Posted on 04/15/2022 4:17:22 PM PDT by nickcarraway
While most joints proclaim there's just salt and pepper in their rubs, there is a key ingredient that even Aaron Franklin fesses up to using.
Texas barbecue’s reputation is built on beef, wood smoke, and salt-and-pepper seasoning. And while kosher salt and coarsely ground black pepper are the backbone of briskest at most joints in the state, there are often more ingredients added. Inside the prep rooms of several top-ranked pitmasters, there’s also commercially produced seasoned salt.
Last June, Jonny White released a video on his Jirby BBQ YouTube channel describing his method for brisket seasoning. He’s the pitmaster and co-owner of Goldee’s Barbecue in Fort Worth, which Texas Monthly recently named the best barbecue joint in Texas. He held up three containers: one with kosher salt, one with coarsely ground black pepper, and another filled with Lawry’s seasoned salt, which White called the “best secret ingredient in barbecue.” Holding the bottle high, he rained the fine powder onto the brisket, whose white fat cap went orange from the seasoning. He confirmed to me over the phone recently that Lawry’s goes on all the briskets at Goldee’s, and the pork ribs get “an insane amount of Lawry’s on them.”
In barbecue circles, it’s not much of a secret anymore. Tim Carman of the Washington Post recently released his updated list of the best barbecue in the D.C. area. He wrote that the brisket seasoning at Grubbing Hard Barbecue relied “on one of Texas’s worst-kept secrets: Lawry’s seasoned salt.” In a video for Chud’s BBQ from last year titled “Texas Pitmaster Reveals All Brisket Secrets,” Bradley Robinson touted the popularity of Lawry’s. “And because it’s seasoned salt,” he said, “they can still get away with saying ‘it’s just salt and pepper.’ Kinda sneaky.” Back in 2013, John Lewis, who owns Lewis Barbecue in Charleston, South Carolina, and was then the pitmaster at La Barbecue in Austin, shared his brisket rub recipe. It included Lawry’s, black pepper, and garlic powder over a slather of mustard and pickle juice.
The Lawry’s name and the stylized “L” in the logo are probably familiar to most people reading this, but you may associate it with your parents’ dusty spice drawer. The mixture was developed by Lawrence Frank and was first sold in stores in 1938. That same year, Frank and Walter Van de Kamp opened the first Lawry’s the Prime Rib restaurant, in Beverly Hills. Today the company has locations in Las Vegas and Dallas. The seasoning line is now owned by McCormick & Co., but the restaurants remain in the Frank family. Their specialty is prime rib seasoned with Lawry’s, which, according to the ingredients label, contains salt, sugar, paprika, turmeric, onion, cornstarch, garlic, sunflower oil, and other unnamed spices. I use Lawry’s often in my home kitchen and on steaks. I haven’t tried it much on smoked meats, but my guess it that its embrace by a new wave of Texas barbecue content creators will spread its popularity.
Pitmasters’ love for seasoned salt may not be much of a secret anymore, but the Lawry’s name is still whispered in discussions of the supposed secrets of the most famous barbecue joint in Texas. In my 2013 interview with Lewis, he hinted that he’d used it at Franklin Barbecue before his departure the year before. “I’ve never cooked a brisket in my life, whether it be at La Barbecue, at Franklin Barbecue, or on the competition circuit, with just salt and pepper,” Lewis told me. In 2011, Andrew Knowlton made a similar claim when he called Franklin the best barbecue joint in the country in Bon Appétit. “Franklin swears he uses only salt and pepper to season it,” Knowlton wrote. “Judging by the complex flavors of the finished product, I think he’s withholding a spice or two, but he promises it’s all about time and the temperature of the pits.”
Given all this renewed interest in Lawry’s, I asked Aaron Franklin if they used it at Franklin Barbecue. “We’ve totally used Lawry’s, and we kinda go back and forth,” Franklin said, adding that, “A place isn’t going to be doing the same thing forever.” What about right now? “We’ve been on the red stuff since we started making it with Fiesta,” he told me, referring to the BBQ Spice Rub bottled under the Franklin Barbecue label. It recently hit store shelves, alongside the Brisket Spice Rub (which is just salt and black pepper), and the staff has been using it at the restaurant since last July. The rub includes ingredients such as garlic, shiitake mushroom powder, chile peppers, and brown sugar.
