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A Lip-Smacking Look at Barbecue · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should know from how Stuff Works
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Clark with Charles W. Chuck Bryant with Jerry. We're eating
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: barbecue style. Actually it's not true. This is I'm just
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: gonna fess up. We don't have any barbecue in front
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: of listening. It sucks. Yeah, you're right, Uh, vegetarians and
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: vegans may not be interested in this one. It's still interesting.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: I would never encourage someone to tune out, but um,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: I have I do all the time. Do you sure
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: some jerk rights? And it's like, oh, how sounds like
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: you're still going on Caney all the time, Like, don't
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: go listen to something else? Pal okay, I see what
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: you mean. I mean before we record a podcast. On
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: the podcast, as we record a podcast at the beginning
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: of the oh gotcha, I don't say like, hey, you
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: might not want to listen to this, but um, yeah,
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: you might not want to listen to this. But I
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: imagine if a vegan saw how Barbecue Works probably be like, yeah,
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: we'll just wait. Yeah, they're probably not going to fall
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: for it, wait for the Tofu episode, which we owe them.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Now after doing this one I had fried tofu and
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: uh Chicago, No no, no. In Toronto at our recent
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: show there it was. It was one of those sushi
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: places where they bring you out a little piece of
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: fried tofu. Yeah. Oh man, I can't believe I'm blanking,
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: but yes, I know what you mean. Is that like
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: a there's your name for it, like the custom of
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: it or no, the dish the piece of fried tofu
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: with a little maybe Ponzi sauce on it and some
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: scaions delicious. This one was okay, but it was that
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: it was one of the worst sushi meals I've ever
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: had in my life. I just chose wrong, like bad
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: sushi or bad rest, bad everything I walked in And
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: it's hard to tell because no, no, no, I won't
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: name it. I don't even remember that. No no, that's
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: the name of the dish. Oh yeah. Um. Like in
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: l A, some of the best sushi are these strip
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: mall holes in the wall. Sometimes sometimes it's not the case,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: though sometimes it is though, Like literally, some of the
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: best sushi that you don't have to go to some
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: fancy place and spend four are these you know, small
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: family run run by Japanese people. Um. This one in Toronto.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: I looked up afterward and they were like, oh, it's
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: one of those. Apparently Toronto has a lot of Chinese
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: run sushi places which get knocked on Yelp and by reviewers,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: and um. You could also make the case that um
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: places that serve sushi and Thai food knocked on as well. Yeah.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: I don't usually order sushi, but at a Thai restaurant,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: if I go to a tie place, I want a
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: good tie dish. Sure you want like a curry, put
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: some peanuts in there or something there some peanuts on there.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: But anyway, I chose wrong, and this was a hole
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: in the wall place. So when I walked in, my
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: instinct was like, oh no, but I thought no, no,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: no Los Angeles, Hollywood. Really good stuff at the holes
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: in the wall, not the case bad fish, bad taste.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: What was just it skive to me? And like if
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: you're skiveed eating sushi, yeah that's put down the chopsticks
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: and just ask for the check, maybe spit up into
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: your nap walk away. Anyway, I don't know why I
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: went off on that. What we're talking about barbecue, all right, Yeah,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: we're talking barbecue. Barbecue. This one made me hungry, dude,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: same here. Um. One of the things that I really
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: opened my eyes about though, was the idea that like
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: people think of barbecue as about as American as it gets,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: even though Australians have their own word for the bobby
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: and that pretty good. And it turns out there's barbecue
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: like all around the world. But when you think of barbecue,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: especially like barbecued pork with barbecue sauce on like two
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: slices of plain old Dixie Girl white bread, that's about
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: as American as it gets. So not just American like
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: Southern American barbecue. There's actually a strip of land known
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: as the barbecue Belt in the United States basically goes
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: from Virginia down into the southeast and then over across
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: Kansas and then into Texas. That's the barbecue Belt in
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: the US. Correct, But barbecue is now every city in
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: the country tries to do their their own hand at barbecue.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: Like I mean, if you go to New York City,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: you can go eat at a barbecue joint. Uh, and
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: they're trying to do it. You know that they're trying
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: to Yeah, which is fine, they're but they're trying to
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: not co opt because that sounds like it's like shady
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: or something. But you know, you go to New York
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: now and you can get like you can go to
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: and get fried chicken and biscuits and barbecue and all
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: these people that are like, come to New York City
