TMBBQ

Linkdown: 5/27/15

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– TripAdvisor has come out with their annual huh? list of best barbecue states and places

– The Greenville (SC) Barbecue Tour will launch June 6 and run every Saturday

– Texas BBQ Treasure Hunt has some thoughts (for and against) about Aaron Franklin winning a James Beard Award

– Speaking of Franklin, you can watch the first episode of his new PBS show online

– India gets a barbecue food truck

– Sean Brock’s most under-the-radar eating experience in Nashville is Mary’s Old Fashioned Pit Barbecue

– TMBBQ’s thoughts on The 100 Best Barbecue Restaurants in America

– Food Republic has a list of barbecue festivals across the country over the next few months

– Marie, Let’s Eat! continues his tour of Alabama barbecue: Betty’s Bar-B-Q in Anniston, AL and Bob Sykes Bar-B-Q in Bessemer, AL

– As a follow up from the AP Stylebook, Our State Magazine’s editor’s thoughts on “barbecue” as a noun rather than a verb

– A couple of good recent barbecue articles from Our State Magazine

Linkdown: 11/5/14

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– Want to know what its like to judge a NC BBQ Association competition? Well, Big Wayner has the deets.

– TMBBQ interviews Sam Jones from Skylight Inn

DV: Do the people who cook it for a living have those same arguments?

SJ: I don’t think so. I don’t anyway. I’m not one of those people that’ll tell you that our way is the only way and that if you don’t do it our way you’re going to hell. Barbecue is defined by geography. In North Carolina it really changes by community. Do what you do and do it with the passion that ought to be in there, and you should be proud of the product you turn out. If you’re half-assing it you know you ought not walk to the forefront with your chest out.

– Speaking of which, some great photos from his Dias de los Puercos event with TMBBQ this past Sunday in Dallas including the one below of Sam Jones and Daniel Vaughn

– This article is subtitled “The Great Beef vs. Pork BBQ Debate” (via)

– Still more coverage on The Great NC BBQ Map

– The original list from USA Today was posted earlier in the year, but Fox 8 in High Point just got around to linking to it

– Just found this article from March of this year (as well as the blog itself), but it’s worth linking to: “The Great Gas Controversy and Pride in the Name of BBQ” 

– Pat Forde, sports columnist from Yahoo, gives Queen City Q and Birdsong Brewing a shoutout in his latest column

POINT AFTER

When hungry and thirsty in Charlotte – site of both the ACC championship game and a bowl game, so you may get there – The Dash recommends a stop at Queen City Q (39). It’s a quality barbecue joint that doubles as a de facto sports bar. Try the Carolina Classic nachos, with pulled pork and smoked chicken onboard, and then get after the brisket. There are plenty of sauces to choose from, including all the Carolina-centric choices. Combine your meal with a Higher Ground IPA (40) from Birdsong Brewery in Charlotte and thank The Dash later.

– Carolina Cue to Go, an “online barbecue shack”, is now open as of November 1

Linkdown: 9/17/14

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– Daniel Vaughn, barbecue editor of Texas Monthly, is definitely the right man to write an article about being “meat drunk”

You’re experiencing a rapid heartbeat, flush cheeks, and a sweaty brow. All are symptoms of overindulgence, but not of the alcoholic kind. Rather than an elevated BAC, the cause might be a high that even a teetotaler can get. You’re getting meat drunk.

– Speaking of Texas Monthly, their annual barbecue fest was this past Sunday and it looks like it was a blast (more photos here and one blog’s top 5 bites here)

– The title says it all: “For traditional Carolina barbecue, a trip to Lexington, NC is a must”

A tanked economy winnowed down the joints, but not the residents’ passion for barbecue shoulders. That’s what makes Lexington barbecue different: Many pit masters have tried the typical ribs, beef briskets, turkey and chicken, but few now offer them except on a few days a week and on special occasions.

“Ribs never caught on in Lexington,” Yountz said, adding that he also tried beef brisket but found it too wasteful and the novelty soon wore off for his customers.

– The latest entries in Tyson Ho’s How I Built a Barbecue Restaurant in Brooklyn series looks at the interior decorating on a dime aspect and standing before the community board

– Elizabeth Karmel (aka Grill Girl) has left Hill Country to start Carolina Cue To-Go, an “online barbecue shack” that will offer whole mail order whole hog barbecue; it goes live on 11/1 (via @BBQsnob)

But after more than a decade focused on Texas-style food, it is time for me to go back to my North Carolina roots.  I have partnered with a childhood friend to form an online “Barbecue Shack” that will sell traditionally smoked Eastern Carolina whole hog barbecue nationwide.  My whole hog is inspired by my long-time barbecue buddy, Ed Mitchell, and it will be sauced with my signature Lexington-Style Vinegar Sauce.  In my opinion, it will be the best of what North Carolina has to offer.

– More coverage on the Great NC BBQ Map

– The Carolina/Texas barbecue joint Curly’s Carolina, TX Barbecue in Round Rock, TX closed last Sunday

– Barbecue Rankings made his way back through NC last week

– Sports Illustrated’s Andy Staples visits Skylight Inn

This is eastern North Carolina, so the hogs started whole and then got chopped into hunks. At the Skylight Inn, cracklins intermingle with the meat.The occasional crunch is entirely intentional. The pork doesn’t need accompaniment, but a bath in the thin, vinegar-based sauce produces an entirely different flavor explosion.

Linkdown: 12/18/13

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 – This month’s featured barbecue photographer on TMBBQ is Denny Culbert from Lafayette, Louisiana, who has some great photos from his Barbecue Bus project featuring Stamey’s, Scott’s, Skylight Inn, and more NC joints

– Here’s what TMBBQ had to say about the new Texas/Carolina barbecue joint Curly’s Carolina, TX 

A big vertical smoker uses pecan for the pork shoulders and ribs. It’s all cooked with wood, but there are no coals. We love our smokers here in Texas, but in the Carolinas the pork shoulders and whole hogs are cooked directly over hickory coals. It creates a flavor similar to the Texas Hill Country style of cooking, but doesn’t taste much like slow smoked pork. I questioned Jay and John about this and Jay hoped to have a direct-heat cooker operational soon and even hinted that whole hogs could be on the horizon. Until then, the meat won’t have much Carolina flavor until you squeeze on the vinegar sauce.

– Although this article has a somewhat unfortunate title – “Private school students start barbecue business” – it’s a cool story about high school kids in Thomasville (just outside the Barbecue Bros hometown of High Point) starting their own barbecue business; check out more on Butch Cassidy Barbecue here (via)

– Fervent Foodie has a review on Elwood’s Barbecue & Burger Bar in Ballantyne

– Ever wonder what it’s like to cook a whole hog with Rodney Scott? Well this gives you a better idea:

It’s nine p.m. at Charles Towne Landing, a six-hundred-acre park just outside of Charleston, South Carolina, and Steven Green is holding a blowtorch to an opening in a repurposed oil drum that is filled to the top with damp pieces of oak. Flecks of rain fall across two cleaned, beheaded, and butterflied pigs sitting on a sheet-metal barbecue pit nearby. Tomorrow, the pigs will feed hundreds of Garden & Gun readers who are in town for the first Jubileefestival. Right now, Green and his boss, pit master Rodney Scott, are just trying to get the fire going.