As Tender As Ol' Austin's Heart - Oak Cliff Memories - Austin's Barbecue

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Back in the day, when we moved to Dallas, in the 60's, we were living only a few blocks away from Austin's Barbecue. As a young fellow, I would often walk to Austin's to order me a BBQ sandwich, "WALKING." - The order was taken from the side for take out. Inside was a nice layout. First you would see the cooks at work and the cashier taking payments for satisfied customers, full of all the goodness of old fashion down to earth food, while people would sit at tables along side the wall with music playing from mini wall jukeboxes that played out of the speakers for a quarter a song or two. Inside the Austin's eatery, the smell of burgers, and the waitresses fast at work serving up breakfast, early in the morning, eggs, bacon and toast with hot coffee in original ceramic cups, it was a place I ate at when I had enough money and I never really ate any place but there, until they finally one day decided to shut down. That was a day I cried. I actually broke down and cried. It was a landmark of my lifetime. It was The place to order the best chopped or sliced beef BBQ on earth, in my opinion. They did catering and sold Smoked Turkey for parties and catering. It was an enormously successful enterprise. No other place around even stands up to their original formula for good food and atmosphere, with a few exceptions, which I won't go into for now because this discussion is all about Austin's Barbecue, a moment in history for those of us who lived in Oak Cliff, back in the day. Back then, there lived among us true Western cowboys. Those who knew how to enjoy a hungry man's meal fit for a cowboy or even a guy like me, a kid from Dallas, who felt like he was living in the old west every time he walked into good old Austin's Barbecue. That place really brought out the Texas Cowboy in me.