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: and eat this good old southern home cooking. Have you
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: eaten a Fatty Queue in New York that's very good
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: barbecue for New York joint? Yeah, And I just I
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: don't do that because when I'm in New York, why
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: would I get what I is literally surrounding me here.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: I want to go to New York and I want
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: to go get go to the Mama Fuco or something.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: I don't have that here. It's steam bun while you
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: can get steam buns here. Yeah. But I mean, you
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: can make the case that you should be going to
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Korea for steam buns. But it is true. And there's
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: nothing wrong with if somebody opening a good barbecue joint
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: outside of the barbecue belt, it's just for it. In
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: the barbecue belt, they don't even think about it. It's
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: just part of the fabric of life. But I guarantee
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: you if you go to San Francisco to a barbecue joint.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: You're not going to be the same. It's going to
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: be different. They'll like a Chinese sushi place. There you go.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: That's the point of my story. So UM. The point
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: ultimately is that when you think of America having a
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: barbecue belt, you think a barbecue as profoundly American. Sure,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: but it turns out that since you were talking about
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: cultural appropriation, UM, that the European settlers who came to
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: the New World um actually appropriated. They got the idea
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: for a barbecue from the indigenous groups they encountered there,
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: and specifically, to start from what I understand, the whole
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: thing started on Hispaniola, where Columbus first landed Um with
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: the Tano Indians. Yeah, I mean cooking. I guess if
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: you want to talk barbecue, there's a couple of ways
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: to approach it. There is the noun barbecue, which here
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: in the South in America we think of is like
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: you said, pulled pork, maybe brisket, smoked wings, and then
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: side dishes like cold slaw, baked beans, mac and cheese,
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: brunswick ste man so good. Maybe if you're getting a
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: little wild, maybe like collared greens or fried okra and
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: monkey eyes that sort of starts to there's a bit
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: of an overlap between Southern meat and three cooking and barbecue,
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: especially when it comes to the sides um, and I
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: think all that actually grow to church picnics originally. Yeah,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: I did some good eating growing up at my church
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: and meet and three for those of you that don't
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: understand in other countries, that means um, a little small
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: family run restaurant, usually in the South, that you get
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: to meat and then three sides, generally served on like
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: a cafeteria tray. And we're talking stuff like fried pork
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: chops or fried chicken, or chicken, fried chicken, chicken, fried chicken, chicken,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: fried steak, chicken, fried steak, steak, fried chicken, fried steak,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: fried chicken, fried monkey eyes, and then all these various
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: sides will be the three. But there's a little bit
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: over that lap with barbecue. But barbecue, the distinction is
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: you're talking about meats that are cooked over a low heat,
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: generally over a long long period of time. Yeah, hours
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: and hours, hours and hours. We'll get in it all
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: the subtleties of this, but that's what barbecue really is,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: right and normally, if you really if you're a purist um.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: You're it's specifically pig. Anything else outside of pig is
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: not barbecue, whether it's chickens, sausage, whether it's shrimp, whether
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: it's brisket. If it's not pig, it's not barbecue. Say
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: a substantial portion of barbecue enthusiasts. Yeah, I say you
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: can just take that and uh then run away with it.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Take that, take that pig and shove it. Well, the
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: reason it's actually that that whole thing kind of is
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: the crux that is found in a nine Esquire article
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: called My Pig Beats Your Cow, which basically argues that
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: if it's not pig, it's not barbecue. And the reason
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: that that would be the cases because barbecue is it
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: came out of the American South as far back as
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: the beginning of the eighteenth century, and the stuff that
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: they were originally cooking was pig. And the reason why
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: they were cooking pig was because that's what they had
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: available to them. And there was a specific reason for
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: cooking pig, like you said, low and slow, very long
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: time over a lowish heat. It's because the pigs that
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: they were originally cooking were had been turned out to
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: feed fend for themselves out in the woods. Because if
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: you are running low on food, because you know you're
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: a colonist to a new place where you have no
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: idea what you're doing. You one thing you can do
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: with pigs and say, just go out in the woods
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: and eat some truffles and then will come kill you
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: later and eat you. Well. As they're doing that, they're
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: becoming like kind of like wood ready and like their leaner.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: Their meat is tougher, there's less fat. So to cook
