Lucille's Smokehouse Bar-B-Que Menu With Prices (2026)

The Lucille's Smokehouse BBQ menu is the broadest of any barbecue chain in America, and that is deliberate. This is a full-service Southern restaurant that happens to smoke meat, not a barbecue joint that added a few extras — which is why the menu carries jambalaya, blackened catfish, a 14 oz New York steak and fried green tomatoes alongside the ribs. Here is every section with current prices, and an honest read on where the money is well spent.

How Lucille's is priced

Lucille's sits at the premium end of chain barbecue. It is a table-service restaurant with a bar, and the pricing reflects that.

Read the combo row carefully, because it is the most important number on this page. Lucille's two-meat combo at $29.99 is nearly double what Sonny's charges — and unlike most chains, Lucille's does not price multi-meat plates as a value item. Combos here are a way to eat more, not a way to spend less.

Slow-smoked bar-b-que — the core

This is what you came for, and it is genuinely good. Lucille's smokes in house and the ribs are the reason the chain has the following it does.

• Baby Back Ribs ($24.99) — The signature. Memphis-influenced, dry-rubbed, sauce on the side.
• St. Louis Spare Ribs ($23.99) — Meatier, a dollar cheaper, and the better rib for the money.
• BBQ Beef Ribs — Sold by the bone: 3 bones $24.99, 5 bones $28.99, 7 bones $31.99. The per-bone price drops from $8.33 to $4.57 as you go up, so the 7-bone order is by far the best value here.
• Texas Style Beef Brisket — 7 oz $18.99 or 10 oz $21.99. The larger portion is better value at $2.20/oz against $2.71.
• BBQ Tri Tip — 7 oz $20.99 or 10 oz $23.99. A West Coast cut you will not find at Southern chains.
• Smoked BBQ Half Chicken ($18.99) — The cheapest plate in the section.

BBQ platters and feasts

The BBQ Half Chicken & Two Meats at $23.99 is the anomaly — six dollars less than the two-meat combo and it includes a half chicken on top. If you want three proteins at Lucille's, order this rather than the Back Porch and save eight dollars.

The feasts work out to roughly $21–$25 a head, which is expensive against City BBQ's Motherload at about $7.90 or Famous Dave's All-American at about $14. You are paying for table service and a much wider menu.

Southern specialties — the part people forget

This section is what separates Lucille's from every other barbecue chain, and it is where the kitchen is arguably strongest.

If you are eating with people who do not want barbecue, this is why you pick Lucille's. No other chain covered on this site offers a 14 oz Angus steak, blackened catfish and jambalaya on the same menu.

Sandwiches and burgers

The cheapest way into the menu. Sandwiches run $10.99 to $16.99:

• Hot Link Sandwich ($10.99) — cheapest item
• Original or Memphis Style Pulled Pork ($11.99) — Memphis style comes with slaw on the bun
• Grilled Portobello ($11.99) — the one genuine vegetarian main on the menu
• Texas Style Beef Brisket ($12.99)
• BBQ or Cajun Chicken ($12.99)
• Southern Fried Chicken Sandwich ($13.99)
• BBQ Tri Tip ($14.99) / Marinated Sirloin Steak ($16.99)

Burgers run $10.99 (Garden Burger) to $15.99 (Smoked Brisket Burger), with the All American at $13.99 and three others at $14.49.

Appetizers

Lucille's runs a long starter list, and two items on it are the best-value barbecue on the whole menu:

• BBQ Rib Tip Appetizer ($13.99) — rib tips are the trimmings from the St. Louis cut. Same meat, same smoke, ten dollars less than a rib plate.
• Brisket Burnt Ends ($13.49) — the fatty point end, cubed and re-smoked.
• BBQ Rib Appetizer ($15.49)
• Lucille's Appetizer Platter ($21.99) — for a table
• BBQ Potato Chips ($5.99) — cheapest thing in the building
• Southern Fried Dill Pickles ($6.99), Fried Okra ($7.49), Fried Green Tomatoes ($8.49), Onion Straws ($9.49)

Ordering rib tips ($13.99) plus a side instead of a rib plate ($23.99) saves ten dollars for arguably more interesting meat. It is the single best-value order at Lucille's.

Salads, desserts and drinks

Salads run $13.99 to $16.49 — BBQ Chicken, Brisket Burnt Ends and Caesar at $13.99, up to Fresh Salmon Salad at $16.49.

Desserts are $4.99 to $5.99, and this is the strongest dessert list of any barbecue chain: Old-Fashioned Banana Pudding ($4.99), The Best Chocolate Cake Ever, Homemade Carrot Cake, Peach Cobbler, Snickers Ice Cream Pie and Chris' Famous Bread Pudding (all $5.99).

Drinks: refillable sodas and iced tea $2.99, fresh lemonade $3.99, peach or strawberry lemonade $4.79.

The biscuits

Worth its own mention. Lucille's serves complimentary made-from-scratch biscuits with apple butter at the start of every table-service meal. They are, for a lot of regulars, the best thing in the restaurant and they are free. Do not fill up on them, and do not skip them either.

Is Lucille's worth the price?

It depends entirely on what you want from the evening.

