Monk: As of Thursday at 8am, Mecklenburg County is enforcing a Stay at Home order effective until at least April 16. Thankfully, residents are still allowed to go to a restaurant “for take-out, delivery or drive-thru.” As hard as restaurants have already been hit, this will be even more of a blow for those that are trying to stay open through these weird times.
Thusly, if we are able, we should do all we can to support our local barbecue restaurants if we want them to still be around after the Covid-19 pandemic. Here’s a list of our five favorite Charlotte options based on our Charlotte Big Board.
Please note: As everything is pretty much a fluid situation these days, please call ahead or check on social media to ensure that the restaurant is open and serving.
1. Jon G’s Barbecue March 28th is sold out but stay tuned to their Facebook page for future events Link to Facebook page
3. Sweet Lew’s Barbecue (available curbside at Dish until Sweet Lew’s reopens on 5/7) Tuesday to Sunday, 11am to 8pm Call ahead to order: (704) 344-0343 (delivery also available)⠀
4. Midwood Smokehouse (Central Ave, Park Road, and Ballantyne locations only) Monday to Sunday, 11:00am to 8:00pm Link to order online
5. Bill Spoon’s Barbecue Monday to Wednesday, 10:30am to 3pm; Thursday to Saturday, 10:30am to 8pm Call ahead to order: (704) 525-8865
Name: Midwood Smokehouse Address: 540 Brandywine Rd, Charlotte, NC 28209 Order: Beef rib with collards and creamed corn, basket of hush puppies (link to menu) Pricing: $$
Monk: Somehow, it has been almost five years. That is, five years since we officially reviewed any location of Midwood Smokehouse, the standard bearer for Charlotte barbecue restaurants since we started the blog in 2012 and a regular go-to for the Barbecue Bros. In that time, they’ve opened two more stores: one in Huntersville north of Charlotte and the other in the back lot of the Park Road Shopping Center, which I’ve eaten at many times since opened in spring 2017 but somehow never thought (or remembered) to review. Regardless, I figured it was time to reassess Midwood Smokehouse in the current climate of Charlotte Barbecue.
If you are new to this blog or to Charlotte barbecue, you may not realize that there was a time not too long ago (way back in early 2011) where wood fired barbecue joints were nearly extinct in a town not really known for great barbecue to begin with. Then, Frank Scibelli along with Executive Chef and Pitmaster Matthew Berry opened their original Plaza Midwood location off of Central Avenue with its Oyler smoker imported from J&R Manufacturing out of Texas. I have always tried not to ding them too much for their overly Texas influence (though they do have eastern NC chopped pork and hush puppies on their menu), because the fact stands that they changed Charlotte barbecue for the better in May 2011 by reintroducing wood-smoked barbecue.
On my last visit, I went for it with the beef rib, a weekend special I had been wanting to try for a couple of years now. While it was a tad on the fatty side, it had great flavor and I liked the aggressive, peppery bark. It did come with a somewhat hefty $32 price tag, though I guess I can’t complain too much because Midwood doesn’t charge by the pound like most Texas joints. Had that been the case, this 1+ lb. rib surely would have resulted in a price tag closer to the $50 mark.
We got a basket of hush puppies for the table and they were a hit with the in-laws and the family. I’ve always been a fan of Midwood’s sides and their creamed corn and collards were solid as ever on this visit. The standard offering of pickles and onions (again, very much Texas-influced) were a nice touch to counteract the fattiness of the beef rib.
While a few places have opened in recent years that I might like just a little better (i.e. Noble Smoke and Sweet Lew’s BBQ), there’s something comforting knowing you can go to any Midwood Smokehouse location (four in the Charlotte area and one in Columbia) on any day of the week and get a consistently legit meal of wood-smoked barbecue. For that, they should be celebrated and not taken for granted.
Eater’s Dining on a Dime checked out the Austin taco scene a few years back to see whether its taco scene is actually better than its barbecue scene.
Description: This week on a bonus episode of Dining on a Dime from Austin, host Lucas Peterson forgoes Austin’s plentiful barbecue options to take himself on a taco crawl, sampling a few of the city’s best offerings. Watch the video above to follow him from Veracruz All Natural to Taqueria La Chilanga to Mellizoz Tacos.
Name: John Brown Smokehouse Address: 10-43 44th Dr, Long Island City, NY 11101 Order: 1/2 lb of burnt ends, 1/2 lb pork belly, and 1/2 lb pulled pork with corn bread and collards (link to menu) Pricing: $$
A quick work trip to New York City allowed me to accomplish a couple of barbecue-related things while in town (after finishing up my day job requirements, of course): try another New York barbecue joint to see how its barbecue scene continues to develop and also meet up with Sean Ludwig of NYC BBQ and The Smoke Sheet.
Regarding the latter, I had met up with Ryan Cooper (aka BBQ Tourist), the other half of The Smoke Sheet, last year in Charlotte so meeting Sean would complete my Smoke Sheet punch card. Turns out, Sean is also a great guy and I enjoyed “talking shop” regarding all things barbecue and how they run The Smoke Sheet. Sean is a thoughtful guy and gave me a lot of great things to think about when it comes to Barbecue Bros.
In terms of barbecue, I knew I would be limited when it comes to barbecue options after 8pm on a Monday night. Consulting with Sean ahead of time, we settled on John Brown Smokehouse in Long Island City since it’s open until 10 and was convenient to both my midtown hotel and Sean’s apartment. John Brown’s is a Kansas City-style barbecue joint that opened in 2012 and its co-owner and pitmaster Josh Bowen has also opened the Texas-themed Mothership Meat Company a few miles away, but that appears to be more of a warm weather patio spot.
Thankfully, John Brown Smokehouse was able to mostly deliver when it came to barbecue though some meats were understandably out by the time we get there (which is of course always preferable to serving old or not-up-to-par meats). Sean took the lead in terms of the order and we settled on a 1/2 lb each of burnt ends, pork belly, and pulled pork.
I’ll get the pulled pork out of the way since it was my least favorite of the three meats. John Brown Smokehouse served a coarsely chopped pulled pork that had good bark that surprisingly lacked much flavor.
The brisket is apparently not the order at John Brown and instead Sean recommended that we should go for the burnt ends. According to Sean, the brisket is sliced too thin while the burnt ends are taken from the fatty point of the brisket so you should just order them instead. Curiously, the burnt ends were not sauced as you might expect from a Kansas City joint but regardless, they were moist and flavorful.
I’m not sure if pork belly is typical at Kansas City barbecue restaurants or if this was a case of just wanting to have a variety of meats on John Brown’s menu, but it was yet another case of a successful protein available past 9. Similar to the other meats, it came sauceless but the well-rendered fattiness of the pork belly didn’t require any sauce.
Speaking of sauces, be sure to taste test your sauce bottles if you do go for sauce, as the highly spicy variant of the barbecue was mistakenly labeled and could have led to unexpected results had I been overly aggressive with the sauce.
In terms of sides, the cornbread is a must order at John Brown Smokehouse. Though its not a traditional cornbread cake, instead having a texture of a corn pudding. Moist and sweet, their version of cornbread was a different twist on cornmeal I hadn’t seen before that more than made up for their lackluster collards.
John Brown Smokehouse would have been forgiven for mediocre meats at a less-than-optimal time of day. Thankfully, they more than delivered a great meal on a rainy, nasty Monday night and I can imagine earlier in the day it would have been even better.
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