Esaul and Grecia Ramos, the husband-and-wife team behind San Antonio's 2M Smokehouse, are the first-ever champions of Food Network's new competition series Pitmasters, taking home a $30,000 grand prize after beating out eight other two-person teams from barbecue joints across the country. The couple entered the tournament as a pitmaster and a pastry chef from San Antonio, and they left it as the faces of a citywide celebration.
According to the San Antonio Current, Esaul Ramos is the pitmaster at 2M Smokehouse, while Grecia Ramos owns Baked by Chef Grecia Ramos, a bakery in Castroville, Texas, where she makes sweet desserts from scratch. Together they are described as Michelin-recognized pitmasters who set out to bring their two culinary worlds together and represent their food and their city. In the finale, Team Ramos defeated Canadian chefs Connie DeSousa and John Jackson, co-owners of Calgary's Charcut Roast House, in a full-day, five-course live-fire culinary battle, according to the San Antonio Report.
A Five-Course Finale Blending Smoke and Pastry
The winning menu crafted by Esaul and Grecia Ramos leaned hard into the couple's combined strengths, featuring date-inspired grilled oysters with chorizo, duck carnitas with esquites, smoked shrimp aguachile, black-garlic-seasoned ribeye with porcini mushroom soup, and a smoker-baked concha served with café de olla, per the same report. That final course, a Mexican sweet bread typically baked in an oven, instead came out of a smoker, a detail the dossier's research notes tied to the flexibility that resonated with judges even after the team navigated unexpected setbacks during the day, including lost tortillas.
Food Network's inaugural season of Pitmasters, which premiered on July 13, 2026, required nine two-person teams to endure eight grueling live-fire challenges over 11 days of filming, including underground pit cooking and whole-hog preparation, according to Texas Public Radio. The competition was evaluated by a four-judge panel consisting of television host Andrew Zimmern, pitmaster Moe Cason, live-fire expert Jess Pryles, and regional Texas pitmaster Ernest Servantes, co-owner of Seguin's Michelin-recognized Burnt Bean Co., according to Food Network.
San Antonio Watches, Then Celebrates
San Antonio locals watched the 2M team compete on a weekly basis throughout the season, and a large San Antonio crowd cheered Team Ramos during the finale broadcast. Fans, family and local chefs gathered for a watch party at McIntyre's Southtown sports bar the night of the finale, where the couple addressed the crowd live after the broadcast, the San Antonio Report reported. 2M Smokehouse employees were among those supporting Esaul and Grecia Ramos as the results came in.
Esaul and Grecia Ramos said winning Pitmasters still doesn't feel real, according to the Current. They said the win belongs to the San Antonio community, and they hope it represents the city's creativity, culture and talent. The couple has described their goal throughout the season as representing 2M Smokehouse and bringing the championship home to San Antonio.
From a Southeast Side Smokehouse to National Television
High school friends Esaul Ramos and Joe Melig originally opened 2M Smokehouse in December 2016 on South W.W. White Road, naming the business in tribute to their grandmothers' maiden names, Marquez and Melig, according to MySA. Ramos had refined his barbecue technique in Austin under renowned pitmaster John Lewis at La Barbecue before bringing his signature South Texas and Tex-Mex style, including serrano-Oaxaca cheese sausage and beef-tallow flour tortillas, to San Antonio. The restaurant now sits at 2731 S. W.W. White Road.
This was not Esaul Ramos's first turn in front of Food Network cameras. He previously reached the final round of Food Network's Chopped: Grill Masters - Texas in August 2018, but he declined subsequent solo competition offers until producers invited him to compete alongside his wife, per the San Antonio Report. Prior to the Pitmasters appearance, 2M Smokehouse had already earned nominations for the James Beard Foundation Award for Best Chef: Texas in 2020 and 2022, along with a recommendation in the inaugural Texas Michelin Guide.
An Expanding Footprint Beyond the Smokehouse
The Pitmasters win arrives as 2M Smokehouse has been building out its commercial presence well beyond its original Southeast Side location. In January 2026, the restaurant announced plans for a $450,000 expansion to establish a location inside Terminal B at San Antonio International Airport, a sign of the brand's growing footprint under the couple's broader hospitality operations. The restaurant's barbecue has also drawn attention at statewide events, including Arlington's Lone Star Smokeout festival earlier this year.
For a restaurant that Hoodline once listed among San Antonio's top barbecue spots, the Pitmasters title caps a run that Esaul and Grecia Ramos frame as belonging to the whole city rather than just to them. As the first-ever Pitmasters champions, the couple now carries that distinction alongside the James Beard nods and Michelin recognition already attached to the 2M Smokehouse name.