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: that kind of food and make it tender, you have
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: to cook it over low heat for a very long time.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: And that's where barbecuing pig in the South originally came from.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: That's the origin of barbecue. Yeah. And what's so cool
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: to me is um from the oranges, oranges from the origins,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: whether or not it's uh. I think. In two thousand seven,
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: Israeli archaeologists found um a two hundred thousand year old
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: evidence of barbecuing, essentially barbecuing wild cattle and gazelle. Whether
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: it's that or Hispaniola like you were talking about, or
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: in the fifteen hundreds uh in Spain, Um or the
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: earliest native Americans. What's so cool to me is that
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: they learned they first learned cooked meat good, and then
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: they learned, oh, but very slow cooked heat meat over
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: low heat better. Yeah, you know, like early early on
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: they found evidence that and these recipes that they cooked
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: slow and low, they actually learned the subtle difference between
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: this is charred meat, it will sustain me, it's it
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: will last a little bit longer and preserve it. And
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: they learned the subtleties that no, it's tender and juicy
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: and delicious, but do it this way. Yeah, it's just
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: amazing to me. Yeah, and again we've known it for
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands of years at least. There's actually a
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: theory that says that the intelligence explosion in humans came
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: about from cooking our food, especially meat, because it requires
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: less energy to digest, which meant we could take a
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: lot of that digestive energy and directed upward to our brains,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: and so our brains got bigger, and hence we got
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: smarter things to cooking our food. Yeah, and there's something
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: to uh, And they talk about this in the beginning
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: of our article here um being the antithesis of fast food.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: There's something about investing, something about getting up at three
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: in the morning to put your your meat on your
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: smoker so you can have it ready by midday, and
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: tending to it every hour and checking that thermometer and
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: the whole time that's starting at three am, um or
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: continuing from two am. Yeah, that's that makes sometimes for
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: a messy barbecue. But there's just something to that. I
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: think it's I think that's one of the big draws
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: for people. Is it is Uh. It's not something you
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: slap on the grill and served fifteen minutes later. It's
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: nuanced and and that's how you build that flavor. Uh.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: And it's an investment in time and you can have
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: the conversations around that fire. And this one writer put it,
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: really Robert Moss, to trace the history of barbecue is
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: to trace the very threat of American history. And there's
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: been books written about it, not just recipes, but about
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: it as a cultural staple in this country. Really really neat. Well,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm hungry. You want to take a break? So hungry?
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: M alright, So we're back, man. I mean that was delicious.
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: That's the sound of me flicking sauce off my fingers. Yeah,
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: we uh took one of Jerry's legs barbecue, Arie do lean,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: she would make good barbecue. Well, no, that's why you
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: want a barbecue slowing. So Um, like you said, there's
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: evidence of us barbecuing is back as far back as
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: two hundred thousand years the ancient Greeks um really advanced barbecuing,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: which sure, it's really just it's a sub type of
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: of roasting meat. And it's not like if you're like,
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: well wait a minute, people have been like creating this forever.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: How can you say barbecuing as American. It's kind of
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: like ketchup, Like remember Ketchup, where you think of Ketchup
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: as American, but it actually has its origins and a
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: Chinese fish sauce. This is very similar. But like barbecuing
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have come about had humans not been doing this
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: for two hundred thousand years already. This is just a
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: kind of a nuanced version of it, right. Um. So
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: around the world people roast meat in various ways, like,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: for example, um, in medieval England they found evidence they
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: actually have a taxidermy um sample of of this breed
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: of dog called the turnspit, and um no, no, it
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: was really cute. So this small dogs they look kind
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: of dock Sundy were bred to run on treadmills or
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: little hamster wheels too. That was connected by a chain
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: to the spit. So it turned this huge piece of
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: meat in the fire. Dog though they were small dogs,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: but they were stout. Oh they were turning the huge dog. Yeah,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: they're like better him than me. Um, And that was
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: in medieval England. Well, you can make a really good
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: case that turning a hunk of meat on a spit
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: very slowly off an indirect flame that's barbecuing. But it's
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: not barbecue because it didn't come out of the American
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: South cooking pork specifically. But um, the lot of people
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: from the south and west of England ended up in
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: the American South, and that's kind of one of the
