When in Texas, do as the Texans do and eat BBQ

austin restaurants seem to love austin food bloggers. so much so, they occasionally invite them to dinner. it’s really awesome that we’ve now become them. that's how andy, logan, rachel and i ended up at the county line, a bbq joint with locations in texas, oklahoma and new mexico.


honestly, after our first visit with andy's family during our texas scouting mission, we probably wouldn't have given it another try. on that trip i'd opted out of the all-you-can-eat madness, choosing a couple of meats, a salad and macaroni and cheese without being impressed. after inquiring about the mac and cheese, i was encouraged by the waitress to try their 'homemade' version. it was a dish of runny cheese sauce and noodles more akin to the stuff out of the box. the brisket and ribs were passable, the salad was fresh and the bread was springy and good. not exactly high marks in the categories that bbq restaurants typically aim for.

when the nice folks at the county line invited us back, we went hoping for the best, and hoping this talk about a tub full of shiner bock was true. the set-up was awesome. we were hosted at the county line location ‘on the lake’. looked more like a river to me…the narrow body of water lined the courtyard that was dotted with tables.

they made our menu options easy by laying out a spread. there were turkey and pork sandwiches, potato salad, pulled pork enchilada-thingys, baked beans and pickles from which to make a plate.

the sandwiches were dry and sent me looking for the bbq sauce that I had surely missed on the buffet.

the salad was a tasty take on the standard recipe and the beans were firm and pretty good. the pulled pork wrapped in tortillas, topped with all the tex-mex fixins, drizzled with a house-made spicy tomato and jalapeno sauce were the stars. I’m not even sure if these are a regular menu item; they definitely should be.

andy is a huge vanilla ice cream fan (how funny and plain jane huh? cute.) and said this fresh made version was rather icy and unmemorable.

the rumors had been true, ice cold texas-brewed shiner bock made an appearance along with wines produced locally by Fall Creek Vineyards which had a really nice representative on hand and a cute tag line, “where the sky fell in love with the earth and gave birth to wine.”

The drinks proved to be a great accompaniment to the view and we loitered and lingered on into the evening.