Eating high on the hog in Charlotte 

In North Carolina, "barbecue" is a noun, not a verb.

What Carolinians do on a Weber is "grill." Barbecue, on the other hand, is the food that binds the society together no matter where you are from, how much money you have, or what you look like. Barbecue is social and laden with memories; a whole lifetime wrapped up on a bun.

Extolling the virtues of any particular style of barbecue is sure to draw fire from opposing fans. One restaurateur told me that those discussions contain so much hot air they could warm up the entire state. Kansas City, Mo. and Memphis, Tenn. have their styles of barbecue; so does Tidewater, Va., and Texas. But most North Carolinians believe the bragging rights to the best 'cue lies with the boundaries of the Old North State. We just can't agree on which part of the state: Eastern or Western.

What is Carolina barbecue? For those uninitiated to its finer points, Bob Garner, author and star of a PBS series on North Carolina barbecue, wrote in his North Carolina Barbecue: Flavored by Time that barbecue here is clearly superior: "It's the only kind of barbecue in which the meat itself is the centerpiece rather than the smoke, the pepper or the sauce. North Carolina pork, barbecued to perfection, has a natural rich, sweet taste that is delicately flavored by smoked -- not overcome by something dragged from a burning house."

Garner explained in a recent interview with Creative Loafing that North Carolina barbecue is divided along old colonial lines. On the Eastern side of the state were the settlements of the original English colonists. Hogs were fed either scraps from the table or left to forage in the wild and the taste of the meat was probably gamey. These hogs were splayed and roasted by the colonists. The idea of covering these roasting pits probably started in Neolithic times as a way to protect food from predators when the food is cooked overnight, as barbecue is. Barbacoa is Spanish for roasting meat in a pit.

Garner says hot, salty, vinegar-based sauces would have been common table condiments to the early English settlers and this original barbecue sauce would have "balanced the gaminess" of the meat. It has also been assumed by other food historians that oysters from the coastal areas may have been used to flavor these original barbecue sauces in a similar way that fish sauce, another condiment known to sailors at the time of the settlement of the New World, was used in Asia.

Thus on the Eastern side of the state, the English residents roasted whole pigs, chopped up the meat of the whole pig mixing white and dark meat (even gristle) and flavored that meat with the salty vinegar sauce. During the mid-1700's, German settlers were arriving in the center part of the state in the Piedmont area from the northern American colonies. These German settlers would have been more inclined to cook pork shoulders rather than whole pigs as shoulders, and hams are common in German cooking. Additionally, these settlers would have preferred a sweet-and-sour sauce, as is also common in German cuisine.

In Western- or Lexington-styled barbecue, the tomato is a defining element of the sauce -- or dip as it is also known. When the Germans settled in North Carolina, the tomato, indigenous to the New World, was just starting to be eaten. Before then, tomatoes were thought to be poisonous. Garner says these original German settlers would have made their sauce with apple cider vinegar, tomatoes, and sugar to achieve a taste similar to that German sweet-and-sour sauce.

This is the difference we find today. On the Eastern side of the state resides barbecue eateries cooking the whole pig and flavoring the meat with a vinegary sauce. Lexington-styled barbecue, which is found throughout the Piedmont, uses pork shoulders and a thin, sweeter tomato-and-vinegar sauce.

The arrival of the thick, often-sweet, ketchup-type barbecue sauce occurred much later with the sale of commercial ketchups. These barbecue sauces are not part of what is considered to be traditional North Carolina barbecue.

Barbecue in the mountains is a more recent story. Many, including Garner, do not believe there is a "mountain-styled" barbecue. Instead Garner says, "Barbecue arrived with the tourists." The original colonists of the mountains probably smoked their meat for the longer, colder winters. Indeed, the taste of most mountain barbecue found today at eateries like The Woodlands Barbecue Restaurant in Blowing Rock has a distinctly smoky flavor.

Here in Charlotte, the state's most populous city that happens to be located on the western edges of the Lexington-styled barbecue region, has garnered the unfortunate reputation of lacking in good barbecue places.

