Podcast appearances and mentions of ali clem

Open wide, because Lovett Or Leave It is serving up a hot, fresh best-of episode with all our favorite food-obsessed segments of the past year. Ashley Ray, Alice Wetterlund, and Max Silvestri give us the hot dish on the best holiday foods. Nancy Pelosi (Michaela Watkins) spent hours making this beautiful democracy for you; the least you can do is taste it. Shalewa Sharp and Lovett bemoan the cookies that have come and gone, while Lindsay Adams and Marcy Jarreau try not to turn green after eating the pink sauce from TikTok. Jared Goldstein sips an experimental “healthy Coke.” A local reporter (Megan Gailey) warns parents against the new razorblade in the apple: weed gummies. Lovett, Akilah Hughes and pit master Ali Clem talk LGBT BBQ in the Lone Star state, while Ashley Ray joins Lovett in sampling the delicacies of Minnesota… and also lutefisk.

Lovett or Leave It pulls on its cowboy boots and takes its Lactaid pills for a queso-filled quorum in Austin, Texas. Beto O'Rourke takes on Greg Abbott and plays Queen for a Day. Ali Clem of la Barbecue and Akilah Hughes help us put the BBQ in LGBTQ. Tate Donavan helps Lovett call out the not-so-magical inspiration behind the Magic Kingdom. And we let the Rant Wheel spin, pardner. Text Lovett to 20377 to help Texas elect Beto O'Rourke. Help asylum-seekers, migrants and refugees at the border: https://borderkindness.org/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You’re listening to the Best BBQ Show and I’m your host, Yoni Levin. I realized something today. After almost 100 episodes of the show, I’m not sure you all know my story on why this show came to be. I’m not sure you know how I got interested in BBQ to begin with or why I’ve spent two years covering the Texas BBQ scene and all the interesting people in and around it. It all started when I was a young boy in upstate New York. Now I say upstate because I’m not talking about New York City. I’m talking about way up state. As in almost Canada. I grew up in small city called Rochester, NY. A city that is almost foreign to me now that I’ve been away for two decades. The only BBQ in Rochester at that time was a place called Dinosaur BBQ. To this day I still like their sauce, but that’s about all that’s good about it. I’ll probably go back the next time I’m up there just to see if they’ve stepped up their game, but I wasn’t impressed back then. Back then all I had was a weber kettle and a dream. Someone gave me a copy of the BBQ Bible and my interest was peaked. Shout out to Steve Raichlen. I read lots of the recipes, dog eared pages, highlighted, took notes and started my BBQ journey. My favorite method back then was the snake method and it was my foray into slow smoked meat. I also spent some time on amazing ribs which if you’ve been following bbq long enough is one of the oldest sites on the internet all about bbq and how to cook it. One of my favorite articles is about how the smoke ring is a myth and how you can produce one without any smoke at all. Now I say slow smoked but I’m embarrassed to admit that I was doing everything wrong. I used cheap charcoal briquettes that didn’t burn very well. I was smart enough not to use lighter fluid back then but I did make some common mistakes. One of them was soaking little piles of wood chips. I soaked those wood chips for hours. I used different kinds, different sizes and I just couldn’t seem to figure out why I wasn’t getting the results I wanted. The one thing I didn’t try was just not soaking the dang wood chips. If hindsight is 2020, my hindsight is clouded with thick white smoke that comes from wet wood. Luckily, that was merely the beginning of my BBQ journey. After college I traveled the state working for non-profits in politics and the environment. I helped create legislation that saved plastic, encouraged recycling and brought a ton of awareness about homelessness. I also worked in kitchens, bars and served at restaurants between campaigns. I loved the work but it wasn’t the full time gig I had dreamed of. Then I caught, what I thought back then, was a huge opportunity. There were field organizer positions opening up for a huge new Greenpeace campaign. I would travel the world helping solve major issues on the national and international level. I went to conferences on both coasts and even attended the conference of the parties United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Long story short, after they sent me to Austin in 2008 I realized there was more politics than progressiveness and decided to stay in this amazing city I had discovered almost completely by accident. Luck would have it that when I moved to Austin I landed in a small neighborhood just south of the river. A small neighborhood that just happened to have a BBQ trailer in it. A BBQ trailer called LA Barbecue. I had luckily found, what was then, one of the only quality BBQ joints in Austin. I know what you’re thinking, not Franklin? Not Lockhart? Nope, my first BBQ in Texas was LA Barbecue. The place where John Lewis worked before he opened Lewis BBQ. Where Esaul Ramos of 2M, Dylan Taylor, and Brendan Lamb of Smiley’s BBQ all worked. When I first showed up in 2012 they had just opened and I knew it was rare to find a place with good BBQ that didn’t have a line. I had heard of Franklin, but had yet to eat there. I was there early and often. Although, back then early just meant a few minutes before they opened. I would bug the guys in the pits and quickly made friends with Ali Clem who was there every day serving up the good stuff to those of us who patiently waited. I was a regular. Some weeks I’d show up 3 days in a row. They had free beer and even some old timers playing country music on a very small hand built stage. About a year later, something happened. I showed up at the usual time and I wasn’t the first one there. No big deal, I just got there a little earlier the next time, but that didn’t do for long. Soon I had to come in 30 minutes early, then 45, then an hour. My #1 spot was in constant jeopardy by all the people discovering this delicious place that I wanted to be my secret! Fast forward a few years and I got my 118 gallon pit. Started cooking my own briskets. Made a list of places I wanted to go and just kept on trying barbecue all over Texas. Then it happened. In May of 2016 I saw a short documentary produced by Yeti about an 81 year old pitmaster named “Tootsie”. She worked all week as a custodian and then woke up early on Saturdays to cook barbecue out in Lexington, Texas. The moment I saw that video I knew I had to go. I rounded up a few friends and we headed out there to try the best BBQ in Texas. If you haven’t been to Snow’s before, it’s an experience. The cool country air, the small town roads and the friendly people are just part of the experience. We didn’t even bring chairs. We just got in line and waited for that slow smoked goodness we had heard so much about. After that day I was hooked. A couple months later we went again and then again. Before I knew it I was waking up at 5am to be near or at the front of the line every Saturday to eat at Snow’s. After a while the crew started to notice. They were like, weren’t you here last week? And “how many weeks is that in a row now?” I became a regular in a small town where magic was happening. Clay Cowgill was the first one to start keeping track. We were fast friends and soon I was spending half the time talking to him while my lady, incredibly patiently, held my place in line. We talked about wood, meat, smoke, timing, feel and I started adjusting my home cooks to match some of Snow’s methods. Almost a year later, we showed up early as planned to see the line was 10 times longer than it had ever been. Our early Saturday ritual was about to take all afternoon. I went and asked Clay what was going on and he told us they had just gotten the #1 spot on the Texas Monthly top 50 for the second time. Til that point I hadn’t even heard of the list, but I was going to find out about it since all these people decided to get between me and my BBQ. A few months later I was talking to some friends about podcasts how to create one and we decided to create one about BBQ. I started calling my friends who owned, operated or cooked BBQ and asked them if they would be on my show. Now, almost 3 years later I’m so happy to share Texas BBQ with you and all the amazing people in it. The BBQ family has been so generous to me and I can’t wait for what’s next in modern barbecue and this show I have created. Stay tuned. 2019 is going to be an interesting year. We’re on youtube and we have more friends than ever on Instagram. I’m so thankful to have ya’ll as listeners and if it wasn’t for you, there’d be no show. So I’ll make a deal with you. If you keep listening, I’ll keep talking tasting and trying to cook Texas BBQ, the best barbecue in the world. For now, go out there what this amazing bbq scene has to offer. If you need some tips, feel free to message me. If you think I need to cover some places, send them to me and they will be added to my list.   This is your host, Yoni Levin saying “Go eat some meat with the people you love and have a great week."