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: ways that it started to grow there. Yeah, so let's
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: let's just quit billy dallying de Soto. Well, first Columbus
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: shows up encounters the Tano Indians on Hispaniola, who are
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: would have been related to um, the Haitians and the
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: Dominicans today. Uh, and I believe people in Puerto Rico
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: to um. So the Tano Indians had this method of
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: cooking meat where they used green wood like fresh saplings,
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: so that it wouldn't catch fire and therefore wouldn't char
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: the meat either, and they cooked meat like probably goats
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: or something like that over this this low heat for
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: a very long time. So I think Columbus encountered it,
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: but definitely Hernando de Soto did as well when he
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: arrived in North America, and supposedly the first European attended
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: barbecue took place outside of what's today Tupelo, Mississippi, in
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: fifteen forty with De Soto, who is the guy who
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: brought pigs to the New World. Could have been my family.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: So it was a roasted pig, Chuck's family, her Nando
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: de Soto, and the Chickasaw tribe who lived around there. Yeah,
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: that was the first, the first barbecue in North America
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: featuring pig. Yeah. And as you'll see as we go,
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: barbecue is very social experience that has weaved its way
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: through churches and gatherings and civic groups and American politics,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: and we'll get into all that, but it's it's it's
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: not surprising that there's evidence of a group of people
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: getting together like any shared meal, but with barbecue, it's
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: just gonna be longer. Well, yeah, and supposedly that arose
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: out of the slaughtering of a pig was a big deal.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: You had a lot of meat on your hands. They
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: used everything from the snout to the tail of the pig,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: so you had a lot of stuff and it was
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: way more than your family was going to eat. So
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: it was an occasion for the whole community, or at
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: least all the neighbors, to be invited over to share
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: in this wonderful food. And that's where barbecues being a
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: social gathering came out of that. During the colonial era, Uh,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: eating a pig was a very communal affair. Well, and
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: we've we've talked before about um I just kind of
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: remembered about fire, about the theories that language of all
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: because of fire, because for the first time, people gathered
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: round after the sun went down to talk about their day.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: So this is kind of along the same lines. Like
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: where you have a fire going, you're gonna have people
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: hanging out. There's some meat on a spit several feet up.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: You've got some tasty food. Can yourself a turnspit dog?
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: Uh yeah, because he wants to crank that thing. Turnspit dog.
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: That's what they were bred to do so Native Americans here,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: they kind of improve things over time. They eventually would
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: make these wooden frames that they would put the meat on.
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: And then in a man named Elsworth, his warrior, patented
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: the charcoal briquette, which started being mass produced about twenty
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: three years later. You didn't know by whom, Well, I
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: would imagine, uh uh, what's the big one now? Kingsford.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Kingsford was Henry Johnny match like. Kingsford was Henry Ford's
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: cousin in law. And Henry Ford was looking for a
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: way to use all of these stumps and sawdust that
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: was left over from the boards that were produced for
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: like the running boards and the dashboards for his model
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: T because he wanted he had all this waste and
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: he wanted to put it to good use. So he
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: started mass producing charcoal briquettes. Yeah, and we're talking about
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: wood briquettes. Yeah. Briquette is basically coal, tar, sawdust, sometimes
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: corn starch. That's like a that's a wood briquette. Yeah,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: or now the wood briquettes. A lot of times it's
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: just real wood, like chunks of wood, like if you're
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: a real barbecue enthusiast. You're not gonna be buying these
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: submit briquettes. Sure you buy some of those, get some
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: open pit barbecue sauce, and you've done. Let's go back
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: to bed Um. Nineteen fifties. A man named George Stephen,
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: he's a metalworker. He got half attached some legs to
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: a half of a spherical nautical booie was the other
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: half of the lid. He said, I'm gonna call this
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: the Webber kettle grill. I don't know where he got
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: the name. I don't either. Did you notice there's a
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: webber grill restaurant in Chicago? Really, we saw it walking around.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: You know, they have a giant webber grill outside. It's amazing.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: I have a giant webber grill in my deck. So
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: I thought it was weird to point this out because
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: he was far from the first person to invent the
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: portable backyard grill. Oh really, yeah, been around for a
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: long time. Well maybe it was just the kettle Girl.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: He definitely invented the kettle girl, but he was. It's
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: just weird that they chose him to point out because