Historically, Charlotte was a farming community without the need for restaurants (folks ate on the farm). But barbecue was the food that brought people together at gatherings. After all, one pig feeds a lot of people. Barbecue became the main dish at social events and fundraisers. This year Mallard Creek Presbyterian Church in north Charlotte will host its 79th Annual Barbecue, always held on the fourth Thursday in October. Originally, this fundraiser was started as a small event for the men of the church, but proved a successful way to help finance the church at the start of the Great Depression. At their first event in 1929, three pigs and a goat were cooked. This year, the church expects to sell 14,000 pounds of barbecue.

One of the original families responsible for cooking the barbecue that's served at the Mallard Creek Presbyterian Church is the Oehlers. From the experience at the church emerged a catering company. Donnie Oehler, grandson of one of the founding cooks at the first MCPC barbecues, says his family got into on-site catering for social events from those church barbecues and is the oldest barbecue catering company in the county. Today their company, the Mallard Creek BBQ Catering Company, no longer does on-site catering. Instead Oehler made the decision to build a catering facility on his farmland in 1988. They cook Eastern-styled barbecue: just the "meat, vinegar, and a little salt and pepper." Oehler says his barbecue is good because he cooks the whole pig over hickory wood. "We don't just flavor the meat with hickory smoke. We cook the meat with hickory wood. That's the difference." He does offer various types of sauces saying that his wife is from South Carolina and likes the mustard barbecue sauce. "It's what you grow up with," Oehler says.

In Charlotte, though, there isn't much evidence of indigenous brick-and-mortar -- or wood-and-tin-roof -- barbecue joints like the kind you find along the roadways of much of the South. The oldest barbecue establishments here were started in the 1950s when Charlotte was moving towards being an urban center. People from the eastern side of the state, Georgia, and Greece relocated here to open barbecue restaurants.

New locally owned barbecue establishments are the products of either savvy restaurateurs who realized that comfort food has financial rewards or amateur pit masters who have turned avocations into vocations. The latter is producing mouthwatering examples of regional barbecue in this century.

One such place is Alfred & Charlie's BBQ House in Gastonia. Standing out back by one of his made-to-order cookers, owner Alfred Current wryly commented that 10 years ago he took an enjoyable weekend hobby and converted it into a full-time, time-consuming business. Located in a charming old house, Alfred's place is known for its flavorful meat. This is one of the few places you can smell the 'cue cooking.

This distinction is worthy of note. It's the smoke coming from the hickory wood cooking the meat for a half day or more that produces the best barbecue.

My dad, who taught me how to have a nose for 'cue, said the only barbecue eateries that he would drive into were those that he could smell from his car. We visited hundreds of those mom-and-pop shops throughout the Southeast; places with names co-opted on a Coca-Cola advertisement, with pictures of smiling pigs, dancing pigs, even angelic pigs. Most of those places were located on old state highways with small buildings -- places my dad knew of from his days as a traveling rep. Some of those places were in North Carolina, like Skylight Inn in Ayden and Lexington Barbecue in Lexington. The typical configuration of these restaurants was a small white or brick building with a large counter for takeout and a larger room in the back or off to the side for dining. Behind this building was a very large pile of hickory wood and smoke. Lots of smoke. The smoke wrapped the building.

"Be careful to notice the wood piles," my dad cautioned. "If you see mostly old graying wood and cobwebs, this place is all about the show."

I learned that being a true 'cue aficionado is not like rooting for a sports team since it's not about one team. Barbecue, like accents, varies throughout the South. And like Southern accents, the diversity of barbecue is lessening. Places that used to use hickory wood to cook the meat have turned to gas rotisseries and then flavor the meat by smoking hardwood.

But one place in Charlotte that has always cooked over wood is the Old Hickory House Restaurant. I get into many heated discussions about why I pick a non-North Carolinian styled barbecue for "Best Barbecue" in CL's annual Best of Charlotte issue. But the reason is the wood.

