Larry Olmsted

Special for USA TODAY

The scene: Austin has long been one of epicenters of Texas-style barbecue, predominantly beef brisket, ribs and sausage smoked slowly at low temperatures for long periods of time. In recent years, hip Austin has also been at the forefront of the burgeoning food truck and trailer trend, with several parking lots turned into trailer-based outdoor food courts, maximizing space and taking advantage of the city’s warm year-round climate. la Barbecue combines these factors with a rich connection to Texas smoked meat history and a trailer that has been wildly popular for five years, though the owner is looking for a local brick and mortar restaurant and is adding another trailer-based location in Los Angeles shortly.

Situated in a small food trailer-filled parking lot in the East Cesar Chavez neighborhood on its main street of the same name, just east of Downtown and the convention center, la Barbecue feels like a secret, off the beaten track find, but is actually quite convenient for most Austin visitors. It consists of a serving trailer with two windows where you order and pick up, graciously covered with a shaded awning to protect against the sometimes brutal sun, a covered seating area of picnic tables, and a second trailer housing the enormous smoking pit. This offset style smoker was custom made from an empty 3,000-gallon propane tank cut lengthwise, and can literally cook a ton of meat at once. On weekends, la Barbecue has a long line and has been known to go through 60 whole briskest in a day. You can smell the meat cooking while you eat, as they smoke 15 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Reason to visit: Ribs, beef rib, brisket

The food: The "la" in la Barbecue doesn’t stand for Los Angeles or the Spanish word “the,” but rather the initials of owner and founder LeAnn Mueller, who is the daughter of the legendary Bobby Mueller, a James Beard Award winner who Texas Monthly called “perhaps the greatest pitmaster in Texas history.” Bobby long ran his father’s business, Louie Mueller Barbecue in Taylor, Texas, which was opened in 1949, has been named the state’s best barbecue spot by The Official Best Of, and is in the grand pantheon of the world’s smoked meat temples. All that is to say that LeAnn Mueller brings a lot of history to this trailer and honors her family’s rich culinary legacy.

For the most part la Barbecue succeeds by sticking to basic tradition without fuss and using the meats most commonly found at Texas-style joints, beef brisket, pork ribs and sausage, though there is also turkey, pulled pork (historically more deep south than the Lone Star State), and ginormous beef ribs, which while definitely a Texan thing, are not commonplace enough to be found on most menus in these parts. All meats are carved to order and sold butcher style by the pound (sausage is by the link) on trays covered with butcher paper, as is also Texas tradition. Sides are equally standard, nothing but chipotle slaw, pinto beans, and plain but rich potato salad. All are excellent, especially the beans and potato salad, which is a perfect cool, creamy accompaniment to the fatty and thoroughly spice rubbed meats. Another Texan tradition is serving everything dry, cooked with just a spice rub, with sauce (if any) on the side. In this case the sauce is a house made offering that is thin in consistency but with a lot of tomato flavor — more of a condiment that lets the meat shine through than a cover up like many commercial sauces, absolutely perfect for its purpose. It’s Texas, so of course, everything is served with plain old white bread on the side.

There are also the basic barbecue sandwiches in addition to the mainstay meats by the pound, most of which simply recombine things already on the menu. These range from the most basic sliced brisket or pulled pork with sauce to the oddball La Frito Loco, which combines the pulled pork and chopped brisket with slaw, black beans, jalapenos, cheese and Fritos, a nod to another less common Texan barbecue tradition, Frito pie. This is historically made by spooning chili or chopped meat over a ripped open bag of Frito corn chips. It’s a cool idea but the varied meats are so good, I’d save room to try a bigger variety of those and postpone the sandwiches for repeat visits.

Where la Barbecue goes modern and beyond standard fare is in its sourcing, using meats from ranches outside Austin that raise grass-fed animals drug free and without steroids, antibiotics or hormones, something very unusual in the barbecue world, though it is starting to gain traction. Any knock on grass-fed beef as being too lean is immediately refuted by the thick band of succulent, juicy fat running through the middle of each slice of near perfect brisket, its exterior covered in a nice “bark,” barbecue slang for the crust formed by the spice rub applied to the exterior of the meat. The brisket is the flag bearer here, though the pork ribs are very tasty as well, a touch more tender and too close to “falling off the bone,” a penalty in the world of competitive barbecue, but still solidly delicious. The sausage is also a standout, with a distinctly German or eastern European flavor, like really fresh tasting homemade kielbasa.

However, my personal favorite here are the beef ribs, something that is hard to find and even when you do, hard to find cooked really well. Some places that offer them use short ribs rather than the full on beef spareribs that are best suited for the dish. At la Barbecue, these are exceptional examples of the genre, with an even thicker bark than the brisket. A heavy dose of spice rub balances the fatty richness of the meat, which is smoked to absolute perfection, tender enough to tear huge strips of meat cleanly off the bone with no chewiness or gristle, but still meaty enough to take bites out of and leave teeth marks. They don’t make as many beef ribs as the other meats and often run out, but if they have them, they are a must try. If they don’t, you certainly won’t go hungry at one of Austin’s very best barbecue spots.

Pilgrimage-worthy?: Yes, Texas-style barbecue is the Lone Star State’s culinary superstar, and the must-try food when in Austin, and this is one of the top spots for it.

Rating: OMG! (Scale: Blah, OK, Mmmm, Yum!, OMG!)

Price: $-$$ ($ cheap, $$ moderate, $$$ expensive)

Details: 1906 East Caesar Chavez Street, Austin, Texas; 512-605-9696; labarbecue.com

Larry Olmsted has been writing about food and travel for more than 15 years. An avid eater and cook, he has attended cooking classes in Italy, judged a barbecue contest and once dined with Julia Child. Follow him on Twitter, @TravelFoodGuy, and if there's a unique American eatery you think he should visit, send him an e-mail at travel@usatoday.com. Some of the venues reviewed by this column provided complimentary services.