Brisket For Days

6 best barbecue bites from TMBBQ Fest 2015

The Texas Monthly BBQ Festival is the rare food event that's too much of a good thing. This concept may seem ridiculous to a barbecue fan that has never attended. With nearly half of the revered TM Top 50 barbecue joints in attendance, the diner's problem is a simple one: There is only so much meat a human can take down in a single setting.

As veterans of the festival, our group has learned to share a single serving per restaurant for two guests, yet it didn't even get us close to tasting the entirety of the restaurants (and four dessert stations) on offer Sunday at the fest. While we made it to a mere 18 of the 28 stations, the food was done with the same care shown at the pitmaster's regular locations. Our only regret is that we couldn't divide the indulgence between two weekends. Here are the highlights from an over-the-top day.

Lockhart Smokehouse
Bone-in prime rib. We could leave it at that, but the post-oak flavor in these thin slices of meat was something we'd never experienced. The Dallas restaurant is co-owned by Jill Bergus of the famed Lockhart-Schmidt family, so the 'cue here is done with care. This is a highlight at the restaurant. When in Dallas, make a point to try some.

Pecan Lodge
Sometimes simple is best. When arriving at the Pecan Lodge booth, there was one simple question: "Lean, moist, or both?" We opted, of course, for both. As with Killen's, Pecan's brisket had the ideal bark texture. The moist brisket meant business — this was a messy eating experience. The lean brisket outshone most moist cuts, with an expertly trimmed and rendered fat cap giving each bite an extra dose of richness and flavor. When walking by the Pecan Lodge booth later in the day, we saw the crew giving a young boy a tutorial on slicing brisket. We can only hope Pecan Lodge will train as many folks as possible to make this food.

Killen's Barbecue
Ronnie Killen now seems to be running the Houston barbecue game. A pop-up at Foreign and Domestic earlier this year brought out big crowds, and it's not difficult to see why. If one can call a slice of brisket precise, we will. A peppery bark led to a perfectly smoked moist brisket with a melted texture, nicely rendered fat, and smoky flavor that led you back for more. There was also pork belly on offer, but we couldn't divert our attention from the brisket.

Stiles Switch BBQ
If Sunday was any indication, the crew at North Austin's Stiles Switch has found a new level. Stiles' jalapeño cheddar sausage (one of three on offer) was aggressively spicy, with the gooey cheddar softening the blow. The smoked beef rib had an excellent salty, fatty grip and was our favorite rib bite of the day. A fried boudin ball sealed the deal for us: We need to stop in to Stiles again soon. The restaurant brought its full pit crew Sunday, and the ambition and hard work were evident in the results.

La Barbecue
John Lewis and Esaul Ramos continue to vie with Franklin for the best barbecue offerings in Austin. On Sunday, they brought a bit of everything to the table. Our serving boat held a platter of lean brisket that somehow built flavor as you went from bite to bite, along with moist pulled pork and welcomed palate-cleansing condiments of pickled onions and a roasted green chili sauce. The classic La Barbecue sausage was there, too, and with its usual level of greatness. The pork casing had great snap, and the peppery flavor profile was singing.

Freedmen's
The quietly awesome West Campus restaurant's two sausage offerings showed why Evan Leroy was picked as a "featured newcomer" by Daniel Vaughn this year. Leroy's King Ranch sausage was made with chicken, beer, cheddar, and tortilla chip crumbles. He also riffed on the Elgin "hot gut" style of beef sausage to great effect: His version had great pepper spice.

The Pecan Lodge folks were educating eaters on the proper way to slice brisket.

Photo courtesy of Pecan Lodge

The Pecan Lodge folks were educating eaters on the proper way to slice brisket.

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Market News

Small specialty grocer in Celina is a go-to for imported foods

Di Mantzios Greek & Italian Gourmet Market

There's a gourmet shop in downtown Celina offering imported European foods: Called Di Mantzio’s Greek and Italian Gourmet Market, it's a small grocery and cafe at 204 E. Pecan St., Ste. C, where it's bringing in goods you might not find elsewhere in town.

Owner Vasilios Mantzios is a native of Greece and former NATO military serviceman who moved to the U.S. in 2008. Missing the foods he'd enjoyed in Greece and Italy, he started a booth at the Frisco Fresh Market in 2015 selling olive oils, Balsamic dressing, olives, and Mediterranean salt. In late 2024, he made the move to open the storefront in Celina (coincidentally down Pecan Street from Mangiamo Italian Market & Deli, another highly personal deli and market, making pecan Street a fun destination for a foodie field trip).

Di Mantzio's carries olive oils, pizza, cheese, charcuterie boards, flour, refrigerated meals, and meatballs with a Greek red sauce, made from a family recipe from Mantzios' aunts and their grandmothers. He also imports marinated lamb and beef meatballs from Greece.

"I only have things that I would put on my table to personally eat — I pick out my items by the quality because I don't want people to have issues with the food," Mantzios says. "I have my mother test everything, so if you pass her, you're in the store."

While he does offer Greek foods such as a recent special with beef kebabs and pita bread, there's a big demand for Italian items. He has a big selection of cheese: parmigiano reggiano, feta, mozzarella, and cheese from Il Forteto. Dry goods include Molino Paolo Mariani Manitaly flour, Caputo gluten-free flour, and Hellenic Farms and Lia extra virgin olive oil.

Mantzios prioritizes small, family-owned businesses because they enjoy what they're providing to customers and value quality.

Di Mantzios Greek & Italian Gourmet MarketDi Mantzios

On the prepared food front, he does pizza using a wood-fired crust imported from Pizza Food Love in Italy, delivered to the shop every three weeks. The base can be topped with ingredients from Tuscany, Italy for a truly authentic experience. More prepared foods are one of the biggest requests he gets from customers, and it's a category he's continuing to expand, as well as adding wine and beer.

They also have cakes and desserts such as cannoli, baklava, Greek rice pudding, French macarons, and gelato from Gelatys.

The interior is neatly organized, with refrigerated foods as well as Greek and European decor such as pestle and mortar, a gladiator helmet, and Greek and Italian flags pinned to the walls.

Mantzios thrives from the personal contact he gets with customers, and they find him equally charming as well.

"The bulk of my customers come from Prosper and Celina, and Celina is the number one growing city with people coming from all around who can appreciate what we are doing," Mantzios says.

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