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: the backyard portable grill had been around a while. Well,
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: maybe it was. This article is underwritten by Weber maybe,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and I just like Buzz marketed them as owning one Webber,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: I don't too whoa I know, right. So the smoke
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: is really I mean slow and low is what we're
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: talking about, temperature wise, And we'll get into the specifics
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: of that in a minute. But what you're really doing
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: is you're you're getting the smoke from whatever type of
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: wood or would briquette that you were using in the fire. Um.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: And we're gonna talk about those flavors now. But my advice,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: if you're new to this, you've never done it, go
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: out and get some different samples of these various woods.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: And you don't even need to cook with them at first.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: Just light them and smell the smoke and see what
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: you like, and then whatever you're drawn to use. That
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: good advice, But starting out, if you want to talk barbecue, Um,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Hickory in the South was widely used, and most of
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: these regionally were used because that obviously was the wood
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: they had near there. So hickory was abundant in the South.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: A little sweet, very rich, good for good for everything,
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: especially monkey guys mesquite uh Texas. Uh. This is where
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: you get the more mesquite flavor. And apparently the mesquite
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: would was sort of a nuisance. But in Texas they
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: got on the beef train obviously and said the stuff
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: mesquite wood is really good for beef. Yeah what else? Um,
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: apparently fruit wood is good for things like chicken and seafood.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: Does think of bacon when I think apple would apple
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: would smoke bacon? Yeah, that's the thing. Um, But yeah,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: I think that's good advice. Just whatever you like, it's
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: was what you should use. Yeah. And if you don't
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: have time to invest in a um would burning briquette,
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: like if you have a propane stove, Um, you can
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: always I know it's not gonna be is authentic. You
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: can always just cheep out and get a one of
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: those pans that you can keep the the wood on
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: and soak it and that'll that'll give you some extra flavor.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: But it's not gonna be anything like you know, twelve
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: hours over a fire, right like a wood fire. You know. Now,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: and if you're if you're starting to get the impression
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: that there's a certain level of purity, Yes, so the
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: idea of barbecuing, Yes, you you're absolutely correct, and I'm
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: not a purist. I'm an amateur. Like I don't have
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: a smoker at this point. So at this point maybe
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Webber will send you. At some point I should I
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: should probably get one for free. Um. So one of
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: the other things that really distinguishes different types of barbecue,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: especially regionally, is or even down to like the individual
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: chef or pit masters. We'll see they're called um although
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: I guess I just spoiled. That is how you get
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: the meat ready to cook. So there's there's really a
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: lot of differences in that you're you're getting the meat
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: ready to cook, and then what you do to the
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: meat afterward. Two is huge as well. But to get
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: it ready, there's one of two things you're gonna do
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: the meat. You're going to either hit it with a
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: dry rub or you're gonna hit it with a wet rub.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: You're gonna do something ahead of time, and you're gonna
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: talk to it nicely sure while you spank and um
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: with the dry rub. In particular, supposedly there's four s
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: is there is are you ready for this? Okay? Sweetness,
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: sugar or honey, typically savory like say, garlic, spices and herbs,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: and spicy sensations like pepper or something or ginger. That's
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: way more ses than four, especially if you count all
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: the pluralization s. Yeah, have you ever made a rub? No?
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Not really? You into this at all? To barbecue? No,
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: I I don't barbecue, but um into eating barbecue. You
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: You get into this stuff now with cooking, Like I
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: could see you smoking a brisket one day and being like, Wow,
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: that was rewarding. Give it a shot, okay. Um. Also,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: you also strike me as a type that would be like,
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: I don't have time to it's into a grill for
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: twelve hours. Well, I mean if there's if if Yeah,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: maybe let's pick the right day. Yeah, I could study
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: for the podcast while I'm tending to the fire. So
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: I have made dry rubs, and I don't know what
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: I'm doing. I just will look at recipes and just
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: kind of do my own thing with it. Um. But
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: it really makes all the difference if you rub this
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: meat down real good, get in all the crevices and
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: and nooks and crannies and and let it let it
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: just sit with itself for a while. Um. I don't
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: add any wetness to it. But you can't add vinegar.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: You can add oil. Um, if you've never done it,
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: like I said, get online. There's a million different ways
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: you can tackle this beast. Yeah, if you be careful,