The Old Hickory House cooks their meat -- Boston butts and shoulders -- over hickory wood. It's the smell of my childhood's barbecue, and like Donnie Oehler noted, people prefer the sauce of their youth. The sauce here is distinctly from Alabama/Georgia. It shouldn't come as a surprise that my dad's barbecue recipes are from Alabama, and I grew up in Atlanta. But the Old Hickory is worthy of note because this is one of the last places I know of that actually cooks (and is grandfathered from health and fire codes) the meat in the dining room. You can smell the barbecue outside the building and in the dining room.

The Old Hickory House is owned by the Carter family who came to Charlotte in the 1950s. They also cooked the first brisket in town in 1957. The dining room at the Old Hickory House not changed since it opened with its Old West motif and covered wagon lanterns, pine panels walls, and turquoise chairs. More importantly this is also one of the only places in town to get "outside brown," which for barbecue aficionados is the best part: the crusty exterior of the meat that you can only get when the meat is sliced and not chopped. The Old Hickory House, however, serves both chopped and sliced meat. They also serve a noteworthy, old-styled Brunswick stew that uses bread as a thickener.

For Eastern-styled barbecue, Bill Spoon's Barbecue is the place. With the death of the founder earlier this year, grandson Steve Spoon is now at the helm. He's been working in the family business since he was 9 years old. He reports that nothing has been changed in the business since it was founded in 1963 with recipes from the legendary Bob Melton of Rocky Mount. At Spoon's, the whole pig is cooked for 15 hours then chopped and served with a simple vinegar based sauce. "Barbecue is good old soul food. You can be mad and go and get barbecue. Everything's all right," says Spoon. For those not used to Eastern-styled barbecue, Spoon says they offer a sample. "We educate people. If people want Texas barbecue, we tell them we're not that. But we're always glad to give you a try of our barbecue." He further notes they only serve pork saying "there's no beef barbecue in Eastern North Carolina."

At one point Bill Spoon wanted to get out of the business and sold his restaurant and recipes, and leased the building to Ralph Miller. That was in 1987. In 1994, Miller moved the business from South Boulevard to Sunset Road and renamed it Bubba's Barbecue (allowing the Spoon's to reopen the original site as Bill Spoon's). Miller said he wanted to move into a bigger place. Bubba seats 120 and is right off the I-77. "The South Boulevard location had changing demographics and was small. They serve on paper plates because the kitchen can't accommodate a dishwasher. I wanted real plates." Miller, who is known to say barbecue is one of the basic food groups in North Carolina, has a loyal following, He also reports that he has kept the taste profile of his barbecue, but modernized the cooking system. Miller is proud of his compliance to rigorous health codes and safety standards of the county. His barbecue is cooked via electricity, which he says is easier to control than gas, with a wood fire pit for flavor. But even though Bubba's serves Eastern-styled barbecue, Miller has changed from cooking the whole pig to selected portions. "Whole pigs has become cost prohibitive." He cooks whole pigs when he can, but now uses shoulders, even hams.

Changing demographics around some older barbecue places have contributed to their demise. Earlier this year Hog Heaven, a spit of a spot serving Lexington-styled barbecue on Eastway, closed and is now a Latino eatery.

But new places are opening. Barbecue had been on the mind of restaurateur J.D. Duncan soon after he opened his upscale Bonterra in Dilworth. He and his sous chef Dan Boone discussed it often. "We wanted to do a Bill Spoon's type place," says Duncan. The opportunity came up with a space on South Boulevard in which the landlords wanted a biker bar and nondescript food. Duncan pushed for barbecue. Today Mac's Speed Shop is opening a third location in January on Lake Wylie (the second is at Lake Norman). The recipes for this barbecue, described as neither Lexington or Eastern-styled, and many of the side dishes came from Boone's family (Boone is no longer with the company). Mac's meat is cooked in a gas-fired rotisserie with wood added for flavor. Even this "modernized" method of cooking, Mac's has met with Bob Garner enthusiasm who noted how "impressed" he was with the different styles of barbecue.

