Moo's Craft Barbecue turns a backyard hobby into Los Angeles favorite

Moo’s Craft Barbecue has turned a husband-and-wife hobby into one of Los Angeles’ most sought-after barbecue stops, with long lines, early sellouts and a menu that carries Central Texas roots into an Angeleno setting. Andrew and Michelle Muñoz began smoking meat in a backyard in East Los Angeles in February 2017, then built the business through pop-ups, catering and Smorgasburg before opening a permanent restaurant in Lincoln Heights at 2118 N. Broadway.

The formula is built on Texas-style barbecue, especially the salt-and-pepper profile and brisket culture of Central Texas. Moo’s core offerings include brisket, ribs, links and handcrafted sausages, alongside sides such as mac and cheese and desserts like banana pudding. The restaurant also expanded into a taproom and craft-beer space, adding another layer to a dining room that reflects Los Angeles’ tendency to remix regional traditions rather than simply replicate them.

That blending helped push Moo’s beyond neighborhood buzz. The MICHELIN Guide named the restaurant a Bib Gourmand in the 2025 MICHELIN Guide USA, and the guide also notes what regulars already know: items often sell out, and arriving early matters. Time Out Los Angeles has described Moo’s as one of Smorgasburg’s most popular vendors, a sign that the restaurant’s rise followed the city’s street-food and pop-up culture as much as its barbecue lineage.

Moo’s popularity also points to a larger shift in how barbecue is understood in America. Once treated as a cuisine tied tightly to one state or one style, it now travels with the people who make it. In Los Angeles, that migration has produced a version of barbecue that still honors Austin’s traditions while fitting a city shaped by mobility, mix-and-match eating and neighborhoods where family businesses often carry the memory of where their owners came from.

For the Muñozes, that history is personal. They have said the restaurant’s story is inseparable from their immigrant family backgrounds, with Michelle Muñoz saying Moo’s “wouldn't be here” without the relatives who came before them. Andrew Muñoz has also said immigration crackdowns feel personal because of those family histories. At Moo’s, the smoke, the line outside and the sellouts tell one story; the family behind the pit tells another, one that links food, labor and belonging in modern Los Angeles.