I'm sure this really was THE pit stop. The place where ranchers and farmers hauling their goods into Austin would stop at midday to re-fuel for the rest of the trip. I don't know, maybe I'm romanticizing it, but it is crazy to think it wasn't that long ago that Texas really was the kind of frontier.
When we head to Salt Lick BBQ, it's a wicked cold and windy day, so there's not a ton of people here. But you can easily see Salt Lick is made to handle a crowd, with a small campus of pits, bars and plenty of dining room seating. In fact, I'm told they can seat 800 people at one time!
The best thing about Salt Lick is that they not only make great barbecue, but the place looks the part, too. Every guest that walks through the front door walks by the one giant pit where all the meat is finished at Salt Lick.
And this is old school barbecue. Mounds and mounds of meat over an open fire, just rendering fats and getting that delicious pit-fired finish.
According to the people at Salt Lick, they were inspired by old school wagon trains, where people would stop somewhere, set up a grate and start a fire. As they explain it, when the wind would kick up, they would build an earthen pit to shield from the wind.
To be clear, this is the last stop for the meat, and not where it spends most of its time cooking. I learned later that Salt Lick uses large vertical smokers to actually cook their meat most of the way. Then when it's time to serve, it gets thrown on the open pit and slathered with sauce all day until it makes its way to your plate. It does serve a very practical purpose for the cook, adding that signature flame-kissed flavor to all of the barbecue. And it makes for a great visual, too!
Something about the cold day really took it out of us so when it came time to eat, we really loaded up! We got the sausage, spare ribs, brisket and pulled pork. One thing to note about Salt Lick is that they are a strong believer that the sides that are supposed to go with barbecue are beans, cole slaw and potato salad. How strong you ask? Well, so strong that beans, cole slaw and potato salad are the ONLY sides you can get! I think the only way we got out of the potato salad is us literally telling them we weren't going to eat it. No matter how good it is, we are not potato salad people!
Overall impressions, this place lives up to its billing. The meat is cooked to perfection, in terms of the ideal barbecue. It's tender, moist, smokey and also has a nice bark.
Different from other places we've been so far, Salt Lick has a spicy and sweet profile. The profile for Central Texas barbecue, broadly speaking, is very savory. But here, it's more on the sweet/spicy side of things.
That's because at Salt Lick, they're Texas bbq joint that's actually doing Carolina-style barbecue. They season all the meat with salt, pepper and cayenne, where it gets that nice kick. The Carolina style comes in during the cook, where they use a mustard-based mop sauce to baste the meat throughout.
The sausage is probably the best I've had on this trip. I think I've said that more than once. But this is everything you want in a smoked sausage. It has a snappy casing and chocked with smokey flavor. When you take a bite, there's a nice juicy burst of flavor, meaning it's nicely rendered.
The ribs are perfectly cooked. When I take a bite, it's incredibly tender but still leaves a bite mark behind. That's a good sign! We typically thing of tender ribs as "fall-off-the-bone." Ribs cooked like that are fine and completely tender and delicious. But when it just falls off the bone like that, it makes it kinda hard to eat! In my opinion, the best cooked ribs are cooked right up to the point just before they start to fall off the bone.
Their brisket is delicious. For my part, I'd say it is the third best brisket I've had on this trip — which is saying a lot! The top two briskets were simply incredible and this is right up there with them. It is also cooked to perfection. I think what differentiates Salt Lick's brisket from the others I've had is the flavor profile. Hear me say that it is delicious and tasty and very good. When it comes to brisket, this gets third place designation because I just prefer a more traditional salt and pepper rub, and Salt Lick's has those spicy/sweet elements.
Just to round things out, we decide to get the pulled pork. It was smokey and a little crispy on the edges, which is a nice added texture. So much of barbecue can end up being so tender that it's just soft and stringy. This gives something nice to bite into. For our meal, it is maybe a little dry to my taste, but that could just be this particular serving and not the norm.
Conclusion
That wraps up day 4! After a chilly day in the harsh Hill Country, Salt Lick BBQ was just the kind of place we needed to rejuvenate our bone-tired bodies. Even as someone who loves presidential history, I don't know that a visit to LBJ birth place and ranch is worth the trip — unless of course, you're going there for your own National Parks Passport stamp! Salt Lick BBQ, on the other hand, is well worth the trip to Driftwood! If you want to really feel like you're stepping into another time — when the wagon trains would circle their wagons, fire up a pit and smoke up a feast — or if you just like really delicious barbecue, you need to go to Salt Lick.
Tomorrow, we head into our last day in Austin, when we finally get the breakfast tacos we've been searching for and we head to a barbecue joint that I wasn't so sure about at first, but get a pleasant surprise.
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