Texas brisket and all the bourbon at region’s newest — and biggest — barbecue restaurant
You can see the smokers from the street — two of them, 22 feet long and 42 inches in diameter. Each door alone weighs a couple hundred pounds.
Jack Timmons, the owner of Jack’s BBQ, says they might be the largest smokers west of the Mississippi.
“I tell people, smokers are like boats and motorcycles: You always want another one and a bigger one, and these are like the Harley 2000s,” he laughed.
When you visit the new restaurant, located in the former home of The Royal Bear Pub and music venue, he’ll take you for a quick tour if you ask nicely. Even if he’s not there himself, he promises his staff will welcome guests to his new Algona restaurant with classic Texas hospitality.
Seating about 200 people at full-capacity (due to pandemic restrictions, 100 for now), it will best Jack’s first restaurant — also in a former dive bar — in South Seattle. The original feeds smoked meats to restaurants in Seattle’s Columbia Tower and South Lake Union, and Timmons hopes this one will eventually offer similar opportunities in the Tacoma area.
Nestled along West Valley Highway and state Route 167, the newest Jack’s is less than a 20-minute drive from downtown Tacoma and less than 15 minutes from Federal Way and Puyallup — without abysmal traffic, that is.
Like the Seattle spot, Algona focuses on Texas barbecue, low and slow and nothing short of it.
“It’s all about the meat,” said Timmons. Seasonings are simple — salt and pepper mostly. No, really.
Translation: juicy brisket, meaty spare ribs instead of skimpy-on-the-protein baby backs, chicken brined overnight and slowly smoked with mayo to retain that moisture, dry-rubbed pulled pork, cheddar jalapeno sausages, which Timmons jokes in his retained Texas drawl “is almost like cheating — it’s like nacho cheese sausage.”
Four types of chili, including one made with leftover brisket, also grace the menu, along with house pickles and red onions; classic sides including coleslaw, collards, creamed corn and cornbread; and just two barbecue sauces — one regular, one spicy.
Beer, bourbon and cocktails extend the concept beyond barbecue. Timmons himself prefers to have a margarita — or one of his restaurant’s mainstays, an old fashioned with smoked oranges and brown sugar — in hand instead of just a Coke.
TEXAS BARBECUE AT JACK’S BBQ
The native Texan moved to Seattle more than two decades ago, working as an engineer for Microsoft and Boeing. He missed brisket, and he didn’t really want sauce with his barbecue.
After studying the art of smoking at the BBQ Summer Camp run by Texas A&M’s meat science department (a very real thing), he started smoking meats in his backyard, which progressed into bigger and bigger house parties and, eventually, increasingly popular pop-ups at breweries. In 2014, he and a few friends bought an old building at 3924 Airport Way S. in Seattle.
He and his team ended up tearing the inside of The Royal Bear down to the bones. Turns out decades of being a dive bar takes a toll on floors, ceilings and long-forgotten corners.
The result is brand-new everything. A long bar anchors the space, and a vast dining room features various seating arrangements of high-tops, low-tops and banquettes. Chairs are adorned with faux cowhide cushions. The tables, floors and ceilings all harken to Timmons’ connection to Boeing: The company ships its engines in giant crates made of tropical woods, slabs of which end up in scrapyards throughout the Pacific Northwest. (You can find some for yourself at Second Use Building Materials in downtown Tacoma.)
“I guess you could say it’s got feng shui,” he said.
When The News Tribune spoke to Timmons in June, he had hoped to retain the music venue’s stage. It has since been replaced with a fresh open kitchen that mimics the classic cafeteria-style line common at central Texas barbecue joints. Eventually, live country music will make regular appearances, though.
Timmons’ mission is simple: offer “friendly, laid-back, really good barbecue, really good Southern comfort, Southern hospitality.”
JACK’S BBQ ALGONA
▪ 35731 West valley Hwy S., Algona, 253-249-7728, jacksbbq.com/algona
▪ Hours: Wednesday-Sunday 11 a.m.-8 p.m. (until 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday)
▪ Details: opening Oct. 31; order takeout online and call for catering
This story was originally published October 29, 2020 at 5:00 AM.