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: because that's what they call a rabbit hole. Yeah, you're
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: going to fall down it when you start just looking
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: into rubs. I'm sure that will lead you to this
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: and that. Well actually I'm kind of into the Memphis
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: style and that kind of thing. So um, after after
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: you also want to make sure that you're aware of
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: this to start that. Barbecue sauce is the stuff you
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: put on right before serving or while you're eating, depending.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: Um all, if you're not into it, sure, some people
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: just eat like dry, dryer, wet, rubbed like barbecue. Um,
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: I love it with sauce. It just seems wrong to
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: eat it without sauce. But yes, some people are into
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: it like that. Um, but that's not what a rub is,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: dry or wet. That's that's the sauce that's different. We'll
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: talk about that in a little bit. And you kind
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: of gave a little um distinction between you gave a
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: definition of barbecuing, right, and I said that that like
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: roasting meat is basically barbecue any type of roasting meat.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: But there's there's slight definitions. One of the things that
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: comes up is the difference between barbecuing and grilling. And
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: this one's actually kind of easy. The distinction is it's
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: based on time and temperature. Yeah. So with with the barbecue,
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: you do that slow and low thing where you're roasting
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: for several hours over a relatively low heat. Uh. This
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: article says to two fifty, I wonder if that's cannon. Uh. Well,
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: I mean it depends definitely. In the low two hundreds
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: is a good idea. I think to fifty seems a
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: little high. But um, I'm no expert, but grilling is
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: hotter and faster. Yeah. And with grilling, I mean there
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: are a couple of ways you can grill too. You
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: can uh direct grill, which is just really high heat
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: if you want to um, sira steak or something, but
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: that's not barbecue. Um. And then indirect grilling when it's
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: on the grill around three fifty but you've just got
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: the coals kind of on one side and then your
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: meat on the other. And that's it's kind of the
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: middle ground. But the verb barbecue, it's very highly regionalized
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: as to what terminology you're gonna use and like, I
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: don't say I'm gonna barbecue today, Like I say I'm
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: gonna grill out. Do you want to come over? I'm
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: grilling out. I don't say we're barbecuing. Some people might
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: say smoke instead of barbecue. Yeah, we're gonna smoke out.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: We're gonna we're gonna smoke some meat or something like that. Um.
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: But I I think of barbecue as the noun, like
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: we'll go get some barbecue or cook some barbecue by
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: grilling out. Yeah, it's always out because you don't grow inside.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: That's a bad idea. Um. And then afterwards, so we've
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: done preparation, the cooking, and now the thing's ready, but
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: it's not ready quite yet because you've got the sauce.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: If you're into sauces, and depending on where you are
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: in the country, uh, you're going to use different types
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: of sauce. And what I found interesting was that with
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: American barbecue, the the Europeans who came in appropriated the
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: barbecuing process brought their own tastes to the fold, and
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: depending on where they settled, that's that area developed a
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: specific type of barbecue sauce. Starting with the Carolinas. Yeah,
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: this kind of reminds me of the accents. Thing was
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: like the trail that, uh, the accents as the accents
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: developed as where people settled, Like food was kind of
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: secondary to that or hand in hand with that. Uh yeah,
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: North Carolina in Virginia, these were British colonists mainly, and
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: they liked tart tarti things, So you're gonna find more
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: vinegar based sauces there until you get the South Carolina
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: where you have the french Ins and Germans who liked mustard,
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: so they have the mustard based sauce. I don't think
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: I've ever had that. Uh yeah, I'm not a fan.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: I mean I don't not like it, but it's never
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: gonna be my first choice. What was do you remember
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: when we hosted that locust thing on Science Channel and
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: I went to the barbecue place. It was like a
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: legendary barbecue place in South no Greensboro, North Carolina. Yeah,
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: that was really neat. Yeah, so they had like the
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: good vinegar sauce. Yeah, just seeing the inner machinations of
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: how a big barbecue place works, right, Yeah, they took
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: us back to where the fire was. Yeah, it was
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: pretty good and hot. Uh. If you go a little
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: further west, a little about as far west as you
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: can to the other end of the barbecue belt, you're
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: in Texas, West Texas to be specific. Apparently in East
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: Texas they eat basically like Kansas City barbecue or Memphis maybe,
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: but in West Texas they get their own And like
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: you said, they're not even using pork, it's beef. They're
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: cooking brisket over mesquite. That's Texas cowboys style barbecue, which
