Abilene – Jay Stearns is a man of Irish decent in Abilene and his proverbial pot of gold can be found in his BBQ pits. The owner of Jay’s BBQ Shack, Jay loves being able to feed a crowd of eager customers daily. “My favorite part every day is opening that window and seeing the line of people ready to eat food that I made,” said Jay. “That’s a pretty good feeling.”
Jay was born and raised on the Friendly Frontier, where he graduated from Cooper High School in 1992. “Schools were great. Sports were great. Great friends, great people, great church. I liked it,” said Jay. “Typical Abilene lifestyle.”
After graduating college, Jay worked for Dell in Round Rock as a computer technician for 10 years before returning to Abilene, initially to work in the oil field. Finally, he got himself into the barbeque business, first by building offset smokers with his welding skills. “I started building these smokers and cooking on them, and over time I realized I like cooking better than welding,” said Jay. “So it kind of transitioned into more of that. Less sleep, but less labor.”
Despite the fact he’s only open for lunch Wednesday through Saturday, Jay stays busy seven days a week, because he does almost everything completely from scratch. “If we can make it, be at a table, a smoker, a pickle, we make it,” said Jay. “And sausage was no different.”
Yes, Jay even makes his own links. “We always have a house sausage, which is a mild German-style sausage, and then we mix up the other, the second sausage, and it could be anything from pepperoni pizza sausage to jalapeno cheese or chili relleno. Anything goes,” said Jay. “Whatever we think we can get away with.”
As the 11 o’clock hour approaches in Abilene, hungry barbeque lovers wait with great anticipation for the call to come and get it. If you really wanted to you could count how many people come through the shack on a business day, but it’s probably easier to just count the brisket that goes out. “We go through about a thousand pounds of brisket in 12 hours,” said Jay.
Before all the good grub is gone, Jay presented a smorgasbord of smoked meats that he likes to call his Texas Trinity plate. The tray featured a hefty helping of beautifully crusted smoked brisket, a few pork ribs and a selection of Jay’s specialty sausages. The brisket isn’t entirely traditional, but it’s smoked to perfection and comes out of the smoker with some fantastic bark. “We do a little brown sugar. You don’t taste it, but it adds richness,” said Jay. “Chili powders, garlic. To me, the mixture of those spices with the mesquite wood adds a really rich, almost chocolatey type flavor. It’s a flavor that you kind of want more of.”
If you can manage to save room after the brisket, you’re drawn to the quartet of sausages, which include the house German sausage, a Tejas-inspired chili relleno sausage, a traditional jalapeno cheese and a chipotle Oaxaca. The traditional German is a wonderful mild sausage that really allows the smokey flavor to present itself. The jalapeno and cheese sausage features Monterey jack and cheddar cheese, which create a fantastic flavor profile with the spicy kick. The chipotle Oaxaca is double smoky from the chipotles and the grill, and the chili relleno sausage just solidifies Jay as a sausage master.
A second tray makes an appearance alongside the main course, and this one is loaded with sides including potato salad, hatch mac & cheese, pinto beans and house made pickles. The beans are full of flavor, the potato salad is fresh and creamy, the mac is rich and flavorful, and the pickle is just as fantastic as all the other offerings from Jay’s.
So next time you’re rolling through the Key City, make sure to spare some time for Jay’s BBQ Shack, well worth a stop on The Texas Bucket List!