Bill's Barbeque Review

Barbecue Explained

I thank my good buddy John Tanner for this link to a musical explanation of what's distinctive about the barbecue of the several states.  I think it is pretty good, though I'd never heard of much less tried Alabama mayonnaise-based barbecue sauce.  And I think these tarheel boys need to own up to their barbarous practice of plopping coleslaw on barbecue meat.  John responds:

There are a few places that have white sauce-- I've been to one in Cahaba Heights.  It isn't really bad -- has some vinegar and isn't cloyingly sweet. It goes better with French fries.

The cole slaw is a bad idea, but at least in NC the places I've been to make cole slaw with only chopped cabbage and vinegar-based sauce.  It ends up being mostly texture.  The real crime is that it has led others to put cole slaw made with mayonnaise, sugar, pickles, onions, celery salt and all sorts of other distractions -- usually on top of faux barbecue.  I do not favor the death penalty as a rule, but there are some things people just shouldn't do.

Readers should note that the death penalty is still applied in every bona fide barbecue jurisdiction in America.  Coincidence?

O Brothers, Where Art Thou?

Two Brothers Bar-B-Que
Near Ball Ground, Georgia
Closed Mondays and Tuesdays
735-2900

Off the beaten path, and then another 200 yards.  Tucked away just off GA 5/372, one mile north of Ball Ground, on the way toward Jasper.   The meat is brisket, slightly smoked, dressed with a vinegar-based sauce, a bit too liberally applied.  The skin-on fries are cooked in peanut oil!  Decor of rural artifacts presented a la musee archeologique --what Cracker Barrel aspires to but does not achieve.  A huge mountain trout is mounted up over the cash register.  If you don't get why a restaurant that serves no seafood would have a fish on prominent display, you have no business eating barbecue.  An enigmatic, faded print of the Mona Lisa hangs amongst vintage firarms and farm tools.  The puddin'-filled chocolate pie and the trout put this reviewer in mind of Ollies, and those dear, dead days beyond recall.

Rating: 

Bob? That you?

Bad Bob's Barbecue Restaurant
2340 Atlanta Highway (Hy 9, in Pine Tree Village Shopping Center)
Cumming, GA 30040
678 519 9700
www.badbobs11.com

The name says it all.  Well, half the name.  Two guesses which.
Meat ("Boston Butt," as if "Boston" weren't bad enough) is on the dry side, unsauced, but nicely stringy with some almost burnt ends.  Don't like it dry?  Well, Bob has thought about that, and put out squeeze bottles of "Hot" and "Special" sauces, "made with jellies, honeys and other fine ingredients" like High Fructose Corn Syrup (listed #3 on the label), brown sugar, and molasses.   

 

The french  fries were dusted with some kind of powdered chili spice.  The thirsty will be glad to know that Bob's is fully licensed, the hurried that he has a drive-thru window.

Rating: P(assable) for the sweet-tooth, all others pass on by.

Category Mistake

What's too silly to be said can be sung.  And what's too silly to sing can be sold.  Or at least offered for sale.  Check out the "BBQPIG Lil' Pig": 
a mere $1600.00, from Traeger Industries.  Traeger asks: "Is it 'Art Deco'" or is it a barbecue?"  And indeed the resemblance to the Chrysler Building is hard to mistake.   The maker's claim that "this grill is sure to raise a 'squeal' from your guests" need not be disputed.   All it seems to lack is a tow-bar for hauling behind our Nieman Marcus Edition Lincoln Blackwood pickup truck.  [Thanks to Gizmodo for the pointer.]

