BBQ Style Smackdown: Which Region`s `Cue Is the Best

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BBQ Style Smackdown: Which Region's 'Cue Is the Best?
by Linnea Covington
In some parts of the country, barbecue means more than simply pouring a bottle of sauce on a slab of meat
and grilling it up on a hot summer day – rather, it’s a way of life. And naturally, there's an ongoing battle about
which region produces the best 'cue. We talked to five renowned BBQ chefs across the country about why their
specific style reigns supreme. Get ready for some smack talk!
Have some of your own? Have at it in the comments.
North Carolina
In Raleigh, NC, chef Darrell Brown dishes out his own region’s style of
barbecue at The Pit restaurant, which he says is far superior. “Here’s the
secret – the salt and vinegar give the slow-roasted pork some ‘pop,’ while
the peppers add spice and heat, and the sugar mellows things out a bit.” In NC, they also cook over coals
rather than wood, heat up the whole hog at once, and then chop it all together.
How You Make It: “First you butterfly a whole hog, salt it and place it on a grate meat side down over a bed of
225 to 250–degree hardwood and charcoal. We cook them for about 12 hours, or until the meat is falling off the
bone and the skin is crispy with a deep reddish-brown color. After pulling the meat from the pig, we chop it and
season it with salt, apple cider vinegar, black pepper, red pepper and
a little sugar.”
Tips: “Touch the top of the cooker – if it’s just right you can lay your
finger on it for a second, any longer and it’s too cool, any shorter and
it’s too hot. Also, be sure to build a fire without lighter fluid so you won’t
taste it later, and it’s best to use hickory or oak for the wood."
Why It's the Best: “Eastern North Carolina is not only the first
barbecue produced in America, but it’s the best barbecue in the country, hands-down. If you can’t get the flavor
of the meat right, then you bury it in tomato sauce. That’s what most everyone else does in the country except
for us, where our vinegar-based sauce is simply the best. In South Carolina, they take perfectly good, mostly
whole-hog barbecue and turn it baby-poop yellow with a mustard-based sauce.”
South Carolina
To get the skinny on barbecue in South Carolina, Jimmy Hagood,
owner of Food for the Southern Soul and founder of the awardwinning BlackJack Cooking Team in Charleston, SC, explains what
makes it so darn good. “We think of barbecue as a noun,” he says.
“And in its truest form, it come in classic cuts of pork or the whole hog,
which is smoked low and slow.” First, he says, pork rules the scene.
After that, it’s a three-step process of local meats, abundance of
natural ingredients like pecan, hickory, peach and applewood, and the regional spicy vinegar and mustard
sauces.
How You Make It: “You start with slow cooking the meat at 225 degrees over a selection of indigenous wood
for many hours. On the exterior of the meat, you use a dry rub that caramelizes into a mahogany color, while
continually basting with barbecue sauce. Having the regional table sauce completes the layering of flavors
unique to South Carolina.”
Tips: “For pork shoulder, whole hog and ribs, the proper cooking temperature is important. One hundred ninety
degrees is an optimal internal temperature.”
Why It's the Best: “Get a South Carolina pulled pork sandwich with all the sides, and I guarantee you won’t
find a better meal anywhere in the country. After all, we've been smoking meat around here for 250 years, and
it's ingrained in our DNA. We have exported the art of cooking barbecue throughout the country, and the
origins of other regional styles can be traced right back to the low country of South Carolina.”
Texas
You don’t have to actually go to Texas to get some awesome Texasstyle 'cue; at Hill Country in New York City, chef Elizabeth Karmel is
doing it right. “It's all about the meat,” she says. “It’s simply seasoned
and smoked slow and low.” But the best thing about it, she adds, is that
Texas is a no-sauce zone, leaving the meaty goodness to shine
through.
How You Make It: “The rub is as simple as it gets with the sole
purpose to enhance the natural flavor of the meat. Our rub is made with kosher salt, butcher grind black pepper
and enough cayenne pepper to turn the rub pink. Season the meat with the rub, smoke it slow using sweet
post oak wood, use a low heat and lots of love.”
Tips: “Have patience! Also, buy a whole brisket with the fat cap left on because fat equals flavor.”
Why It's the Best: “Really, I enjoy all styles of barbecue. And, actually, I grew up in North Carolina and find
their style similar to Texas, though in the latter, it’s all about the beef while North Carolina is all about the pig.
Ultimately, if the barbecue is done right, then you don't need to cover it up with a heavy, sweet sauce. Also,
liquid smoke should be banned since no real barbecue needs it.”
Kansas City
After 30 years of cooking, Paul Kirk, aka the "Kansas City Baron of
Barbecue," and the winner of 500 barbecue competitions, takes his roll
in the smoked meat world seriously. “We cook it all including brisket,
ribs, pulled pork, sliced pork, chicken," he says, "and in some places,
you even get lamb.” But one thing that really makes Kansas City
barbecue unique is the sweet, spicy, tomato-based sauce that they
use.
How You Make It: “It’s pretty much the seasoning and woods that we use that put out the best products. The
rubs are a balance between sugar and salt, paprika, chili powder and pepper, which give it a little heat without
being really salty or really sweet. Next, we smoke it. My preferred woods are oak, hickory and apple.”
Tips: “Pay attention to what you are doing and, most of all, have patience. Don’t open up the pit to see how the
meat is doing – it’s doing just fine.”
Why It's the Best: “It used to be hard for me to say Kansas City is the barbecue capital of the world until
people started competing with our meat and we kept winning. It’s just better. I don’t really know how to
compare it. Though I do love all the different types like the vinegar- and mustard-based sauces. As for the ones
that don’t have sauce, well, that’s fine too since it’s more an accompanist, not a necessity.”
Memphis
In the city where dry-rubbed meat trumps saucy brisket and pork
reigns as king of meats, we talked to Chris Russell, a barbecue
connoisseur who helps whip up the menu at Southern Hospitality in
New York, to see why this style won his heart. Russell’s officially the
director of operations at the restaurant, although he does a fare
amount of barbecuing, and he flocked to the Memphis-style because
of its no-mess approach and tender meat that takes on a sweet tang
from the spice rubs.
How You Make It: “Though just about any meat can be used, traditional Memphis barbecue is usually smoked
pork served in one of two forms: ribs on a slab or pulled. Memphis is probably best known for its dry-rubbed
barbecue, which is highly flavorful and is less messy to eat than wet. In this process, first the ribs are coated
with a rub made from a special blend of seasonings and then cooked in smokers over hickory and cherry wood
until they are tender. After, they’re smoked and then finished on the grill with another liberal dose of the dry
rub.”
Tips: “Don't overcook your 'cue, it's not supposed to fall off the bone.”
Why It's the Best: “In Texas, they serve mostly beef with a salt-and-pepper rub, which can be very good, but
an overly lean piece of brisket of dry beef ribs can taste like shoe leather. In the Carolinas, they use too much
sauce, which makes it sticky and messy. If you want the most flavorful, tender and satisfying barbecue, without
needing a hose-down afterwards, Memphis-style dry-rubbed is the only way to go.”
Posted on July 27, 2011 10:58
Tags: Hill Country, Southern Hospitality, The Pit
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