By the way, Ozersky seems to be generally a jerk. The Wikipedia entry on him says that “he has said in numerous public appearances that he disliked ‘food writing’ as such, and that his strongest influences have been G.K. Chesterton, Thomas Babington Macaulay, and A.J. Liebling.” Make that a *pretentious* jerk.

Similar story for Texas. Robb Walsh quotes Edgar Black on the change from BBQing forequarters to briskets in the 1950s, when the slaughtering business moved North.

Still, I’m kind of sympathetic to your view, at least with respect to Carolinians cooking Carolina BBQ. It does feel as though a kind of perfection has been achieved in the marriage of smoked pork with that old 4-ingredient sauce.

But Texas? Pfft. Their antisaucitism is merely a sign that they’ve still yet to discover a comparably impressive marriage of ingredients. (Though, New BBQy things like Franklin’s espresso sauce and the kind of coffee rub described in that link are pretty smart and a step in the right direction, I think.) I didn’t eat a burger when I was there, but I don’t imagine Texans insist on nothing but salt & pepper between their burgers & buns, do they?

And finally, the rest of the country needs New BBQ, if for nothing else than to avoid generic everything-to-everyone remixes of regional BBQ and the crappy BBQ establishments that follow.