Recently, the Charlotte area has also seen a few openings from backyard pit masters. Champions Candy and Brian Elkins opened EB Bar-B-Que in Indian Trail in 2005, but recently closed the restaurant and went back to catering only.

Rock Store Bar-B-Q is located in the miniature historic Rock Store, circa 1936 in Stallings. In 2004 Mark Murphy operated a coffee shop, but allowed amateur pit masters Jack "Bubba" Chavis and Jay Mondock to sell their barbecue from a truck in the parking lot. Soon it became clear that the barbecue was the hit and the three became partners in Rock Store Bar-B-Q.

Chavis and Mondock competed in Charlotte Shout's 2nd Blues, Brews, & BBQ contest winning second place and recently competed again this year. Chavis, a native Charlottean, says his sauces are a complement to his savory meats. "Some sauce their meat to cover the dryness. Some reheat the meat the next day. We cook all our meat fresh. That's the difference." Rock Store offers three sauces: a S.C.-styled mustard-based, "down home," and an Eastern-styled vinegar.

Just over the state line, pit master Mike Dial opened 521 BBQ & Grill. His story is typical: "Folks started telling me how good my barbecue was and said I should start my own place." Dial uses a spice rub (hence the slogan "Butts Rubbed Nightly") and cooks his pork over wood, which subtly imbues the meat with hickory smokiness. Sauces here are a house-made pepper-vinegar dip and a sweeter, thicker Memphis-styled sauce made per Dial's specifications by a regional bottler.

In Matthews, owners Alton Wright and Tim Thomas of Elliot's Barbecue smoke their meats with hickory or apple wood and offer a variety of sauces. They not only serve pork, but beef, and chicken.

Charlotte has another group of barbecue restaurants which were opened by Greek entrepreneurs. The oldest is the Ole Smokehouse #1 (#2 closed years ago) which Bill Koutsoupias opened in 1957. They have a large oven built in Greece similar to one the family used in a restaurant in Greece, and build a hickory wood fire each morning. They are also known for their sauce and make four to five gallons daily. In the sauce are ketchup, vinegar, brown sugar, molasses, pepper, and lemon.

Another successful Greek-American establishment is Bar-B-Q King on Wilkinson Boulevard, which was recently featured on the Food Network. Opened by Gus and George Karapanos and Steve Gianikas in 1959, this small drive-in was also written about in Smokestack Lightning: Adventures in the heart of Barbecue Country, by Lolis Eric Elie. The meat is cooked here for ten hours in an electric rotisserie with hickory wood to add flavor. The tomato-based sauce was created fifty years ago.

Closer to town, Art's Barbecue & Deli was opened by Danny Katopodis in 1976. His meats are cooked in an electric rotisserie and he also offers a tomato based sauce.

Charlotte is home chain restaurants, too such as the Florida based Sonny's Real Pit Bar-B-Que; Shane's Rib Shack, and Smokey Bones Bar & Fire Grill.

For those Lexington-styled aficionados, the best barbecue is 45 minutes away: either north to Lexington Barbecue in Lexington or west to Bridges Barbecue Lodge in Shelby.

What does the future hold for traditional barbecue restaurants? After the passing of founders Gene Carter of the Old Hickory House and Bill Spoon of Spoon's, I was relieved that family members will continue in such a demanding business. One entrepreneur said he located beyond the Mecklenburg county line to avoid the strenuous code requirements. Certainly there is a need for sanitation rules and fire safety. Last March, the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control urged those who had purchased barbecue (both pork and chicken) at a March 30, 2008 fundraiser for the Tega Cay Volunteer Fire Department to throw the food away since they feared it might be contaminated.

Yet, barbecue is seeing a culinary rebirth in the Charlotte area through backyard pit masters turned restaurateurs and events like the annual Blues, Brews, and BBQ contest enjoyed by hard-core barbecue hounds and novices alike . Even neighborhood Boy Scout barbecue fundraisers are selling out in record time. Barbecue, it seems, is still on fire.