The ribs are selling fast on an August afternoon. Within 12 minutes they are down to their last half rack. Garrett Linebaugh, the 16-year-old owner and cook, is slicing into tri-tips and plating other menu items alongside his mother while his sister takes orders from a consistent line of hungry customers. 

Linebaugh, of Powell, is the owner and cook of WYTEX BBQ, which has operated since July. The food trailer is the culmination of three years of barbecuing; it's taken about that long to figure out his preferences, he said while working inside the trailer in the parking lot of Sage Brews, Wines and Spirits.

All the dishes at WYTEX are homemade, all the way down to the spices. His goal is to sell restaurant quality food out of a food truck.

“I like working for myself, and a lot of people nowadays get too caught up in the money in the food business, but for me it wasn’t ever really much about the money, it’s just fun to do, it’s always been a hobby of mine,” Linebaugh said. 

Despite making everything fresh he said he is still able to keep his prices competitive.

“He likes cooking good food for great people,” his mother Julie added while helping with orders. It's a slogan used on a wooden menu that travels with the truck, although he didn’t bring it that night. 

Linebaugh has been cooking since he was about 10 years old when he would cook burgers for barrel races his mom would organize at their house. Then he started researching barbecue and began to do that, he said.

The fastest meat dish on the menu, his bacon wrapped chicken breasts, take about one hour to smoke and the tri-tip takes about three hours. The brisket is a much more time-consuming process.

This summer Linebaugh has tried to be open for business about three times a week, and it takes several hours to prep the truck for each outing, he said. Despite the time commitment Linebaugh will still be open during the school year — his homeschooling allows him some flexibility. His goal is to run the food truck through high school, with the view to potentially opening a restaurant down the line. 

He has enjoyed some success since opening, selling out every day at this year’s Park County Fair, but on this Thursday the customers are coming in droves.

As Linebaugh’s standing near the cutting board, his sister prepares to take orders from a second wave of customers, and it only takes Linebaugh a second to pick this day as a standout in his young career.

“Today is a pretty standout moment because I’ve never had this (crowd) in Powell before, so this is pretty cool, but every day is a standout moment,” he said. “Just to be thankful and to be able to have the opportunity to do this.”