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: some people would argue is not actually barbecue. Yeah, and
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: that's because the German immigrants who raised all in the west,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: in West Texas. Um, I love brisket, so yeah, I've
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: got no problems with brisket and pulled pork, and me
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: I like them both. Like when I woulder like a
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: catered if I'm having like a big party or something,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: I would er a catered barbecue, I get one of each.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: The one. Yeah. The one thing I'm not crazy about
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: is barbecue chicken. I like it. I mean I make
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: it at home because that's a quicker, easier thing to do,
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: just like for dinner. Um, but I don't ever order
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: that in a barbecue restaurant. I just didn't know what
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: a waste. Yeah, I do that home cooking. Sure. Uh,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: Memphis style. Um, they were a port town because of
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: the Mississippi River right there, and so they could get
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: molasses more readily. So that's why Memphis has a very
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: sweet tomato base sauce. Yeah, delicious. Which and then have
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: you heard of Alabama barbecue before? I had not, so
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: the way that this article puts it, it's a lesser
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: known style from northern Alabama, involving a white sauce made
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: with mayonnaise, vinegar, and lemon juice. For some reason, that
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: use of the word involving makes it sound like they're
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: talking about some unpleasant business. It's just hilarious. It doesn't
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: sound very good, but I would try it. I've had
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: that white sauce. I don't think I knew it was
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: Alabama specific. Oh yeah, but I've had it before. So
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: perhaps you can answer this one for me. What is
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Georgia barbecue? Is it just basically like a rip off
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: of North Carolina? I don't know, man Like, Well, we'll
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: get slayd for this because we live in Georgian iight
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: at barbecue places all over town. Yeah, I guess it's
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: its own thing, but it doesn't seem it's it's a tart.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: It's a tart vinegary based sauce, but sweet as well. Well.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: There can most of the places I see in Atlanta
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: have both. I have the vinegar sauce or the or
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: the sweet sauce, like the really thick And I think
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: Kansas City is barbecue is sort of known. Um Henry
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: Perry settled there and opened up one of the first
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: barbecue restaurant, and I think they kind of pulled from
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Memphis a little bit. I think they drew influences from
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: all over because they were last and but I think
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: in the city is generally known for that kind of
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: sweet and tangy sauce. But but once in Atlanta, I've
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: seen kind of have all kinds, but it's typically pork,
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: although they'll have brisket on the menu. But most people
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: when they think of barbecue in the South or in Georgia,
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: think of pulled pork. I think people think of both.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Or maybe I'm just saying that because I do Well,
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: I don't know, there's a lot of transplants in Atlanta,
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: So maybe what what's your favorite place in Atlanta? Uh,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: it depends on what you're looking for because the ribs
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: obviously Fat Matt's Rib Shack is the real deal. Um
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: wings chicken Fox Brothers obviously. Okay, yeah, their wings are
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: good and their sauce is good too. And then for
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: pulled pork. There's a place on Peachtree Industrial and it
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: doesn't even have a name. It just says like brick
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: pit Barbecue. But it's not even the name of the place.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: They're just saying like they have a brick pit barbecue it'
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: and um, you can tell like that same fire has
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: been going since the late sixties and it is just
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: amazing just for like a regular old pulled pork sandwich
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: with like really good Brunswick's too, and then like that
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: plain white hamburger bun perfect. What about yours? I like
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Fox Brothers. Okay, Um, it's good. Um My favorite barbecue
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: is Community Barbecue. Um yeah, I've never heard of that.
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: It's really good. I mean, I guess you call that Decatur.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: It's in that shopping center with it's kind of the
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: best food restaurant shopping center in Atlanta because it's got
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: a tie place, an Italian place, a barbecue joint, a
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: an Indian restaurant, that's not true. I have eaten there.
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: It is good. So it's got like seven restaurants and
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: all of them are different ethnicity, um, which obviously wasn't
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: an accident. I don't know who owns that, but like,
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: kudos to them, hats all. But Community Barbecue is just
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: the best. Their brisket is unbelievable, and they're mac and
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: cheese is indescribably good. It's that's really saying something because
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: usually mac and cheese is terrible at a restaurant. Stuff
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: is so good. You see him making it sometimes, and
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: like if you walk to go to the restroom, you'll
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: see in the kitchen they're making these pans of mac
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: and cheese. I don't know how much cheese goes into
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: it or the different kinds. And they have cream and
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: stuff every cream, but it's just ungodly the amount of cheese.
