salt lick

–noun

1. a place to which animals go to lick naturally occurring salt deposits.

2. a block of salt or salt preparation provided, as in a pasture, for cattle, horses, etc.

3. a veritable, meat-lovers Mecca of heavenly BBQ goodness. 

Today, we’ll be focusing on item number three, Salt Lick BBQ in Driftwood, TX. Since 1967 this genuine pit BBQ hotspot outside of Austin has been serving up great meat to hill country locals and far ranging visitors alike. 

When it comes ordering time, there are a few ways to go. You can peruse the menu for the right Plate for you. Plates offer sausage, ribs, brisket, chicken, turkey, vegetables or combinations all served up with potato salad, cole slaw, beans, bread and pickles & onions (on request). Also available are sandwiches served with pickles & onions on request. 

However, for those who really brought their appetites …you can go Family Style. That’s Salt Lick-speak for All-You-Can-Eat. Heaping platters of beef, sausage, pork ribs are served up and refreshed as many times as necessary. Accompanying these platters of moist, tasty bbq are their traditional sides, potato salad, cole slaw, beans, bread and pickles & onions. 

The sausage is plump and juicy with a firm, slightly crisp skin and just the right amount of spice and a great smoky flavor brought on by the well-seasoned pit just inside the door (the sausage is great with the spicy bbq sauce). The pork ribs stopped just short of being great, but succeeded in being really good. They were moist, basted with the great sauce and fall off the bone tender. The brisket was prepared with a dry rub, cooked up on the pit and slow cooked until a nice, tasty crust developed on the outside. Meanwhile the slow cooking at the perfect temperature had turned the brisket into fork tender morsels perfect for pressing between a few slices of bread with pickles, onions and some of their regular or spicy bbq sauce. 

A busy Friday night saw my wife Julia and I making the trek down to Driftwood with a co-worker, Jay, and his girlfriend, Brandi. Parking was an event in and of itself. The police were on-hand (typical for a Salt Lick weekend night) to direct everyone out back to a dirt lot cordoned off into hundreds of spaces. 

There was a short wait for our table, and we were seated just as the sun was setting across the Central Texas hill country. Jay and I were prepared to do serious BBQ battle and went with the Family Style platters. Maybe it’s just a bit carnivorous of me, but I have a soft spot in my heart and a hard spot in my arteries for a big, heaping plate of perfectly cooked meat in three styles. Oh, the sides were good too. 

All in all, this trip to one of the handful of legendary Central Texas BBQ joints did not disappoint. I put away more BBQ than any person has a right to reasonably eat. Julia’s plate was loaded down with ribs, sausage and brisket and she muscled her way through, finishing off the whole thing. We even saved a bit of room (or really, groaned and pretended we had the extra room) to squeeze in some blackberry cobbler, topped with Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream (we split an order, of course). The cobbler, like everything else that night, was outstanding. 

Now, I can understand how those of you reading this from hundreds or thousands of miles away might not be willing to visit Texas just to have some BBQ (though, really you should). However, those few of you living in the Central Texas area who are a short drive away from Driftwood and the Salt Lick, but have never made the trip down there…shame on you. Fix that.