Barbecue, football, Kansas: Pitmaster threads it all together at New Orleans area joint
Late afternoon on a Thursday, and Smoked was running low on meats.
“We cook everything fresh in the morning and sell until we run out,” said Steve Mock, owner of the barbecue restaurant, which is sandwiched between a gas station and a bar in the sleepy New Orleans suburb of Harahan. “Usually that’s around 5 p.m., if not before.”
Mock had been up since 2:30 a.m., as he is every day that Smoked is open, cooking chicken, brisket and ribs. He hails originally from Lawrence, but Smoked isn’t Kansas City barbecue, exactly — something like a cross between Texas and KC styles.
Mock emphasizes brisket, a Lone Star State signature; he injects it with water and au jus to keep it tender. But the sauces he makes are tomato-based and somewhat sweet, comparable to what you’ll find in a lot of KC joints, and on Fridays he sells burnt ends, KC’s traditional barbecue dish.
“It’s all my family’s recipes — stuff my grandfather and dad and uncle taught me to do growing up in Kansas,” Mock said. “The sides are recipes from my grandma and mom and aunts. It’s been really well-received down here.”
Mock’s been living in New Orleans since a little after Hurricane Katrina. Prior to the storm, he’d built homes outside Lawrence. His wife was from Louisiana, so he came down after the hurricane to fix up homes. He ended up staying.
For years, he catered and cooked for others while holding down day jobs he didn’t particularly love. People often told him he should open his own restaurant. He wasn’t interested. Then, suddenly, he was.
“I ended up quitting my job as a supervisor at UPS one day,” Mock said. “I came home and told Maureen (his wife), ‘What if we opened a barbecue restaurant?’ She said, ‘Are you crazy?’ This is Louisiana, all we have down here is food.’
“But I said they don’t have good, real barbecue down here, like home-cookin’, mom-and-pop barbecue. And what’s the worst that can happen, it’s gonna fail? That was seven years ago.”
He opened Smoked in 2018 in an 800-square-foot space on Jefferson Highway and moved it to its current, larger location a few years later.
A healthy chunk of Smoked’s business comes from catering. About four years ago, the New Orleans Saints hired Mock to cook team meals a couple of times a month during the season.
“They eat a lot of food,” Mock said. “It’s like 100 pounds of brisket, 75 racks of ribs, 150 chicken quarters, lots of sides.”
The Saints contract led to a regular gig with the New Orleans Pelicans. He’s since cooked for other NBA teams, including the Houston Rockets and the Oklahoma City Thunder. “The word spreads in the league,” he said. “It’s just me and four employees here. So it’s been a blessing to get those deals.”
Mock’s restauant in Harahan is about a 20-minute drive from the Superdome, but fans here for the Super Bowl won’t need to travel that far to try his brisket. Last year, he partnered with the owner of Pour House, a bar with two locations in New Orleans. Smoked now has full kitchens in both spots, one of which is in the Superdome-adjacent Warehouse District.
Pour House is hosting a party for Chiefs fans the Saturday night before the Super Bowl — Mock said he’s been told several former Chiefs will be in attendance — and Mock is in charge of the food.
“It’s going to be 500, 600 pounds of brisket,” Mock said. “I’m gonna start cooking Monday to get them loaded up, and I’ll be cooking every day to keep up. But I’ll make sure they have a taste of KC down there.”
This story was originally published February 2, 2025 at 5:00 AM.