Is this KC-area spot the world’s best barbecue? That’s for visitors to decide
Editors note: Welcome to KC’s Best Eats, a series where we explore the most iconic, beloved and tastiest spots in the metro. These restaurants are places you’d recommend an out-of-towner (say, someone who’s coming for the World Cup).
If you have a recommendation, email our reporter at jthompson@kcstar.com.
A note to non-locals: The average Kansas Citian is eager to debate where the best barbecue spot in the city is. So don’t ask if you’re not prepared for a passionate opinion.
“SLAPS BBQ in KCK is top for me!!!!!” wrote a Redditor on one of the many threads debating the topic. “I was halfway through a slab of their delicious ribs before I realized they had no sauce!!!!”
“Give me Arthur Bryant’s any day of the week, that’s my go-to,” asserted another. “Their sauce is my favorite in town, and they don’t mess around with their sandwiches, they stack those things high.”
“It’s trash compared to Wolfpack BBQ,” another shot back.
Nothing short of a civil war would settle the question that’s been simmering since burnt ends were first chopped and served at Arthur Bryant’s. But there is one spot that’s landed on more travel guides and “best of” lists than any other area restaurant in the past 10 years.
Locals will likely guess the answer correctly: It’s Joe’s Kansas City in its original gas station location at 3002 W. 47th Ave. in KCK.
A popular stop for tourists, the restaurant has captured the attention of Southern Living, TripAdvisor, Yelp, Food & Wine, The Eater and several others. Anthony Bourdain declared the spot to have the best BBQ in the world, and if the World Cup draws the visitors it hopes to, the world will soon weigh in.
‘Hard to beat’
What makes the high-traffic restaurant with gas pumps so good or — according to some passionate fans — the best in the world? If anyone can answer that question, it’s Jerry Taylor.
An employee since 2002, Taylor led The Star through a set of swinging back doors and into a concrete room with Southern Pride and Ole Hickory smokers, which quietly hummed and buzzed.
“That particular smoker’s been here longer than I have,” he said, pointing to one in the corner. “That is the OG of OGs.”
Today, Taylor is the operations manager.
Employees stood at a stainless steel counter nearby and covered St. Louis ribs, which will be cooked at 250 degrees for four to five hours, in a peppery red smattering of Joe’s all-purpose seasoning. An employee popped open a smoker door and showed a glistening stack of rotating meat.
Taylor said the ribs are supplied by Seaboard, which has a quality that’s “hard to beat.”
That all-purpose seasoning, by the way, is for sale by the bottle at the restaurant. Customers can find it on the same shelves as a selection of barbecue sauces.
“It’s good on everything,” Taylor said.
While the ribs cook, employees will check on them periodically.
Taylor led The Star down the stairs to another room with low ceilings and more smokers. Here, the brisket will cook at 180 degrees from 7 p.m. until about 9 a.m. the next day. The process flies in the face of the “hot and fast” motto of some competition barbecue participants.
Taylor attributes the consistency to owner Jeff Stehney, who’s been winning awards for his ‘cue since before Joe’s was conceived. Before Stehney opened his restaurant, he took home trophies at the American Royal Open and the Lenexa Kansas State BBQ Championship.
“Stick true to what your roots and where you got where you got,” Taylor said. “Low and slow was where it’s at.”
There’s no formula to barbecue, either. Knowing whether something needs a little more time on the smoker, more seasoning, or a couple more squirts of sauce is a sixth sense pitmasters must acquire.
“Pigs and cows, they’re all like humans,” Taylor explained. “Some walk around a lot more, so they’re a little bit on the leaner side. Then you got some that like to lounge around underneath the tree. They’re a little on the fattier side.”
Sticking a probe into a pig and deciding it’s done based on temperature isn’t the way. Does it feel done?
‘The mystique’
Perhaps just as iconic as the food is the space Joe’s resides in. Comedian Drew Lynch recently joked online that the gas station spot “feels like a trick that you do on tourists.”
“Go to a gas station. Get the freaking brisket. Try it,” he said, eliciting a chorus of laughs from the audience at Funny Bone.
But the offbeat atmosphere is attractive to the brand, despite its national acclaim.
“It’s the mystique,” Taylor said. “It has a little bit of this crazy story.”
In 1996, Joe Davidson opened Oklahoma Joe’s in Stillwater, Oklahoma, with the help of Jeff, who had decided to take his barbecue aspirations to the next level.
Meanwhile in Kansas City, Jeff and Joy desired to open something in the neighborhood convenience store on 47th Street, which had once housed a chicken restaurant.
The second Oklahoma Joe’s opened in KCK, replacing the chicken spot.
“This is where the cars would drive up to get their chicken,” Taylor told The Star during a recent visit. He pointed to the concrete curb inside the ground-level smoke room. The back room indeed looks as though a parking lot was encased in four walls and a roof.
As Joe’s grew, it took up increasingly more space. It commandeered the floor space where toiletries and snacks once lived. It crawled into the basement, which was once a liquor store.
Love for Joe’s ballooned, so much so that it couldn’t be contained to one building. Today, it serves thousands of customers a day across three locations.
“This building was not built or designed to do what it does, but we make it work,” Taylor said, crossing the rusty brown tile. “A lot of it was dictated by our business.”
While Joe’s offers pulled pork sandwiches, rib slabs and barbecue sausage, the Z-Man sandwich is easily the most popular, leaving its counterparts trailing far behind.
The sandwich has its own history, too. In 1997, just a year after Joe’s opened, sports radio host Mike Zarrick approached Jeff and his wife, Joy, about promoting their restaurant on-air. He was a major fan of Jeff’s food.
Jeff agreed, creating a sandwich with smoked brisket, smoked provolone cheese, onion rings and sauce on a kaiser roll.
It was named after Zarrick, aka “Z-Man,” and it quickly became a favorite.
‘By far’ the best
Even if fans will declare it, Taylor isn’t ready to say Joe’s is the world’s best. Perhaps humility is one ingredient in the recipe to success. He will concede, however, that it’s in the top three.
“Well, that’s always been the great debate — who’s the best in Kansas City,” he replied meekly after The Star posed the question. “There’s a lot of good barbecue places around Kansas City.”
But ask Aaron Bonham, who makes a stop at Joe’s every two months while he’s visiting Chillicothe, and he’ll say: “Yeah, by far. And I’m an expert.”
“Every time we come, we have to drive an hour and a half just to eat at Joe’s,” he continued, with sauce-covered barbecue on his plate. “It’s authentic as the day is long.”
The key, he said, is its sweet-and-spicy seasoning.
Even on a late Monday afternoon, lines stretched around the store. Another customer, Lee Howell, laughed nervously when asked if Joe’s was the world’s best.
“Oh, you’re gonna start a fight,” he said. “Everybody has their favorite, and honestly, I really do like this place.”
That said, he makes frequent stops at the restaurant, ordering whatever daily special is highlighted.
For pitmasters who’ve been scanning the page, searching for Joe’s secret to the perfect ‘cue, Taylor is happy to oblige.
“I got one word: patience,” he said. “You can’t rush it. I like to say, ‘Barbecue is not a robotic function. It’s an art.’ And there’s no other way to explain it.”
This story was originally published May 20, 2026 at 5:00 AM.