For barbecue alone, it is expensive. A pulled pork sandwich at $11.99 is $3.60 more than City BBQ charges, and the two-meat combo at $29.99 is nearly double Sonny's Pick 2 at $15.99.

For a group with mixed tastes, nothing else comes close. Lucille's is the only barbecue chain where one person can order baby back ribs, another a 14 oz steak, another blackened catfish and another a garden burger — with a full bar and table service. That range is the product.

What to order

First visit: St. Louis Spare Ribs ($23.99) — meatier and cheaper than the baby backs. Best value: BBQ Rib Tip Appetizer ($13.99) with a side. For a group of three: BBQ Half Chicken & Two Meats ($23.99), not the Back Porch. Best beef: 7-bone beef ribs ($31.99). And whatever else you do, take a dessert — this is the one barbecue chain where they are worth the calories.

What Lucille's actually smokes, and how

Lucille's runs wood-burning smokers in every restaurant and cooks overnight, which is unusual for a chain of this size. The influence is Memphis rather than Texas — ribs are the centre of the menu, they are dry-rubbed rather than sauced during the cook, and sauce arrives on the side in squeeze bottles at the table.

That matters for what you should order. This is not a beef house. The brisket is competent and the tri tip is genuinely interesting, but the kitchen is built around pork ribs, and everything else on the smoked side is secondary to them.

Sauce range

Lucille's puts several sauces on every table rather than running a wall like Mission BBQ. The spread typically covers a sweet original, a spicy version, a vinegar-forward Carolina style and a mustard sauce. Take the vinegar one for pulled pork and the sweet one for ribs — the standard pairings explained in the smokehouse guide hold here.

Ordering for a group

The feasts are the headline group option, but they are rarely the cheapest route. Here is the same food for six people, three ways:

That third row is worth reading twice. Two BBQ Half Chicken & Two Meats platters ($23.99 each) plus two rib tip appetizers ($13.99 each) feeds six people for around $76 — roughly 40% less than the Family Feast and with more variety on the table.

The bar

Lucille's is one of only three chains covered on this site with a full bar, alongside Famous Dave's and Sonny's. It runs a proper cocktail list, a bourbon selection and beer on tap. That is a large part of why the food is priced where it is, and it is the main reason to choose Lucille's for an evening rather than a lunch.

Timing your visit

Unlike counter-service chains, Lucille's cooks to order from a held supply, so meat quality varies less across the day than it does at City BBQ or Mission BBQ. Time your visit for the queue, not the food.

Calories, from Lucille's own published figures

Every number below is Lucille's own published calorie count for that item, not an estimate. The Cal column in the full menu further down this page carries the rest of them, section by section — and it is worth reading, because this is the chain where the intuitive guesses go most badly wrong.

Start with the sandwich pair, because it is the clearest thing on the page. The Original Pulled Pork Sandwich is 610 and the Memphis Style version 1,030 — same meat, same price, and the slaw and dressing on the bun account for a 420-calorie difference. If you want the Memphis build, order it knowingly. At the top of the section the Southern Fried Chicken Sandwich at 1,580 is the heaviest sandwich Lucille's publishes and beats the Smokehouse BBQ Bacon Burger at 1,410, which is not the order most people would predict.

The salads are not the light choice here. The BBQ Chicken Salad is 1,100 and the Chicken Caesar 1,110 — both higher than the brisket sandwich at 890, and within touching distance of the All American burger at 1,150. The Tri Tip Salad at 830 is the lightest of them. If you are ordering a salad at Lucille's to eat lighter, the pulled pork sandwich at 610 is the better move.

The starters deserve the same warning. Southern Fried Dill Pickles are published at 1,410 — the same as a bacon burger, from an item that reads as a snack — and the onion straws are 1,060 and the spinach and cheese dip 1,050. These are table-sharing portions, which is exactly how they should be treated. On the sweet end, the Old-Fashioned Banana Pudding is 1,310, the cheapest dessert on the list and the heaviest one published; the Snickers Ice Cream Pie is 1,080. Sharing one between two remains the sensible default, and now there is a number behind it.

Two gaps worth stating plainly. Lucille's publishes no calorie figure for its pork ribs — neither the baby backs nor the St. Louis spare ribs — so despite ribs being the centre of the menu there is no number to give you; the only rib figure the chain states is 710 for a three-bone order of beef ribs, the same as the smoked half chicken. And there is no published figure for the complimentary biscuits. The advice still holds — most tables get through three or four before the food arrives, and that is real bread on top of a large main — but we are not going to put an invented number on it.

Where Lucille's falls short

Three honest criticisms:

• Combos are not a value item. At almost every other chain, a second meat is the cheapest food on the menu. Here the two-meat combo at $29.99 costs more than two separate sandwiches.
• No by-the-pound counter. If you want to buy 5 lb of brisket to take home, this is the wrong chain — go to Dickey's or City BBQ.
• Brisket is not the strength. At $18.99 for 7 oz it is expensive for what it is. Order ribs, tri tip or the Southern specialties.

Who Lucille's is for

It is for an evening out with a group that does not all want barbecue, where someone wants a cocktail and someone else wants a 14 oz steak. Judged as a barbecue restaurant alone it is expensive; judged as a Southern restaurant with a serious rib programme attached, it is one of the better chains in America.