About Us

G’day, I’m Aaron Behrndt
from Smok’n’Steel.

our
Journey

I’ve been playing around with various forms of barbecue for most of my life from the burnt snag on a piece of steel over a wood fire, to gas grills and webers.

I stumbled across Texas offset style barbecues a few years back and instantly fell in love the mix of playing with meats, fire, smoke, beer and bourbon.

After playing around with a Hark offset for a couple of years I decided to get a new custom made bbq for home and as happens, the build got a little out of control. I went from trying to get a basic small family bbq built to ‘accidentally’ having the one we use today built.

Along the way we realised that at 800+kg it was a bit big to wheel around so we had it trailer mounted with sinks, water tanks and a gas hot water service.

It was at this point I decided that I might as well see what was involved in turning my hobby into a business. 6 months later with the help of the local council and the support of our fantastic family and friends, Smok’n’Steel was launched part time and has been rapidly growing ever since.

The
Apprentice

I think now would be a good time to introduce my daughter Belle who has been at the helm with me since the very first event we did when she was just 9 years old. She has been such a major part of this whole crazy adventure and I really don’t think I would have gotten this far or had as much fun without her by my side.

THe
CUrveball

Fast forward to March 2020 and a job redundancy due to COVID saw me deciding it was time to have a real crack at making it my full-time job and I haven’t looked back since.

Along the way we have upgraded from our little single axle bbq trailer and marquees to a 7m long mobile bbq kitchen with mobile cold room and refrigerated truck regularly catering events at well over 1500 serves per day.

Now in 2022 we have been operating for over 5 years and Smok’n’Steel is Cairns longest running low’n’slow bbq vendor.

We now travel all over Queensland servicing all sorts of events like bbq competitions, rodeos, motor racing, food festivals and much, much more.

We also cater weddings, functions, events and any other kind of celebration you can think of.

Belle and I look forward to meeting you somewhere out and about on the road.

Book us for your event!