Our Barbecue
Will is an old fashioned Pitmaster who believes good barbecue is cooked with a hardwood fire. While his family hails from Kentucky and Illinois, Will specializes in Texas Brisket, Kansas City Burnt Ends, and South Carolina Pulled Pork. Will also loves to experiment, and he's found some items not traditionally associated with any established regional style, like Bacon Burnt Ends, Beef Cheeks and even Impossible Meat make for really good barbecue.
We don't believe in short cuts. Each piece of meat is hand trimmed, and each piece of wood for the fire is selected for perfect seasoning. Each spice mixture meticulously blended, and each batch of sauce is crafted for the perfect finishing touch.
Texas Beef Brisket
Brisket is the undisputed king of Texas Barbecue. The brisket cut is one of the most flavorful to be found out of any cut of beef. As far as our barbecue goes, we don't take many liberties and do it as much like they do in Texas as we can.
Kansas City Brisket Burnt Ends
This is the one that started it all. Burnt Ends are the crown jewel of Kansas City Barbecue. These chunks of heaven come from the fattier "point" portion of a brisket. Twice smoked for a total of up to 15 hours, then tossed in sauce and brown sugar - they have a depth of flavor that cannot be described. If any barbecue'd meat can be called a delicacy, these are it. Without a doubt, they are our favorite thing to cook and serve.
South Carolina Pulled Pork
South Carolina Pulled Pork is all about the sauce, and our signature South Carolina Mustard sauce is worth writing home about. But we don't settle for just a great sauce, we make sure that the meat can stand on its own as delicious, tender and full of the wonderful bark that an offset cooker provides. It's the dish that is truest to barbecue's roots - great for feeding a hungry crowd.
Meat Candy (Bacon Burnt Ends)
Put simply, bacon burnt ends are an extra smoky, extra sweet, extra juicy morsel of melt-in-your-mouth delicious. Bacon burnt ends taste like someone challenged bacon to be more delicious than it already is - if you are a bacon lover, these will be your newest obsession.
Our Pitmaster
Will fell in love with Barbecue at Joe’s Kansas City Bar-b-que, when he first tried Burnt Ends on a road trip to Kansas City, and he knew he would dream of those sticky sweet meat morsels for months to come. When he returned home to the upper Midwest, with nary a burnt end to be found, Will bought his first smoker, determined to learn to make them himself.
Will is a homegrown barbecue Pitmaster who learned the trade from watching experts, experimentation, and endless hours at the pit. From Aaron Franklin's online class to Chud's BBQ YouTube channel - no source of barbecue expertise was safe from Will's insatiable pursuit. Will invested thousands of hours at the pit trying out the advice he learned from those experts - tweaking and combining techniques until he perfected a process of his own. For years, only his friends and family were the lucky recipients of his delicious talents - until he was finally convinced to bring his barbecue to the public, and Whiskey Hotel Barbecue was born.
Will believes that barbecue is a part of America's hard fought cultural heritage and should be celebrated. As a former history teacher, Will knows that the roots of American Barbecue are humble, and the various styles of barbecue draw from the fabric of our American tapestry: from Indigenous, African, and European cooking methods. Once, barbecue was the answer to making otherwise undesirable cuts of meat easy to digest and delicious to eat - often the only meat available for working class and enslaved people. In today's America, barbecue is a delicacy, but one that celebrates how American ingenuity can make the most out of anything. If you have the chance to chat with Will at his pit, he'll always be happy to talk shop.
