The Cost of Barbecue in 2026
New York City’s barbecue scene is heating up again.
But in a different way than before.
Over at Time Out Market, Jase Franklyn is telling the story of Jamaica and Trinidad with jerk ribs and other fare. At Bark in Bushwick, Ruben Santana nods to the Dominican Republic with chicharrón. And at Kirbee’s, Jonny White and Chuck Charnichart serve Texas barbecue while tipping their hat to Mexico with green spaghetti.
For the full lowdown on third-wave barbecue, check out my colleague Luke Fortney’s column over at The New York Times! But today, let’s spend a minute or two meditating on Kirbee’s.
I haven’t been yet, but I want to talk about one of my favorite subjects: prices!
White and Charnichart, the nationally renowned pitmasters, are doing something a little unusual with their Greenpoint space. They’re not selling meats by the pound or even a la carte. Kirbee’s is serving plates of barbecue with fixed sides. A sliders platter runs $30. Brisket with sausage and ribs (or sausage and turkey) goes for $45.
That’s a lot.
Now here’s the thing: Can you spend this much on good smoked meats at any proper barbecue spot? Of course. Beef is expensive. Just look at what Katz’s is commanding for pastrami. But what makes things a little more complicated is that some of Kirbee’s starting prices are considerably higher than the established competition. One of the city’s finest smoked beef ribs, at Hometown, runs $45 by the pound, which worked out to $63 after weigh-in last summer. Sides are extra.
At Kirbee’s, the big beef rib plate with sides runs $90.
Let’s be honest, we can all spend much more on a ho-hum porterhouse at a mid-range steakhouse. But since folks griped about the cost of dining out when we started seeing otherwise affordable half-chickens running $40 at neighborhood rotisseries, I reckon Kirbee’s will raise a few eyebrows too.
That all said, I can’t wait to check it out!
It’s Sunday, 13 September 2026. The skies were eerily blue, again, earlier this week.
The Mets played the Yankees. A showing of nearly 3,000 drones — not an incidental number — recreated the appearance of the Twin Towers on Wednesday night in Lower Manhattan, an event that was likely a weighty emotional surprise to anyone who witnessed it (one wonders if the drone show was…truly necessary). CNN released a new documentary about Windows on the World, focusing not just on the cultural importance of the restaurant (as the city came out of the 1970s financial crisis), but also on the everyday staffers who worked and died there.
And new documents seem to suggest that New Yorkers were misled about whether it was safe to return to work (or live) in lower Manhattan in the aftermath of the attacks a quarter century ago. It all recalls a scene from Spike Lee’s “25th Hour” (2002), when Philip Seymour Hoffman and Barry Pepper’s fictional characters were chatting while overlooking the very raw, very real footprint of Ground Zero. Here’s a snippet of that dialogue, from 2002:
Hoffman: “New York Times says the air’s bad down here,”
Pepper: "Yeah?…I read the Post. EPA says it’s fine."
Hoffman: "Somebody’s lying."
Pepper: “Yeah.”
Anyway. It’s been one of those weeks where it’s been hard to think about anything else.
Let’s talk about the red meat program at Dean’s!!!
My visit to Dean’s was, simply put, one of my favorite meals of the year. I’ve already written about the lamb chops for the NYT, and about the scratchings for my “Best Dishes of 2026, So Far.”
Below the paywall, we’ll also talk about what some of the other critics said about Dean’s…