John Lewis

Linkdown: 10/8/14

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– Congrats to Marie, Let’s Eat! on their 300th barbecue review, Blind Pig in Jackson, GA

– The NC Whole Hog Champion was crowned after this past week’s championship in Raleigh, and congratulations to Grillfather Cooking Team of Roanoke Rapids, captained by Ernest Twisdale

– A man and his two sons also participated as contestants in the Whole Hog Barbecue Championship this past weekend in Raleigh

– Charlotte Observer writes up next week’s Q City Charlotte BBQ Championship, which for the first time this year is a NC BBQ Association event

– Uncle Ho nears the opening day of Arrogant Swine

The first issue was getting my hogs. I have specific heritage breed pigs shipped up from North Carolina. Getting the logistics set up for them to arrive in time for me to cook is harrowing indeed. There’s really no last minute supplement either—it’s not like I can wander into any random supermarket and pick up a 200-pound pig if my delivery falls through.

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Cook too much and you waste money. Cook too little and you not only lose sales, you also sour relationships with customers who made the trip to see you. It’s basically spinning a roulette wheel with over $20,000 all on red. If that’s thrilling to you, you’re in the right place. I, on the other hand, needed a midwife next to me reminding me to breathe while placing my orders.

– Congrats to BSA Troop 33 for winning Creative Loafing’s Critic’s Choice for Best Barbecue (huh?); meanwhile, Midwood Smokehouse wins the reader’s choice for best barbecue

– The Great NC BBQ Map gets more coverage, this time from Paste Magazine

– Mac’s Speed Shop buys a former auto shop in Greensboro and plans to expand there

– Charlotte Business Journal interviews Mike and Anna Hicks, owners of Carolina BBQ in Spartanburg, SC

– Here and Now reports on how politics and barbecue are intertwined in North Carolina

– Scott’s Bar-B-Que gets mentioned in yet another barbecue list (via)

– John Lewis of la Barbecue to open a barbecue restaurant called Lewis Barbecue in Charleston next spring and as a result I just so happen to be planning a trip to Charleston for the late spring/early summer

– Speaking of John Lewis and Charleston, this:

– Charlotte, NC is the #1 “Best Big-City Bargain” according to Money Magazine and Midwood Smokehouse gets a brief shoutout

 

Linkdown: 7/16/14

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– Our State’s latest in the barbecue profile series Carolina ‘Cue is Hursey’s Bar-B-Q in Burlington (our review here)

Hursey’s Bar-B-Q in Burlington has a tale like this to tell. In the mid-’40s, patriarch Sylvester Hursey and a good friend were engaged in a night of bacchanalian revelry — they had a little party that got out of hand — and at some point it seemed like a good idea to find a pig and cook it, so that’s what they did. I imagine them in the still heat of a Carolina summer’s night, climbing over a splintered wooden fence and into the pigpen. The moonlight broke through the limbs of the giant oak and shone on the chosen pig, as big as any pig there ever was, and the two of them wrestled with it into the night, coming this close to losing their own lives in the process, but finally emerging victorious. They had their pig, and then they dragged it halfway across Alamance County and fired up the pit and cooked it.

– Indy Week reviews Ed Mitchell’s Que, saying it “lives up to the hype”

– Durham restaurant Piedmont is hosting a whole hog barbecue dinner next Thursday (h/t bbqboard)

– Eater guide to where to eat barbecue around Atlanta

– Also, some Eater photos from Heirloom Market on a Wednesday at 11:35am

– The latest update on The Great NC BBQ Map states that the maps will mail out the week of 7/28-8/1 to all Kickstarter backers; also, they have a new logo

– Really hate that I missed the first SC-TX BBQ Invitational because it sounds like it was legendary; no seriously it looked epic

Rodney Scott we love you and your pulled pork, but we must concede the star of yesterday’s SC-TX BBQ Invitational was clearly John Lewis of Austin, Texas’ La Barbecue. The man’s beef brisket was O-face-inducingly good (I saw more than one pair of eyes roll back into eaters’ heads). And the pit master’s presence was all thanks to the members of Charleston Brown Water Society (CBWS), whose Holy City Brewing hoedown came off smokingly well, despite intermittent rain threats.

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Linkdown: 6/25/14

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– While the newest incarnation of the Hornets opted not to use Alexander Julian as a free consultant to help design their new uniforms, he designed the original ones in exchange for barbecue

Julian was already a standout in the design world because of his “Colours” collection of men’s clothes when Shinn asked him in the 1980s to come up with the Hornets’ original uniforms. Julian said he would do it if Shinn would ship five pounds of barbecue to his house in Connecticut every month – “Carolina caviar,” as Julian called it.

“I had no idea that an expansion team uniform was going to sell as much as it did,” Julian said. “I was really dumb. I didn’t know what I was giving up. I normally get a five percent royalty. The reports I saw was that they sold over $200 million worth of stuff. So I traded $10 million for some barbecue. George got rich, and I got fat.”

– Stamey’s was featured on the Cooking Channel show “Man Fire Food” (via bbqboard) yesterday

– Well this sounds promising:

– Yet another list of best barbecue joints in America, this time from Smart Travel list (via Huffington Post). At least it’s pretty accurate for NC, both in the description of east vs. Lexington styles as well as the joints they choose

Where to Get It: Our resident North Carolinian editor says Allen & Son in Chapel Hill is quintessential, with large brick pits out back and telltale checkered oilcloth on the tables inside. Skylight Inn in Ayden earns Southern Living‘s high praises for its whole-hog approach. Locals laud Lexington Barbecue‘s wood-smoked, ketchup-laced pork shoulder; a roll to heap it on will cost you $0.17 extra, and some Cheerwine (a super-carbonated cherry soda native to the area) is the only proper accompaniment.

– From a few weeks back, Daniel Vaughn (aka bbqsnob) had the good fortune to explore whole hog barbecue through tasting it from Ed Mitchell, Samuel Jones, and Rodney Scott at The Big Apple BBQ event earlier this month

– Robert Moss explains smokers across the south in this article for Serious Eats (via)

– 8 Things to Eat at a Charlotte Knights game includes two barbecue items from Queen City Q – a pulled pork potato and a pulled pork sandwich

– Q4Fun figures out which beers from NoDa Brewing pairs best with various barbecue dishes

  • Pulled pork
  • Mustard sauce – Ramble on Red – counterbalances the acidity – competing flavors 
  • Vinegar sauce – Ramble on Red or Cavu 
  • KC style sauce – Hop Drop ‘n Roll 

– This Fourth of July, feel free to go with slaw as a side dish at your cookout

“Slaw is universal,” says John Shelton Reed, author of “Holy Smoke: The Big Book of North Carolina Barbecue .” “Slaw is part of the deal unless you ask not to have it.”

– Well this looks amazing: John Lewis of la Barbecue and Rodney Scott of Scott’s Bar-B-Que to smoke barbecue together in Charleston; too bad its on a Sunday and during the World Cup Final