It's a nice hot December day and it feels damn good to be in Texas. Northeast of San Antonio is a quaint town called Cibolo. Not much to do there other than eat some BBQ and call it a day. That BBQ will most likely come form Harmon's. After walking inside Harmon's BBQ from the front, it looked like they know what they were doing. They got a dance hall in the back and butcher paper to serve your meat on. Unfortunately for us they were out of beef ribs and pork ribs. So Clay and I got chicken, sausage, sliced pork, and brisket. This is what was presented to us...
So beautiful it brought a tear to my eye.
Sausage was pretty decent, their chicken was moist, and I don't remember a bad thing about the pork. In my book sausage, chicken, and pork are side items and I don't eat BBQ for the sides. Eating BBQ for the sides is about as bad as putting ice in your scotch. They had BBQ sauce there for the women and hot sauce for the men. We sampled this BBQ sauce and it was nothing more than K.C. Masterpiece rebottled. I'm a big fan of hot sauce and I thought it was a good choice for them to choose Louisiana Hot Sauce. It is personally my favorite brand.
Now...the moment of truth. To the main course. In Texas, where cattle is king, it's the brisket that is the mark of a true pit-master.
When I order brisket I expect the "flat." The "point" is for the Yankees in Kansas City to cut up in little squares and serve them as desert that they affectionately call "burnt ends." Judging the moistness of a brisket by eating the point is like judging the moistness of a chicken by eating the dark meat. There is a big ass handicap there that is not taken into consideration. Having said all that, this is what was served to me as brisket.
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| more fat from the second piece of brisket |
After we pulled back the fat, the rest of it crumbled into little pieces like so...FYI this is a sign that it is overcooked. Let me clarify something. It's not that I don't eating the point. In fact I do like eating it. There is so much fat around the point that if you are going to serve it without trimming it a little, don't charge me by the pound for something I'm not going to eat.
You know what Harmon's reminds me of? Adam Everett. Adam Everett use to play shortstop for my beloved Houston Astros. Adam Everett had all the working parts and mechanics. He was one of the game's greatest defensive players. Unfortunately when it came time for him to step up to the plate, there wasn't a lot there (with the exception of 1 great season). Harmon's BBQ has everything right except the MOST IMPORTANT THING. They have great chicken and pork and I'm sure their sides are tasty as well. In baseball you don't get graded and paid based on your golden glove awards, it's what you do in the batters box. In Texas that batters box is The Brisket. Harmon's struck out on that at bat.It's hard to say that I'd give this place a second chance because they are located in the BBQ belt in Texas. There are so many places I have yet to try and so many places I'd love to come back to and try again. For the city of Cibolo I think they have a great BBQ spot for a town of its size (17k) . If they want brisket, San Antonio isn't too far away.
Harmon's BBQ will be receiving a generous score of 3.5 out of 5 stars.
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I've eaten at Harmons many times and found their food to be better than all but one barbeque restaurant in the San Antonio area. They blow Rudy's away in every category. Every out of town guest that I've taken there for dinner has commented that it was some of the best that they've ever eaten. As for them running out of brisket - that was a rare event. I've never gone in and found that to be the case but I'm sure there are times when business exceeds the norm and they just ran out. You might do yourself a favor and give them another try.
Not sure when you were there but they did catch fire and the main restaurant burned a couple years back. They were operating out of the end of the building for a while during which time the main restaurant was rebuilt. I did find a time or two when I went to the temporary restaurant things weren't as I had come to expect them to be. It was still good and all but not up to his normal standards. They've been back in the original restaurant for a while now and it's better than ever.
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