Franklin’s admission was a surprise to me. He has been the salt-and-pepper poster boy since the restaurant opened. Franklin has used only salt and pepper to season briskets in his online videos and in his 2019 MasterClass course. I wondered why he didn’t mention the seasoned salt then. “I’m trying to get people to make clean fires, and all those other flavors get in the way,” he said. Franklin is more open to the idea of seasoned salt in his book, where he writes that nothing more than salt and pepper is required for good brisket, but adds, “That’s not to say that playing with seasoning salts, garlic powder, onion powder, or any of the hundreds of other spices and seasonings that are available at most grocery stores would be wrong. I’m just saying that you don’t have to have a complicated rub to make great barbecue.”
Like any barbecue joint, Franklin Barbecue is entitled to its secrets. Then again, I’m not sure how recently Franklin has been directly questioned about the seasonings at his restaurant. I’ve been guilty of a lack of curiosity in the past. I told Anthony Bourdain that Franklin “just uses salt and pepper,” when we filmed No Reservations at Franklin Barbecue in 2012. In my book The Prophets of Smoked Meat, published a year later, I wrote, with Franklin in mind, that “The best briskets I’ve eaten have a rub that consists of only two ingredients—salt and pepper.” And maybe it was that simple back then. Restaurants change their methods. Goldee’s recently switched from kosher salt to table salt, so that Jirby video is already outdated. “It’s easier to make it the saltiness you want,” White told me, referring to table salt.
Franklin and Goldee’s aren’t alone in their love for seasoning salt. I asked every pitmaster from the top ten barbecue joints on our most recent list for their seasonings. Here are their replies:
InterStellar BBQ Kosher salt, black pepper, and granulated garlic.
Truth Barbeque Mustard and pickle juice slather with kosher salt, black pepper, and garlic powder.
Burnt Bean Co. Kosher salt and two different black pepper grinds. Lawry’s goes into the potato salad.
LeRoy and Lewis Barbecue Diamond Crystal kosher salt and 16-mesh black pepper on the smoked brisket (which is served only on weekends).
Cattleack Barbeque Lawry’s is part of their brisket seasoning.
Evie Mae’s Pit Barbeque Kosher salt and black pepper is applied after a dunk in pickle juice.
Snow’s BBQ Table salt and 16-mesh black pepper
Panther City BBQ Lawry’s, kosher salt, and black pepper are three of the six ingredients in the brisket rub.
In total, four of our top ten joints use Lawry’s (or another seasoned salt), while two use only salt and pepper as their seasoning. Then again, from what we’ve learned, we may have to take their supposed transparency with a grain of seasoned salt.
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Thanks : )
*Native pecan meaning nut grown, not grafted.
Native persimmon also has its own special flavor.
“MSG is what Lawry’s is.”
indeed ... Lawry’s lists “NATURAL FLAVOR” as an ingredient, which is just a euphemism for glutamic acid, i.e., MSG:
https://www.google.com/search?Do+all+natural+flavors+have+MSG?
I’m pretty sure coopers is just meat
You use sauce u want later
Brasil and Nicaragua and Argentina
Three churrasco laden nations use at most a salt coating
Mariu in Leme Rio de janiero
Rodiziho São Paulo
El Churrasco in Cordoba
But best to me was Los Ranchos in Managua
Went there
Before Sandies
During Sandies
After Sandies
Through it all they remained ultímo
😂
I tapped into Lawery’s Sesoned Salt when raising my sons. Never looked elsewhere after and still use it today. Great using with fried potatoes and porkshops esepcially so.
1. Smoke 3-4 hours via a smoker and not over direct coals.
2. The coals should have water soaked oak or pecan laid on top.
3. Take out of the smoker and put in a deep large Roaster. It is still raw in the middle.
4. Take “Old Roy” BBQ sauce a whole lot and cut it in half with water. Pour it all over the brisket. Place in oven at 220 degrees until tender. About six hours. The Roaster should be covered and not open.