"The New Q"

Bill knows there is a fine line between righteous traditionalism (good) and ornery atavism (not quite as good).  He just isn't sure where it is.  Bill does know that he had some fine barbecue this afternoon at the Slow Food Atlanta and Heritage Foods USA first annual BBQ benefit  for the Atlanta Community Food Bank.  Bill did have to swivel his head more than a couple of times to get a close look at some of the "Twists on Old School BBQ" served up there.  For instance, it had never occurred to him that somebody could drink wine with barbecue, unless maybe it was a Sunday and they were out of beer, which it was not.  And who'd of thought you could wrap barbecue meat in a little pancake and serve it that way?  It put Bill in mind of the Moo Shoe Pork that Missus Bill had got for him the other night at the Chinese take-away.  Anyway, Bill is for anything and everything akin to slow cooked, open-pit pig's meat.  His favorite today was some Utah-style barbecue served up by 5 Seasons North chef David Larkworthy.  What it says on the menu is "Sequatchie Cove Farm Cracklin' Scallion Whole Ossabaw Hog Crepe," and it was good. 

  The meat was tender, moist, and well-smoked, and you had three different sauces you could try on it: Chip-olay which they said was Mexican, Carrot (I kid you not), and the third which was the favorite was vinegar-based with some orange juice in it.  Chef Larkworthy's crew obliged Bill by sitting for a picture portrait that he took with his new camera that works fine when he remembers not to grab it by the front of it.   They are looking proud because it was just announced that they had won the First Annual Bill's Barbecue Review Golden Pig's Foot Award for the best tasting whatever-it-was that Bill liked so much.  Bill will not call it "Q".  If you can't say nor write out "BBQ" or "barbecue" or "bar-b-que" he feels sorry for you.  It may take a little longer but it will sound a lot better.  Slow Food folks shouldn't have to be told that.

Harold's

Harold's Barbecue
171 McDonough Blvd
Atlanta, GA

Rating:

Can you say "authennick"?  That's what Harold's is in any language, and has been since 1947.  Within wafting distance of the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, Harold's delivers, if only in the figurative sense. A basic pork sandwich can be had sliced or chopped.  Buns are not served at  Harold's.  If the idea of untoasted sliced white bread doesn't get it for you, be warned --you're doing yourself out of a treat.  The  French fries are  salty crinkle-cut greasers which nonetheless  are indistinguishable from those anywhere else, just as fries should be.  Harold's is located in a neighborhood that has mercifully been spared the modish horrors of gentrification-- thanks in part to the closure of the GM plant next door.

It is a hangout of the Guardians: police, prosecutors, custodial officials, and nonPopperian philosophers.

12 7 06

Bill's Rating System

Bill's Rating System tm, sm, ope   

      = worth repeated local patronage (e.g. Golden Rule, B'ham Ala.)   

      = worth a detour (e.g., Lexington Barbeque, Lexington, NC)   

      = worth a pilgrimage (e.g., Ollie's, B'ham, Ala.)   

These ratings are based solely on a basic pork barbecue sandwich. The quality of other dishes, service, decor, and ambience may be remarked, but are not factored into the ratings.  Service at a barbeque place is expected to be sincere but erratic even when officious. French fries are not expected to rise above the mediocre, hush puppies are never anything but.  A particular effort has been made to note the availability of pie and beer (please do not combine them), and to ignore the coffee (good coffee is not scheduled to be served in barbeque places until after the opening of the seventh seal). General hygiene is noted but not a factor unless it calls into question the wholesomeness of the sandwich itself.

Old South Bar-B-Q

Old South Bar-B-Q 

Rating:      

Corner of Windy Hill & Burbank Circle (1 block east of South Cobb Drive)
Smyrna, Ga.
770 435 4215 

   

  Family owned since 1968 (tumultuous year!). The tangy, pasty, tomato-based sauce is somewhat overabundant. The attraction here is the succulent, precisely done meat, served chopped, sliced, or "pulled" (recommended for its ample "outside" content and toothsome "mouth feel"). The sandwich was served on an institutional green melmac-type ("Dallas Ware") oval plate, on an untoasted bun with sliced dill pickles on the side. The French fries were agreeably inconspicuous. Also available: okra, applesacue, brunswick stew. The reviewer ordered chocolate pie, which suffered  from prolonged refrigeration. Lemon and pecan pies were also available.