How LeAnn Mueller and Ali Clem - the only wife-and-wife team in Texas - finally brought Austin's la Barbecue indoors, and why Los Angeles doesn't know what it's missing.

How LeAnn Mueller and Ali Clem - the only wife-and-wife team in Texas - finally brought Austin's la Barbecue indoors, and why Los Angeles doesn't know what it's missing.

This week I’ve got a great episode for you. I long list of people I spoke with at the close of Texas Monthly BBQ. Some of these BBQ restaurant owners, cutters, pitmasters rarely get to meet and this is one of those rare occasions. The final hour of TMBBQ. I’ve got a long list of people that I got to speak with while I was walking around. So get ready, we’ve got a lot to cover. We spoke with Catherine Stiles and Lance Kirkpatrick, two of the many talents at Stiles Switch BBQ. They were hanging out with John Kulow aka ATX Food Guy. We talk to Evan Leroy of Leroy and Lewis BBQ. A modern man who always experiments with new ideas, even in BBQ. Evan was with Brad Robinson of Chuds BBQ as well as Chris Mcghee from The Switch. We talk briefly to Shane Stiles and Johnny Texas before I run into Rober Sierra of S&S Pit Crew. A guy everyone is happy to see and someone who works hard cooking BBQ. Robert cooks for his competition team when he’s not cooking for his family. I talked to Dusty Dworak from 2M Smokehouse, his knife skills serve some of the best BBQ in the state. John Mueller pulls me away to hang out with the LA BBQ crew, Ali Clem and LeAnn Mueller. They told us about their travels and all the weird things they ate in Asia. I grab a shot with Dominic Colbert and Mike Ruffino while John Brotherton shouts out his friends. Misty Roegels and they guys from Panther City get on the mic until I run into Patrick Hernandez. Patrick was working with Truth BBQ for the fest and they had one of the longest lines of the day. Of course if we’re going to hang around by the Truth tent we’re going to talk to Cory Taylor, one of the most outspoken members of the team. Leonard Botello IV owner and vision behind Truth BBQ talks to us about Houston and their soon to open second location. Finally, I run into Dylan Taylor and Joe Yim who have been cooking at Terry Black’s BBQ at one of the biggest operations in Austin. Just over that weekend they cooked over 400 briskets and they’re still smiling and having a good time. That’s the beauty of the BBQ life. You can work long hours and still have a big smile on your face. You’re creating something delicious and putting smiles on peoples faces. You get to make people happy.   That’s why this show exists, because I know it makes people happy. It connects people all over the world. I’m happy to be that connection. It’s an honor to be your host and it’s an honor to present you yet another episode of the Best BBQ Show. Enjoy.   Thank you again for listening and as always tag us in all of your meat posts and if you see people getting a little too friendly with their bbq, remind them #dontsqueezeyourmeat! And as always tag us in all your social media with @bestbarbecue and use #meatman and #meatwoman wherever you see someone who loves meat!

Host Luke Burbank and announcer Elena Passarello “Face the Music” in this episode from a hotel room in the Live Music Capital of the World – Austin, Texas. Busker-turned-bona fide blues artist Charley Crockett subs in as Live Wire’s house band; poet Roger Reeves stops by and tells us why poetry is the harbinger of the future; and the women behind Austin’s famed La Barbeque – music and fashion photographer LeAnn Mueller and her partner Ali Clem – share the secrets to quintessential Texas BBQ.