“TEXAS STYLE BARBECUE,” read the window signs by the entrance to Andrew and Michelle Muñoz’s Lincoln Heights restaurant. Those three words only tell the beginning of the story. Forays into barbecue during business trips to Dallas over the last decade sparked Andrew’s interest in smoking meats. In his East Los Angeles backyard, he taught himself to emulate the slowly blackened brisket, caked in coarse pepper and salt, that epitomizes Central Texas barbecue — a once-obscure art that is a global obsession in the new millennium. In 2017 he grew his hobby into an underground pop-up. Matched with Michelle’s sides (creamy, punchy esquites; beans seasoned with stray bits of brisket) and the sausages she perfected using flavor boosts like roasted poblanos and queso Oaxaca, Moo’s Craft Barbecue made a commotion. Their restaurant, with a bar that focuses on local craft beers, opened last year. The line from the ordering counter usually stretches through the dining room and out the door.

So yes, Andrew rightly acknowledges the Lone Star roots of his craftsmanship. He renders brisket nearly to pudding; the meat on his pork ribs, with their barky crust, nicely tugs back a little. But their efforts are not solely about homage. They’ll glaze pork belly burnt ends with gochujang as a special, and the tres leches strawberry bread pudding served on the weekends sells out fast. The thick, campfire-scented burgers have their own cult. On the shoulders of Mexican and Indigenous pit-cooking traditions and the Black barbecuers who arrived in Southern California as part of the Great Migration, the Muñozes are setting the tone for a new school of Los Angeles barbecue.

• 2118 N. Broadway, Los Angeles, (323) 686-4133, mooscraftbarbecue.com