    There are varnished plywood booths with various hot sauces and catsup on the table. The cash register sits squarely in front of a pass through, over which there is a back-lit takeaway menu featuring (in plastic movable letters) delicacies such as "P salad" and "T salad". Through the pass-through one looks directly into the pit, glimpsed through a clothesline on which the orders hang. The decor features photomontages of customers, numbering in the high hundreds. Smyrna's most famous resident--Julia Roberts--is not pictured. She is not known ever to have dined here, despite having graduated from nearby Campbell High (summa cum attitudinis).
   

Old Hickory House

Old Hickory House 

Rating: B(eware) 

2202 Northlake Pkwy
Tucker, GA 30084
770 939 8621

The motto of this barbecue place is "Put Some South In Your Mouth" (to which my mother would have replied, "You don't know where it's been"). It is appended to Northlake Quadrangle Office Park, just off I-285. The dark, pine-panelled dining room (where the DeKalb County Libertarian Party holds its monthly meeting) is decorated with photos of midcentury downtown Atlanta. Service was of the "Quick to greet, but when do we eat?" variety.  

  The eclectic menu includes a "Gourmet Barbecue Sandwich" on Toasted Garlic Bread, and a "Dieter's Delight Salad," described as "4 oz lean sliced smoked pork or beef served over crisp salad greens, low cal dressing, and saltines." Also featured: a wide variety of southern style vegetables, banana pudding, potato salad, and a mayo-based coleslaw. 

    This reviewer ordered a standard sliced barbecue sandwich, which was served on an oval stoneware plate, wrapped in foil. The accompanying French fries were biggiesized, chunky, and satisfyingly nondescript. The sandwich was served uncut, with outsized slabs of perfunctorily-smoked meat, generally lean but with one dismaying goblet of fat. There was ample outside content. A sugary tomato-based sauce had been applied to the sandwich, and extra sauce was served on the side in a small plastic tub. No pickle was served or offered (apparently sliced pickles are served with the barbecue plate, however). ketchup, pepper sauce were also available on the table.

The sauce, which resembled a watered mixture of ketchup and Karo corn syrup, macerated the sandwich bun, causing its disintegration near end of the meal. The sauce recipe is said to have  "been handed down for three generations" --putting this reviewer in mind of Justice Holmes' uncharitable reminder that sometimes three generations is enough.

Four hours and one squash lesson later, tonstant weviewa fwo dup.

9 10 03

Old Brick Pit

Old Brick Pit           

Rating:
4805 Peachtree Road, Chamblee, Ga.
770 986 7727   

      

  A mansard barn with asphalt barnyard.  Counter service only. Standard pork barbecue sandwich is satisfying, if diet-sized. Bun appears to be perhaps under 4" in diameter in widest dimension. The Krystalization of barbecue?  Meat is tender, lighly sauced, not quite but nearly succulent with no suggestion of greasiness, chopped, with flakes of outside meat. A light, agreeable, almost fluffy consistency to the meat. Whole pickles available for order. No fries, but baked beans, ribs, extra sauce, cobbler, and Brunswick stew are also on menu. Bottles of Tabasco sauce on the table. Sandwiches are served wrapped in paper, on plastic trays with simulated basketry texture. Spartan decor with vinyl banquettes, and wood-grain synthetic table tops and panelling. Outside seating     available for tree huggers and nicotine fiends.

This reviewer had planned to have one sandwich but ate three: the small portion size and unavailablity of fries contributed perhaps as much to this outcome as the fact that this is pretty good barbeque. Well-heeled, older, single diners in good number are evidence that this place has a following among local aficionados.   

Rating: One ,  unless you are at Lenox or Phipps Mall, in which case you should avoid the food courts and take the five minute detour up Peachtree Street to the Old Brick Pit.

8 2 03