America’s Best BBQ Might Be in Missouri – And It’s Dirt Cheap

Burnt Ends and Sticky Ribs for Less

Missouri doesn’t just do barbecue. It dominates it.

Kansas City and St. Louis both landed in the top five BBQ cities in America for 2025, and between them, they’ve been smoking meat for over a century. One city invented burnt ends.

The other created its own rib cut. And because Missouri’s cost of living runs about 11% below the national average, you can eat your way through both without the sticker shock you’d get in San Francisco or New York.

The story of how these two cities became barbecue royalty starts with a steamboat cook, a newspaper-wrapped slab of meat, and 25 cents.

Kansas City Ranked Number One

Kansas City claimed the top spot in LawnStarter’s 2025 ranking of the best BBQ cities in America. St. Louis came in fourth, marking the third year in a row the city made the top ten.

The rankings measured access to barbecue restaurants, quality ratings, competition awards, and elite memberships in barbecue organizations.

Kansas City led the nation in National Barbecue and Grilling Association award-winning cooking teams over the past five years and in top finishers at the World Series of Barbecue.

Texas cities like Austin and Houston also made the list, but Missouri put two in the top five.

Henry Perry Started It in 1908

Henry Perry was born in Shelby County, Tennessee, near Memphis, and worked on steamboat restaurants along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers before arriving in Kansas City in 1907.

In 1908, he began serving smoked meats to workers in the Garment District from an alley stand, charging 25 cents for hot meat smoked over hickory and wrapped in newsprint.

Historians agree that Perry coined the local style of Kansas City barbecue and was the first person in the city to open a barbecue restaurant and truly make a living selling his meat.

His menu included beef along with wild game like possum, woodchuck, and raccoon.

Perry Trained the BBQ Legends

After Perry died in 1940, Charlie Bryant took over the business and later sold it to his brother Arthur, who made the sauce sweeter and relocated the restaurant. That became Arthur Bryant’s, still operating today.

Arthur Pinkard, who had worked for Perry, helped George Gates found Gates Bar-B-Q.

By the 1930s, there were close to 100 barbecue restaurants in the Kansas City area, all tracing their roots back to Perry’s techniques.

Perry was inducted into the American Royal Barbecue Hall of Fame in 2014, and Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas proclaimed July 3 as Henry Perry Day.

Burnt Ends Were Free Scraps

Burnt ends are the leftover part of the brisket, which was often considered too cooked to serve.

Arthur Bryant’s stroke of genius was to save those scraps, chop them up, and hand them out as a free snack to customers while they waited for their orders.

In 1972, journalist Calvin Trillin wrote about Bryant’s burnt ends in a famous article, calling Arthur Bryant’s the best restaurant in the world. After that, demand exploded.

Kansas City pitmasters started saving the burnt ends, cooking them in barbecue sauce, and offering them as a menu item. Today they’re called “meat candy” and cost real money.

Over 100 BBQ Joints in KC

Kansas City is now home to more than 100 local BBQ restaurants and countless competitions of all sizes, including the American Royal World Series of Barbecue, known as the world’s biggest barbecue contest.

In April 2025, the city opened what is believed to be the world’s first museum dedicated entirely to barbecue at Crown Center.

New restaurants keep opening, including American Way Smokehouse in Independence and Meat Rushmore at the Kansas City airport.

Food trucks like KC Que and Point and Flat BBQ are also making names for themselves on the competition circuit.

St. Louis Created Its Own Cut

The name St. Louis-style ribs comes from the meatpacking houses concentrated in the area between the 1930s and 1960s.

In the years following World War II, local butchers started removing the pointed end of the rack beyond the 13th bone, eliminating much of the fat and gristle.

The trimming creates a uniform rectangular slab where every rib is about the same length and cooks at the same rate.

The USDA eventually formalized the cut as “Pork Ribs, St. Louis Style. ” The name refers only to the cut, not the sauce or cooking method.

Louis Maull Made the First Sauce

The Louis Maull company started in 1897 as a grocery business selling out of a horse-drawn wagon. The company began selling condiments in the 1920s and started making barbecue sauce in 1926.

Maull’s set the standard for St. Louis-style sauce with its unique blend of spices and tangy flavor.

St. Louis reportedly leads the nation in barbecue sauce consumption per capita.

The original Maull’s recipe includes unusual ingredients like anchovies and pepper pulp, giving it a distinctive tangy kick different from Kansas City’s sweeter sauces.

St. Louis Style Means Grill First

St. Louis-style barbecue is characterized by its process of grilling and then saucing the meat, rather than applying a dry rub and wood-smoking the meat for many hours.

This means the cooking time is much faster than other regional styles. St. Louis barbecue sauce is tomato-based and sweet but slightly thinner and more vinegary than its Kansas City cousin.

The city is also known for specialties like pork steaks cut from the shoulder, snoots made from pig noses and cheeks, and rib tips. White bread on the side is standard for sopping up the sauce.

KC Style Wins the State Poll

A February 2025 poll by Saint Louis University and YouGov asked 900 likely Missouri voters which regional style of American barbecue was their favorite.

Kansas City style came out on top with 41% of voters selecting it, more than double the 17% who favored St. Louis style.

Kansas City style was the top choice across nearly every major demographic group, including gender, age, race, income, and education level. Texas style came in third at 10%, followed by Memphis at 9%.

Only 5% of voters said they don’t like barbecue at all.

Missouri Costs 11% Below Average

Missouri had the sixth lowest cost of living in the United States for the third quarter of 2025, with a cost of living index of 89.0.

Housing runs 18% lower than the national average, while groceries match the national average and healthcare costs 3% less.

Dining out at a casual restaurant in Missouri averages around $15 to $17 per person, while a mid-range meal for two runs about $58. Compare that to coastal cities where the same meals can easily double.

Your barbecue dollar stretches further here.

Two Cities, One Road Trip

Kansas City and St. Louis sit about 250 miles apart on Interstate 70, making them easy to hit in a single trip.

Start in Kansas City with burnt ends at Joe’s or Q39, tour the new Museum of BBQ, then drive east to St. Louis for sticky ribs at Pappy’s Smokehouse or Bogart’s.

Pappy’s was ranked the top BBQ restaurant in Missouri for 2025, with Q39 and Jack Stack leading in Kansas City. You’ll spend less on a week of eating in Missouri than you would on a long weekend in Los Angeles.

And you’ll eat better.

Visiting Kansas City, Missouri

Kansas City’s barbecue scene centers around several distinct neighborhoods.

Joe’s Kansas City Bar-B-Que operates out of a gas station at 3002 West 47th Avenue in Kansas City, Kansas, and is open Monday through Saturday.

Q39 has two locations, including one in Midtown at 1000 West 39th Street. The Museum of BBQ at Crown Center, 2450 Grand Boulevard, is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. , with tickets costing $10.

Arthur Bryant’s original location at 1727 Brooklyn Avenue is still serving. Most restaurants don’t take reservations, so arrive early or expect a wait.

Visiting St. Louis, Missouri

Pappy’s Smokehouse on Olive Street is located less than two miles from Busch Stadium in Midtown. The restaurant dry rubs its ribs with brown sugar and smokes them over cherry and apple wood.

Bogart’s Smokehouse sits in the historic Soulard neighborhood, and Salt + Smoke has multiple locations around the city. Other top-rated spots include Sugarfire Smoke House and The Shaved Duck.

St. Louis restaurants tend to serve their ribs with sauce on the side, so you can control how much you add. Most joints are cash-friendly, and lines form early on weekends.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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