A genuine Texas dive west of Fort Worth serves brisket and burgers on a rural backroad

Most restaurants serve burgers and short-order grill cooking.

Either that, or barbecue.

But rarely does a restaurant serve both.

When somebody does, that’s an opportunity for new combinations.

And that’s one reason to find the Dead End Trading Post.

Another reason, of course, is simply to go to a barbecue dive bar-and-grill on a dead-end road out in the country at an RV park 3 miles west of Loop 820.

When you’re this far out of town at a genuine Texas roadside hole-in-the-wall, you can order strange things like burger sliders topped with brisket, barbecue sauce and jalapenos, or potato skins with smoked turkey, queso and pico de gallo.

In fact, you can order just about anything you can find at other burger grills. But then you can cover it with brisket, barbecue sauce, queso, pico de gallo, jalapenos and everything else Texans love.

Let’s just say the Dead End Trading Post, 10250 Western Oaks Road, is a freewheeling kind of place.

It’s an RV park with a restaurant-bar and patio open daily, with music some nights.

It’s off Silver Creek Road in rural western Tarrant County, serving the same Azle-Lake Worth-Westpoint-White Settlement community that used to go to Billy’s Oak Acres BBQ, which has moved several times and is now in Eastland.

In a previous life, the Dead End was the BBQ Ranch, a decent old-school backroad barbecue place which opened just when barbecue crowds were crazy for something more flashy.

Now, the Dead End is back serving the same barbecue — $12.95 sandwich platters, $17-$24 dinners, $20-$24 for a pound of ribs or brisket — and adds hand-packed burgers, cheesesteaks and, well, whatever you dream up.

The brisket-burger sliders are the size of small cheeseburgers, topped with queso and grilled onions.

Smoked turkey or brisket were good choices on potato skins and they also would fit in the quesadillas. Or try one of the two kinds of sausage.

Or maybe make a Philly cheesesteak, but with smoked brisket or turkey?

It’s barbecue and burger anarchy.

The only fail was the chips and watery salsa. But the queso made up for that.

The homemade banana pudding was better than it needed to be. Cobbler was also on the menu.

Dead End is open for lunch and dinner Thursdays and Fridays, breakfast through dinner Saturdays and Sundays.

Take Loop 820 West to the Silver Creek Road exit and turn west to Western Oaks Drive; 817-980-3448, deadendtradingpost.com.