Arnold and Leigha Mendez opened their meals truck, Arn’s BBQ, with the aim of offering the Flathead Valley with genuine Central Texas barbecue. The couple has all the time beloved making good meals because it gathers folks collectively.
“In spite of everything,” Arnold laughed. “Everybodys gotta eat!”
Arnold and Leigha acquired their begin by bringing meals to small events. Ultimately, Arnold’s barbecue grew to become well-known amongst their buddies, household, and coworkers.
“We’d present as much as an occasion, and other people would say ‘Hey! Arn’s barbecue is right here’ and that’s how we acquired our title,” Arnold stated.
Then, buddies requested them to cater small occasions and from there, their enterprise continued to develop with them opening their meals truck in July 2021.
Arnold barbecues beef ribs, smoked turkey and hen, and the fan favourite is their brisket. Leigha creates the selfmade barbecue sauce and southern-inspired sides reminiscent of macaroni and cheese and peach cobbler, each of that are constituted of scratch and gluten-free.
Leigha feels it is vital that their meals is inclusive.
“There’s no purpose to make somebody really feel like they’re an inconvenience as a result of they’ve an allergy,” she stated.
After spending the final 10 years perfecting their craft, the couple says they refuse to compromise on high quality or style.
The important thing elements to Central Texas barbecue is heavy salt, and heavy pepper to season the meat, after which smoking the meat over publish oak, which grows in abundance in Texas. With a view to preserve the authenticity of their meals, Arnold drives all the way down to Texas thrice a yr with a purpose to decide up a trailer load of publish oak.
“The publish oak interacts effectively with the salt and pepper and we use this on all of our meat,” he stated.
Whereas the pair get pleasure from cooking from the center, they determined it was necessary to create recipes for his or her meals to make sure the standard and consistency of every meal.
“We wish it to be constant and what folks wish to come again to,” he stated.
Rising up, each Leigha and Arnold’s households used meals as a solution to join with the group and present hospitality to their buddies.
“They are saying there are 5 love languages… effectively, the sixth is meals,” Leigha laughed.
Regardless of the dearth of a brick-and-mortar restaurant, it is very important them that patrons are nonetheless served home-cooked, heat meals.
“I wish to present hospitality even in a industrial surroundings,” Leigha stated.
The Mendezes’ 4 kids are additionally concerned within the group of Arn’s BBQ. Annie, Maddie, Maverick and Cody assist their mother and father by placing collectively sandwiches, taking orders, giving out samples, and serving to with the stream of the queue. The youngsters stated that they love studying about entrepreneurship and enterprise administration.
Arnold and Leigha wish to be the go-to for Texas barbecue within the Flathead Valley.
“When somebody thinks of Texas barbecue, I need them to think about us,” Arnold stated.
Arn’s BBQ caters for weddings, festivals and different occasions, they usually have streamlined their course of to serve about 100 folks in 30 to 40 minutes. Arn’s BBQ plans to be at Underneath the Massive Sky Pageant in July and Kalispell Brewing Firm most Sundays between Might and August. Take a look at their web site for dates, instances and places at arnsbbq.com or go to their Instagram web page @ArnsBBQ
