With all due respect to Bob Garner, who I admire and who has a terrific new book out, the best book published to date on NC barbecue is Holy Smoke. My barbecue buddy John Shelton Reed, one of the book’s authors, alerted me to an opportunity to win a free copy this Friday (plus an apron!). Check out UNC’s Press’ page at http://uncpressblog.com/2012/07/03/free-book-friday-holy-smoke-edition/
Filed under: Swine Swag | Leave a comment »
Happy Fourth of July everyone! There are few things more American than Andy Griffith, who recently passed away in his beloved our beloved home state of North Carolina. I was trying to figure out an excuse to talk about Andy on this blog but it seemed like a stretch. I mean, what does Andy Griffith have to do with pork? Well, my good friend Eric “Cracklin’s” Calhoun answerwed that question for me with the following video. Take a look and pay your respects to the man who everyone loved and who helped give NC a good name (even if most of us have been subject to a handful of Mayberry-golly-gee stereotypes over the years!).
Andy, you’re an honorary BBQ Jew in my book. Rest in peace.
Filed under: Miscellaneous | 1 Comment »
There’s a new barbecue restaurant open way up north, the north part of the state that is. Robinson Ferry Restaurant & Spirits opened in Warrenton a week ago, and specializes in southern food including barbecue. I plan to try it soon but let me know if you’ve already been…
Filed under: Restaurants & Reviews | Tagged: Warren County, Warrenton | 6 Comments »
Like many underprepared minor league players before me, an injury-decimated major league squad had no choice but call me up. Or at least that’s my assumption.
I received an invitation to guest blog for the Southern Foodways Alliance during their summer of barbecue blogging. I can only assume this means that their starting bloggers all came down with swine flu, and nobody else was left. Or maybe there just aren’t many folks willing to write posts for someone else’s blog without pay. Either way, I’m happy to help, as the SFA is a spectacularly cool organization. Give them a Google if you don’t know what they do, and come on over and visit me and the other summer bloggers in the weeks ahead at http://southernfoodways.blogspot.com
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Everyone once in awhile I get an email that stands out from the dozens–okay, just two or three–that I get each week. Last week I got a note from someone I will call “Mike” because his name is Mike. I had no good answer for Mike and hope some of you loyal readers can help me out. Mike’s email follows verbatim (even his use of the word perspicacity, which I had to look up):
To my favorite parttime purveyors of pork perspicacity,
Filed under: Miscellaneous | 2 Comments »
McDonald’s dreadful McRib sandwich is under attack and so is all of western southern civilization: Burger King has announced its plans to bring, ahem, regionally inspired barbecue to the masses.
If Dickey’s Barbecue Pit is to BBQ what the Olive Garden is to Italian food, than Burger King must be Pizza Hut. The end is near my friends.
Don’t take my word for it? Look at this quote from Alex Macedo, Burger King’s senior vice president: “Barbecues are synonymous with summer; we gather together with family and friends to eat great food, and now Burger King offers guests a chance to sit back and let us take over the grilling.” Grilling, eh? Yeah, that about sums it up.
Filed under: 'Cue Culture | Tagged: Signs of aporkalypse | Leave a comment »
Christmas has come early for the BBQ Jew, in the form of a new Bob Garner tome.
Bob is already a cultural icon in NC and his latest work should add to his legend. So far I have just thumbed through, but Bob Garner’s Book of Barbecue has already earned the coveted BBQ Jew seal of approval as shown below. Buy a copy today at Amazon.com or your local bookstore if you still have one…
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Filed under: 'Cue Culture | Tagged: Words of wisdom | 1 Comment »
File this under “So Sad It’s Funny.” CBS Charlotte reports that Salisbury Police apprehended a man employed by a local barbecue restaurant for peeping on his mother-in-law. What’s funny about that? Well, it was the glorious stench of barbecue that helped police catch the criminal.
According to CBS Charlotte, the victim “told police that she smelled barbecue coming from outside her home. Knowing her son-in-law works at a local barbecue restaurant, she grew suspicious.” I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that the victim would prefer her son-in-law not refer to her as “mom.” Just a hunch.
You can’t make this stuff up, folks. God bless America and its muckraking journalists.
Filed under: BBQ in the News | Tagged: Salisbury, Sex, Shameless, Signs of aporkalypse | 1 Comment »
There is a cool class coming up in Durham for those of you who really want to go whole hog (or have a meat cleaver fetish) and learn how to butcher one. Only a couple of spots left in this June 27th class so sign up soon. On the other hand, if you think the whole (hog) is greater than the sum of its (pork) parts, you could skip the class and just put the whole hog on the cooker like they do in Eastern NC.
Filed under: Cooking, Hog Happenings | Tagged: Classes, Durham, Events | Leave a comment »
Southern Living, that bastion of southern culture as viewed through a sometimes snooty lens (a monacle?) is in its best down home mode with a “‘cue awards” feature, which is available for free online. North Carolina is well represented, as it should be, including in the cover page video that highlights Sam Jones of the Skylight Inn’s family dynasty as well as legendary pitmaster Ed Mitchell.
Features include “The South’s Best Butt,” which gives props to Allen & Son, Bunn’s, Jimmy’s, Lexington #1, and Red Bridges; my only real quibble with that list is that focusing on butts (shoulders, really) rules out all the great whole hog places down east, but at least they didn’t confuse butts and full hogs. On a low note, only one North Carolina sauce made the Southern Living best of list, and it’s from, gulp, Cary. It’s a shame that they didn’t include any NC classics; Scott’s sauce would have been worthy of inclusion, among others.
Another feature worth a chuckle is the barbecue personality test. Porky LeSwine scored a “Pitmaster,” which may be a bit of a stretch but reflects my barbecue fundamentalism. I’m not sure if “yankee” is another possible test result, though I sure hope so. Anyone willing to slander yourself?
There’s quite a bit of other content within the main ‘cue awards page, so you have my permission to leave BBQJew.com to browse awhile.
Filed under: 'Cue Culture | 3 Comments »
BBQ Jew 