Robert Sietsema

Linkdown: 2/24/21

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment

Featured

After a few weeks in soft open mode, Sam Jones BBQ’s downtown Raleigh location has finally opened; the latest opening towards Raleigh staking its claim as a modern barbecue capital. Next up in some order is Ed Mitchell’s The Preserve, Wyatt’s Barbecue (from the team behind Picnic in Durham), Lawrence Barbecue, and Longleaf Swine. More coverage on Sam Jones BBQ can be found in this article from industry trade publication QSR Magazine.

In the next few months, a visit to Raleigh will certainly be called for, as our Capital brethren continue to beat out the Queen City in barbecue openings. Step up your game, Charlotte!

Native News

Robert Moss explores the origin stories of 5 southern sauces, including Scott’s Barbecue Sauce from Goldsboro which is available across the US thanks to its distribution via Wal-Mart

Moss went into even more detail in his weekly Cue Sheet newsletter

Jon G’s has your St. Patty’s Day dinner plans solved as they will be slinging cue from their food truck at Waxhaw Taphouse

Non-Native News

Sad news out of Memphis’s Rendezvous

“Black Smoke” author Adrian Miller will be on an online Zoom interview this Friday (2/26) with Delaware Libraries that is free to the public

La Barbecue is moving, and will have a lot more space to work with at their new location

Goldee’s Barbecue in Forth Worth gets some love from the Dallas Morning News

RIP to a Kansas City barbecue legend, L.C. Richardson

Robert Sietsema’s top pastrami in NYC may surprise you, as it comes from a barbecue joint and beats out the world famous Katz’s Deli

Just gonna leave this here

Linkdown: 1/12/21

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment

Featured

A couple of big barbecue books are now available for pre-order. “Rodney Scott’s World of BBQ” by Rodney Scott and Lolis Eric Elie will be released on March 16 and Adrian Miller’s “Black Smoke” from UNC Press will be out on April 27. Both are available for preorder now here and here, and I can’t wait to read both of them to get different perspectives on barbecue. I strongly encourage you to do the same. -Monk

Native News

Congrats to RayNathan’s in Gastonia on celebrating 2 years open as of this past Sunday

Wyatt’s Barbecue is one of Eater Carolinas’ 17 most anticipated restaurants in 2021

Non-Native News

More on the passing of the legendary Mike Mills

CM Smokehouse from Cade Mercer gives South Austin a new and promising food truck option

Texas Monthly makes the case for a barbecue tour of the Texoma region north of Dallas

Robert Sietsema recently posted this photo of Billy Durney of Hometown BBQ from happier times

Linkdown: 9/30/20

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment

Featured

ICYMI, check out our post this week where Garren and Kelly Kirkman of Jon G’s Barbecue describe what it’s like to open a barbecue restaurant in the middle of the pandemic

Native News

Charlotte-based Bojangles is adding barbecue to its menu for a limited time just in time for National Pulled Pork Day on October 12

Joe Biden made a stop at Mac’s Speed Shop while campaigning in Charlotte last week

Brisket is the order of the day in southeastern Virginia (with the best of the list actually coming across the border in North Carolina)

Non-Native News

Horn Barbecue hit a bureaucratic snag and hasn’t opened in Oakland yet, but when it does it may put Oakland barbecue on the map

Get to know Derrick Walker of Smoke-A-Holics BBQ

Seely’s Mil, the restaurant at the Beeman Hotel in Dallas, is getting serious about barbecue

Eater NY critic Robert Sietsema takes a bike tour of NYC brisket

Mmmm…brisket donut

Linkdown: 9/16/20

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment

Featured

Monk: When I moved to Charlotte in 2005, I was surprised at the lack of barbecue options in town. Though had I been paying attention then as I do now, it shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise. Mac’s Speed Shop was a fun option for awhile but eventually fell off a cliff after it jettisoned its original barbecue partner and began to expand too quickly. It wasn’t a few years living in Charlotte until I finally checked out Bill Spoon’s Barbecue on South Boulevard, and while the style of barbecue seemed out of place (eastern NC whole hog in the Piedmont?) it was clear to me that it was Charlotte’s classic barbecue joint.

Unfortunately, as of close of business today after 57 years in business, that will no longer be the case. It was announced on Facebook Monday by current owner Steve Spoon, who in 2006 bought it from his grandfather Bill and began operating the barbecue joint in much the same way he had since he opened it in 1963 (albeit in a different location than their current one on South Boulevard). Screw you 2020, and screw you COVID-19.

Kathleen Purvis summed it up perfectly with this poignant quote that doubles as a warning for us lovers of other classic joints: “If all the hard lessons of 2020’s season of terrible teaches us anything, it’s that: Those places don’t last, can’t last, if we don’t make sure of it.“

Charlotte Magazine’s Greg Lacour also pitched in, noting that the restaurant was struggling before COVID and had been operating in takeout only mode for the past few months

Sadly, its taken the restaurant closing for Charlotte to show up again

Native News

Seoul Food Meat Co will open a second location in the Optimist Park neighborhood (not NoDa as noted in their post) as part of an adaptive-reuse project called Lintmen’s

Bear’s Smokehouse BBQ is a small Connecticut chain that will open a Kansas City-style barbecue restaurant in Asheville’s South Slope

Non-Native News

Rodney Scott’s BBQ in Charleston has been getting a big bump from “Chef’s Table: BBQ”

Home Team BBQ’s smoked wings makes the list

The best barbecue options in Virginia, according to Virginia Living

Solinsky’s in the Catskills of New York is serving some “epic brisket”, says Eater NY critic Robert Sietsema

I like this guy’s style