This is Highly Recommend, a column dedicated to what we’re eating, drinking, and buying.
On a Friday night in Brooklyn, the line at Bark BBQ snakes through long communal tables, past a glass-enclosed show pit, and out onto the sidewalk, where the rich scents of oak-smoked beef and pork fill the air. If you didn’t arrive hungry, you certainly are by the time you reach the order counter.
Once you get a taste of pitmaster Ruben Santana’s 14-hour smoked brisket, with its peppery bark and butter-soft interior, you’ll forget the wait. Sour orange-kissed chicharrón—pit-smoked for six hours, chilled, sliced into strips, and fried to order—provides a crackly-chewy counterpart. Smoked carnitas, a play on Dominican carne salada made from brisket trimmings confited in their own fat, are a study in silky-fatty goodness, doused with spicy green aji verde. Each meaty platter arrives with a small mound of bright, house-pickled bell peppers that I wanted to bring home in an extra-large jar.
Perhaps the most unique item, though, is the daily Cerdo a la Leña, a Caribbean-style whole hog that’s marinated in sofrito for two days before it reaches the low-country smokers. Rather than being pulled or shredded, the pork is quartered, its skin rendered crisp in the oven throughout the day, and then chopped to order by weight and dressed with a South Carolina-style vinegar sauce.
Pulling from his Dominican upbringing in Queens, Santana has done what often feels impossible in this oversaturated city — created a fresh culinary mash-up. After studying Central Texas barbecue online and on TV, Santana began infusing his classic Southern meats with the Dominican flavors of oregano, sofrito, adobo, sour orange, molasses, honey, and achiote.
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The business began as a pandemic pop-up, which then grew into a Time Out Market stall, which then ballooned into this 8,000-square foot meat emporium in Bushwick. Here, with help from six custom Cen-Tex smokers (four offsets, two low-country) imported from Luling, Texas, Santana’s process begins at 5 o’clock every morning and lasts until the final piece of brisket comes off the smoker at 10 p.m.
The sides, Santana says, offer the most direct connection to his upbringing. Earthy and aromatic arroz congrí follows a recipe from his Cuban uncle. Rich criollo BBQ beans are simmered in adobo and barbecue sauce with a bit of pulled pork. Maduros nail that perfect fried sweet plantain texture: caramelized on the outside, tender on the inside. For dessert, Torta Dominicana reimagines cornbread as a warm, spiced cake soaked in honey butter. Bark also boasts a full bar offering cocktails and meat-specific wine pairings—a rare move for a barbecue joint.
And then there’s the colmado. Modeled after the classic corner stores that serve as social and cultural hubs for neighborhoods in the Dominican Republic, Bark’s ode features lit-up shelves lined with classic snacks like Guarina crackers, Hojuelitas, and Princesa cookies. A collection of vintage vinyl signals the DJ sets and live merengue performances that sometimes take place here, and a poster-sized ’80s-era photograph of Santana’s late mother in full dance regalia watches over the whole scene.
Can I tell you this is the best barbecue in New York? I’m not sure I’m qualified to make that statement. But I can tell you, as a born Southerner with a deep interest in such things, that it’s my favorite in New York, not to mention some of the most personal and delicious barbecue I’ve tasted anywhere.
