Three local

fire, smoke, meat, veg

THREE BARBECUE JOINTS GENERATING HEAT IN LAKE HIGHLANDS

Story by ALEJANDRA PUENTE | Photography by KATHY TRAN

Kyle St. Clair, owner and CEO of neighborhood barbecue destination One90 Smoked Meats, practiced law before the call to the barbecue-restaurant business became irresistible.

“I felt like there was a ton of room in the market, and we knew how to cook good barbecue,” St. Clair says.

He and business partner Herman Guerra launched One90 with hopes of being “the barbecue place” for our neighborhood.

“We built it ourselves. We did all of our decor, burned everything, then opened it up, and as soon as we did, people started coming,” he says.

One90 has become known for its smoked brisket, St. Clair says.

It is the most requested item, especially after being featured on Food Network.

On the show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, Guy Fieri tried One90’s spicy brisket sandwich.

Customers can come by the store on Northwest Highway to pick up either frozen or ready-to-eat items — like the jalapeño-cheddar sausage being made as he explains its process (which involves adding ingredients one at a time and hand mixing).

Customers can also opt for shipping.

Before it arrives in store, all the meat is prepared at an East Dallas warehouse.

He takes a lot of pride in the warehouse and his five trusty smokers, because that is what gives his barbecue flavor, he says.

Each house specialty contains a hand touch, St. Clair says, making his offerings even more unique.

Phin Lean opened up his own Chinese barbecue

restaurant during the 1980s when the Asian population in Dallas started growing. Years later he and his brother coown it, and now the whole family works together to keep the restaurant a success.

Hiep Phong BBQ offers Chinese dishes, each handmade from carefully followed family recipes. Everything has a story and a place where it came from, the family members say.

“We are always making sure the customers leave happy. We always accommodate them. That’s what kept them coming back,” says Mea Nea, Lean’s sister in law, who also helps run the place.

For first-time guests, she recommends roast pork, because of the crispiness Hiep Phong strives to have.

“We work on getting our pork extra crispy and extra juicy. We make sure there’s enough flavor in each section of the pig,” Nea says.

A dish that makes their barbecue different from others in the world of Asian barbecue is the soy sauce duck.

“They (her husband and his brother) cook their soy sauce the traditional way and with traditional flavoring. It’s steamed like soy sauce usually is and they put a special spice that I haven’t seen anywhere else,” says Nea.

Focusing on customers is a priority of the restaurant. With their homemade meals, they have made themselves stand out.

The barbecue world is traditionally known for pork ribs. However, Back Country Barbecue also specializes in beef ribs, says Scott Collard, who has owned the eatery for six years.

He took the reins after 40 years of managing another barbecue place in Dallas. The beef ribs, he says, are a small way to improve the already successful local business.

“There’s two different styles of beef ribs. I do what they call the back rib, which is from the back of the cow and I get an extra meating so they’ve always got meat on them,” he says.

He has added chicken to the menu. While he recognizes chicken breast is a bit difficult to cook, he wants to please all customers, he says, and many of them wanted chicken.

“It’s all about customer service and putting out good food for the customers,” he says. His priority is the entire customer experience while in his restaurant, Collard says.

The Back Country Barbecue menu is close to the same way it was before Collard came in. He says he wanted to keep the traditional menu and tweak it as the company grows.

Collard recommends the menu’s “classic combo” for barbecue first timers, because that gives them a little of everything.

That’s “a three-meat combo of beef, sausage and pork ribs … I’ll suggest the beef ribs too,” he adds.

The neighborhood’s appreciation for Back Country Barbecue is evident in the various flags and trinkets throughout the dining room, which Collard says customers have given the restaurant.