You will have a moist tender Brisket. It will have the smoked rind on it but not crusty. In the bottom of the roaster will be a rich gravy to pour over rice or potatoes etc. Drain the fat off. There will be a lot of it.
Serve it up with the choice of condiments that the eater wants.
It is easy but does take time.
My bottle of Lowry’s sits unused on my spice rack while my Johnny’s is always used for beef on my BBQ.
Coopers in Austin most certainly is salt crusted. I just had brisket there last week and the crust was heavy on the salt. It was great the new Congress Ave location is as good as the classic spot and you are then walking distance to some of the best night life in the nation if not the world. Franklin’s is good I find it hyped vs some of the other heavy weights of Central Texas BBQ. Snow’s blows it out of the water for sure Toosie is BBQ royalty. Blacks in Lockhart makes the cut if top five too.
Llano
I was there last October
I did not see salt on it...
Been there many times since early 70s when we had a deer lease on lake Buchanon at beaver creek hunting club part of the vast Goodrich ranch north of Burnet
But I could be wrong
And unlike 99,999999% here I’ll admit when I am
Factually wrong on occasion
Never been wrong yet on contentious issues
From opposing open borders zots (me) till now
Well I had to research it
Salt.....and pepper rub on the big chop and brisket
Salt and pepper and secret seasoning on the ribs
Sirloins .....usually nothing
T bones they sometimes have....prolly same
Sausages ditto
Cabrito ....didn’t say
Chicken not sure but looks like a rub on it
Best I could glean...many Texans poo poo it as too dry but being from wet or heavy dry rub tennessee I like it ....my kids love to go there ....
In the 70s it was beef ribs .....now they say they sell 90% pork ribs like everywhere else
Never had prime rib there
Their sides and accompaniments are wonderful meal by themselves
Cobblers rock too
And sweet tea perfection
I lived in Dallas as a boy
Brown sugar would not flow well out of the shaker. When used on the barbeque it would add something but I use it on most everything including eggs. Makes me think of my honemade BBQ sauce, have not made it in awhile. Ketchup, brown sugar, molasses, honey, and tomato salsa.
Honest to Almighty God, I thought it was just me with Lawrys on my BBQ. I had no idea. I'm somewhat shocked I actually am getting my BBQ right and it's a Texas thing.
Talk about luck!
Absolutely right. Rub it in and leave some on top too.
Ok, that's it. Weather's finally getting nice here. I'm going to re-read this entire thread and I'm making some BBQ.
Some of the suggestions on this thread are awesome, new to me and I'm going to try 'em all.
That isn’t what is in McCormick’s or even what’s in real Montreal Steak seasoning.
Yes but what makes it better to you? I dont have experience with either.
I didn’t know McCormick’s Montreal Steak seasoning wasn’t real.
From the article: “InterStellar BBQ Kosher salt, black pepper, and granulated garlic.”
From McCormick’s: Coarse salt (check), black pepper (check), granulated garlic (check) (plus a few spicy odds and ends)
So what is in real Montreal Steak seasoning?
McCormick’s = Coarse Salt, Spices (Including Black Pepper and Red Pepper), Garlic, Onion, Sunflower Oil, Natural Flavor and Extractives of Paprika.
Who knows what “natural flavors” are, and “extractives of paprika” sounds vaguely obscene. Regardless, the “natural flavors” are probably used to make up for coriander, cayanne, and ground dill seeds found in traditional Montreal Steak seasoning, in addition to the common ingredients of course. The “extractives of paprika” is almost certainly used to make up for paprika. I’m not sure what the sunflower oil is for. A preservative? Anti-clumping agent? Extra weight?
“McCormick’s = Coarse Salt, Spices (Including Black Pepper and Red Pepper), Garlic, Onion, Sunflower Oil, Natural Flavor and Extractives of Paprika.”
I’m getting lazy and just use McCormick’s Taco Seasoning on everything Beef, Chicken and Pork. Very similar set of ingredients.
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