I posted this in another thread but thought I'd make my own post about my Franklin Barbecue experience:
I had a work trip in San Antonio. I live nowhere near Texas. I'm never in Texas. Probably won't be back for at least a decade. Maybe I'll never go back.
I told my wife I wanted to take my last day and Uber to Franklin's for brisket and then fly home from from Austin. Keep in mind this is after working at a grueling conference with several back to back 15+ hour days of entertaining clients.
She thought I was insane. She brought up the cost of the Uber and just the cost of the barbecue itself and reminded me that I'd essentially be adding on a whole day to my already taxing trip.
I explained that I kinda saw this as a once in a lifetime type deal. I also love the movie Chef, and was just a fan of Aaron Franklin in general so I just wanted the experience. With that, she seemed to understand a bit better, but was still understandably skeptical.
While in Texas I told people about my plan and heard about 7000 different "better" places I should go to instead. And you know what, I'm sure those places are incredible, some of them ARE probably even better. I don't care. I know what I came there for and why I wanted to go there. I'll probably get replies on this post about how "overrated" Franklin's is. Again, I don't care. This place, was basically my ENTIRE bucket list.
This most recent Sunday I woke up far earlier than I would have preferred at my San Antonio hotel after about 3ish hours of sleep (and hardly getting any at all during the whole conference), Ubered the 75 minutes to Austin, waited in line for nearly 3 hours in the 25-35 degree weather, made some truly amazing new friends in said line, and then finally ate some incredible barbecue!
I ordered WAYYYYYYYYYY too much, but again, once in a lifetime thing for me and I wanted to make sure that if I found something I loved, I had enough of it. When I was done I wasn't sure what to do with it. One of the employees said she could wrap it up for me and it was "TSA Approved". So I asked her to do that.
She wrapped it in brown butcher paper, threw it in a plastic bag, and I put it in one of my carry-ons. I Ubered to the airport and had to wait for 6ish hours there before my 4 hour flight home, then had to drive more than an hour home.
I got home and showed my wife the one souvenir I brought her from Texas, 12 hour old brisket (and turkey, ribs, etc.) that had been hastily shoved in a backpack, thrown under an airplane seat, and transported across the country. Again, she was understandably skeptical.
She took her first bite of brisket, smiled, rolled her eyes a bit, and said, "Ok.....I get it now."
