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Kansas City has more than 100 barbecue restaurants, plus the World Series of Barbecue competition and the Barbecue Hall of Fame.
Barbecue Museum
People have been cooking over open fires for at least 780,000 years. Even today, few can resist the enticing aromas and umami-rich flavors of tender baby back ribs or melt-in-your-mouth brisket.
Now a new museum will celebrate America’s long love affair with fire- and smoke-kissed meat. Next spring the Barbecue Museum is scheduled to open in Kansas City, Missouri, a place famous for its thick, sweet-spicy sauce and burnt ends.
According to one announcementthe new location will be the world’s first museum dedicated to barbecue. The museum is co-founded by Jonathan Bendera food writer and barbecue judge, and Alex Pope, a chef-owner whole animal butchery.
Visitors will be able to explore two different “storytelling trails” covering a total of 4,223 square feet, according to the announcement. First, they learn about the various components of barbecue, including meat, rubs, spices, sauces, wood, fire and smoke, and learn how chefs transform these basic elements into succulent dishes.
Then they explore four key regions of American barbecue – the Carolinas and Texas, and Memphis and Kansas City – and see what makes each one unique.
“Barbecue is meant for sharing,” says Bender KCTV‘s Ryan Hennessy. “It is meant to be experienced together, and this museum is designed to help you connect with both the elements and regions of barbecue, of which Kansas City is the epicenter.”
The little ones can also play in a ball pit-like area designed to look like a giant pot of grilled beans, according to the Kansas City starby David Hudnall. That area will also feature custom bean artwork and bean puns.
“We saw this as a natural fit, so that children and adults could experience it together,” says Bender Startland news‘Joyce Smith.
To complete the experience, visitors can browse the gift shop for rubs, sauces, aprons, shirts, hats and other barbecue-themed items.
Before it opens in spring 2025, visitors will be able to view a miniature replica of the new museum. Barbecue Museum
The museum will open in the city in the spring of 2025 Crown Center shopping and entertainment area. It will be near the National WWI Museum and Memorialthe Sea Life Kansas City Aquarium and the Legoland discovery centeramong other attractions.
In the meantime, visitors can view a miniature version of the museum near the planned entrance.
Today, Kansas City is home to more than 100 barbecue restaurantsplus the World series barbecue competition and the Barbecue Hall of Fame. The roots of barbecue in the Midwestern city date back to the early 20th century, when a black chef named it Henry Perry came from Memphis and started cooking meat in a stone-lined hole in the ground. Perry called himself the ‘Barbecue King’ Kansas City star‘Michael Wells.
Perry cooked everything from possum and raccoon meat to pork and mutton. Whatever he prepared, his barbecue “had a smell that stayed with you. And that’s what made them want to come back to him,” said historian Sonny Gibson KCUR‘s Mackenzie Martin in 2021.
“They traveled from Leavenworth, Kansas, and Omaha, Nebraska,” Gibson added. “They just came down to eat his food.”
From there, the city’s rich barbecue traditions grew second wave of pit masters help cement its place in culinary history.
“Kansas City is a natural home for the Museum of BBQ,” Bender said in the announcement. “Barbecue is synonymous with the city because of the rich traditions here.”
