Hoodoo Brown BBQ Serves a Smoked Cheeseburger On Sundays and It’s Awesome

I can count on one finger how many times I’ve had a smoked cheeseburger in our general area.

The smoked burger is seemingly elusive. My first came in 2019, in Irvington, at a BBQ joint that’s no longer there. I’m not saying it’s impossible to find one, I’m just saying it’s rare—that’s an on-purpose meat pun.

In Connecticut, two spots where you absolutely can find a smoky, beefy, beast of a burger, are Hoodoo Brown BBQ and Hindsight Barbecue that were both recently named in terrific piece on Texas Monthly (link HERE) that you absolutely should read.

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This very moment, however, is Hoodoo Brown focused. They posted their smoked burger a little over two months before the publication date of what you’re (hopefully) still reading right now. And one of the comments on that Instagram post by @smittysreviews hit the nail on the head, “Once you have a smoked burger, you don’t ever not want one.”

THAT.

So, I stopped by Hoodoo to dig a little deeper into how it came about and what goes into what now looks to be an every Sunday special.

According to the man that runs the place, Chris Sexton, Hoodoo’s smoked burger was created due to a combination of factors including having some killer ones when they’re on BBQ road trips and from wanting to use brisket trim in other creative, delicious ways.

“The ones we’ve had in Texas at LeRoy and Lewis Barbecue is really good, and Dayne’s (Craft Barbecue) when we were down there,” he says. “We were trying to find different ways to use our trim other than in sausage, like today we have a chili-cheese fries special, and it’s in the chili. The burger came as an outlet to use it in something that’s a little different and exciting.”

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But the crew also knew that the burger they used to have slowed the kitchen down, and what’s that about picky eaters?!

“We liked our burger before, that was just a chargrilled burger, but it slowed our ticket time,” Sexton says. “We can serve our Holy Texas Trinity (pound of brisket, two links of jalapeño cheddar sausage, rack of pork ribs, two pieces of cornbread) in a minute, but one burger ordered by one person at one table probably takes 12-14 minutes to put it all together. We only had it on the menu for that one picky person that didn’t want BBQ. We took it off to streamline service. But how about, instead of that, we find them some BBQ that they do like? Try to get that person to try the chicken or the pork, maybe the smoked Cobb salad, the chicken and waffles. We want kids to come in and eat pulled pork and mac and cheese, not chicken fingers, to spread the message of barbecue.”

And this smoked burger, and all that goes into it, certainly spreads the message of BBQ.

The brains behind the burger is pitmaster Tyler Hodge, who did plenty of R&D to come up with something that’s sure to result in a sellout every Sunday.

“It’s a fatty boy,” Hodge says. “It’s 100% brisket, mainly the point, a little bit of lean, and some hard fat. There’s no exact fat ratio. It just looks right, if that makes sense. I’d guess 70-30 or 75-25.”

Because it’s a brisket burger, each eight-ounce (or half pound) patty gets hit with Hoodoo’s own brisket rub (that definitely includes salt, pepper, and garlic powder) plus extra salt. Hodge mentioned that the house-ground beef sits out at room temperature so they form together before they’re formed, seasoned, then smoked for around three hours at 200 degrees.

“It’s just under three hours, cold smoked,” Hodge explains. “I hot smoked them the first time at 250, but they ate a little drier. I don’t really love thick burgers normally, but thicker plays better for smoking. They come out slightly smoky, and they’re smoked to medium rare, then we sear them in beef tallow.”

I mean…come on!

And that’s not all. Even the three-hour caramelized onions that come as a topping are slow cooked in beef tallow, plus there’s plenty of pickles, and just the right amount of messy drip from the melt of high-quality New School American Cheese and if they can’t get that, Cooper Brand Sharp White, and a special sauce that Hodge didn’t want to be too sweet. “It’s super simple,” he says. “It’s our house chili mayo that has a whole bunch of different peppers in there, our BBQ sauce, and the best mustard from Walter’s Hot Dogs.”

You can pick up your jaw now.

I’m not saying you should skip the other meats, by all means, get your fill, but if you can snag one of the 30 burgers available on a Sunday, you should absolutely do so.

FYI: Hoodoo Brown BBQ opens at 11:30. There’s no judgement if you’re standing outside the door 15 minutes early.

967 Ethan Allen Hwy, Ridgefield
203.438.6033, hoodoobrownbbq.com