Big Mike's BBQ

Brisket, ribs, pork and chicken go over real wood and come off when the smoke says so — Central Texas barbecue by the book, low and slow, nothing rushed. Then the menu cracks a joke about it. Cluck Norris, Notorious P.I.G, Two-Bawk Shakur and The Piggy Smalls hang the day's serious smoking under a bracket of bad puns. Big Mike's BBQ runs that split out of a food truck in Prince Edward County, parked in the yard of the All My Friends Beer Co taproom near Bloomfield, where a plate of smoked meat and a nearby pint turn a County afternoon into a plan.

The Big Mike is the truck's clearest single order: chopped brisket and locally made sausage stacked on a bun with maple-mustard slaw, pickles and the house Big Mike Sauce, the sharp slaw cutting the richness before it turns heavy. The Piggy Smalls does the same trick with pulled pork shoulder. For the meat straight, the Hunk-A-Hunk-A plates hand over half a pound of brisket or pulled pork, and Notorious P.I.G brings a half-rack of pork side ribs. Every plate arrives built the same way — a sidekick, Texas Toast, pickles and sauce — so the order lands as a full meal in the mid-teens to mid-twenties rather than a bare tray of protein.

What holds the menu together is that the smoke never stays in its lane. Big Poppa Spud buries a smoked potato under cheese, fire-baked beans, green onions, sauce and a choice of pulled pork or chopped brisket, turning a side into dinner. Cowboy Nachos carry brisket burnt-ends chilli, and the Outlaw Dog runs that same chilli over a double-smoked hot dog. The playful names point at something real about the kitchen: this is a truck confident enough to fold its brisket into a potato or a plate of chips and trust the wood smoke to carry the plate. The discipline lives in the smoker; the fun is in what happens after.

For a table that wants range, two orders do the work of a sampler. Cluck Norris pairs smoked chicken thighs with a third-rack of pork side ribs on one plate; The Texan gathers brisket, ribs and sausage into a focused trio; and The Meat Sweats reaches wider across whatever the smoker is running that day. Split the difference — one order for definition, one for abundance — and a group can graze through most of the menu without anyone settling for a single plate. The plates run firmly meat-first, so a strictly meat-free table is better off checking the day's options before making the trip.

Mike and Trish have run the operation since 2020, with Michael Bell as the chef behind the smoke. The family's hand shows up on the menu itself — Mrs. Bell's Cornbread sits among the pulled pork and the ribs like a signature. Sharing a yard with the taproom gives a small barbecue outfit steady foot traffic and gives the brewery a reason to keep people around into the evening. Six years in, the pairing has become part of how the County eats on a warm weekend, the smoke drifting across the tables as easily as the beer does.

None of it works on impulse alone. Big Mike's keeps food-truck hours — Thursday through Tuesday, noon to six, dark on Wednesday — and the smoker sets the ceiling: when the brisket is gone, it is gone. The truck takes orders by text ahead of the trip, the surest way to land a specific cut before the afternoon sells it out, and the taproom a few steps away handles the rest of the table's thirst. Come for the barbecue, stay for the pint, and send the text early if the brisket is the reason you're making the drive.