Dayne's Craft Barbecue.

Dayne's Craft Barbecue

Dayne Weaver cooks pork belly on the same schedule as his briskets and sells it as bacon brisket, off a five-hundred-gallon offset a man in Saginaw welded for him.2

Why go

Weaver taught himself out of barbecue books and videos, selling out of his backyard in White Settlement, then a trailer, then a pitch at Lola's Trailer Park in Fort Worth's Cultural District, and in 2023 took a 2,700 square foot building in Aledo with crooked old wooden floors and pecan trees out the back.45 Texas Monthly put the room seventh in the state in 2025, and D Magazine's North Texas guide ranks it seventh too.18 Everything runs on post oak, with pecan mixed in at times, through a five-hundred-gallon offset smoker built by El Cucaracho in Saginaw.2 The sausage programme is the other half of the case: Weaver used to air-dry links for a couple of days before smoking them, decided you were always chewing on the casings, and now cold smokes them, chills them again and finishes them on the smokers before service.2

Order this / avoid

• Order: the bacon brisket. Weaver on what happens to the bellies: by the end of it, they just think they're a brisket.2
• Order: the black-bark brisket and the pork ribs, which Vaughn calls done to perfection.1
• Order: a blueberry and Gouda sausage, or the jalapeño-Havarti. Vaughn calls the sausage programme one of the more creative ones in the state.1
• Order: the OG Burger, ground from brisket trim, which Vaughn says might be adored more than the Texas trinity here. Fort Worth Magazine called the smashburgers the best in the city.16
• Order sides properly: Frito-pie beans and Flamin' Hot street corn on one side, apple slaw and broccoli-grape salad on the other.1
• Finish on the bourbon banana pudding. Vaughn says to save room for it.1
• Avoid: the weekend if the line matters to you.4

What locals & experts say

• Daniel Vaughn, Texas Monthly, number 7 in Texas, 2025: The black-bark brisket and pork ribs are done to perfection.1
• Dayne Weaver, on the night that changed how he cooks, after Joe Zavala invited him into the Zavala's pit room in December 2017: That was kinda my eye-opening moment with Texas barbecue, spending the whole night drinking Lone Stars with the Zavala's guys.2
• Ashley Weaver, co-owner, on how the kitchen runs: Dayne didn't learn from anybody else. He learned from self-experience, and then he taught me, and then he taught our pitmasters. And now we're continuing to share that knowledge with our employees.4
• Ashley Weaver, on getting a table after the ranking: We do call Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays our local days because that's when locals know they don't have to fight the crowds.4
• Dayne Weaver on the Aledo building: It's got these cool old, slightly crooked wooden floors that you just don't see anymore.5

Good to know

• It trades like a restaurant, not a sellout queue. Five days a week, all day, which Fort Worth Magazine calls a rarity among top-ten Texas joints.4
• The staff is the reason the wait is short, about thirty-five people including eight or nine pitmasters.4
• Breakfast runs later in the week, kolaches and brisket, egg and cheese tacos.1
• The big order is the Fort Worth the Wait platter, $95 as Vaughn priced it in 2025: half a pound each of brisket, turkey, pork ribs and pulled pork, two house sausages and five small sides.1
• Specials are where the kitchen plays, peach cobbler burnt ends and pork belly lumpia among them.1
• Dayne and Ashley Weaver met at a car dealership in 2012, she on reception and he selling.4

Verdict

must-visit — A pork belly rubbed, smoked and rested alongside the briskets until it behaves like one, out of a five-hundred-gallon offset a man in Saginaw welded, in a room that trades like a restaurant rather than a sellout queue. Order the bacon brisket, the black-bark brisket and the blueberry-Gouda sausage, and put the OG Burger on the table for whoever came along.