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: Everybody on this side that makes it good. They don't
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: call it macin some cheese. All right, let's take a
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: break and we're going to talk about sides and uh
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: a little bit about politics and barbecue around the world.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: Finish up, let's take it home, Chuck. All right, we
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: gotta talk about sides for a minute. We we got
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: literally watery in the mouth talking about mac and cheese
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: at community. Um. But typical sides are, like I said earlier,
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: maybe some cold slaw, which will also vary by region. Um,
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: Brunswick stew, which is set in here. It was originally
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: squirrel meat, but chicken will do. I've only had pork
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: here Brunswick stew, never had squirrel Brunswick stew. Not into that.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: It sounds like a Mike Huckaby dish. Um. Baked beans, Sure,
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: I make really good baked beans. That sort of the
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: dish I will volunteer to bring to any cookout or
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: spake beans. That's ironic because I make a good FARTI
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: sound with my armpit. That's what you bring to barbecue. Um.
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: What else, well, French fries. Uh, it depends on the restaurant,
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: but the usually be some kind of like French fries
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: or something like that. To me, if you can, if
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: you can wolf down anything besides the barbecue, they're not
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: giving you enough barbecue. Like, yes, it's nice to have
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: some sides or whatever, but like it's the barbecue that's
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: the point. Sure, And I think you should be able
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: to get full just off of the barbecue, that's my opinion.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Do you like it chopped or oh, I guess you're
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: doing the pork, so it's see brisket, they'll slice it.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: But I like it chopped for a sandwich. Um, and
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: I do like to mix the brist choppers, get up
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: with the sauce. Yeah, so good. Oh man, I'm really
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: and I ate lunch and I'm still just like super hungry.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: That's good stuff. Um. Politics has often has long been
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: linked to barbecue. Way back in the old days of
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: the colonies and the early days of American politics, they
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: found a good way to get a lot of people
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: together talk to him about stuff was to promise them food. Well, no,
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: I remember. It grew out of this tradition of we
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: just killed a pig, so everybody came gather around, we're
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: gonna cook it. Needed together, And then politicians started showing
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: up at these things or holding them themselves. But yeah,
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: there's a long tradition of of politics and barbecues. And apparently, um,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: Fourth of July, which you think of as barbecue like
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: holiday here in the States. Um, that's long been a
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: barbecue holiday. That's nothing new. And apparently they used to
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: get drunk and barbecue and read the fourth the Declaration
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: of Independence. That was the big, the big, the big
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: fourth thing. Uhties they m they were such a big
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: hit in the South. They started kind of spreading out
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: politically in eight thirty six. That was Daniel Webster, U
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: S Senator. He was a wig. We should do something
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: on the wigs. I like those dudes. Um. He gave
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: a two hour speech at a barbecue in St. Louis.
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: So did uh candidate William Henry Harrison. It just became
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: a tool, you know, at these rallies to get folks
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: together and feed him almost bribe them both food and booze.
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: What was it called applying the planters with bumbo or something? Yeah,
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: that was from the Bars episode. Yeah, but yeah, it's
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: it's it's like, here, you eat these ribs and drink
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: all of this uh bourbon. Yeah, and uh don't yeah exactly.
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: And throughout the years of many many presidents have thrown big,
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: big barbecues, from Linda Johnson to the bushes. Um, I'm
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: not sure what's going on today. Trump didn't struck me
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: as a hitmaster, No, but Johnson apparently had something called
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: barbecue diplomacy out on his ranch in Texas. He throw
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: huge barbecues, invite uh V I P s and say hey,
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: I want you to sign this bill. Okay, I'm melb J.
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: That's that's nothing like I think it does. It was obviously,
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: uh Slavery in the United States played a big part
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: because UM part of the sort of facade of treating
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: slaves to a big barbecue as a reward for being slaves.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: UM was something that happened on plantations. But on the
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: flip side, UM slaves would also have barbecues and go
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: over plans for a rebellion. I think the Nat Turner
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: rebellion was planned over barbecue or escape via the underground railroad.
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: And in the Civil rights movement in the nineteen fifties
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: and sixties was barbecue was a lot of times these
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: barbecue restaurants in the South were sort of the meeting
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: places and headquarters. Yeah. What's weird, especially in the Jim
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: Crow era, was that barbecue places were segregated. UM, so
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: you'd have like, um, black owned barbecue joint, white owned
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: barbecue joints. UM. But the thing about barbecue is that
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: it kind of transcends race and class in that like
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: everybody in the South loves barbecue right um. And apparently
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: during the Jim Crow era, white people would sneak over
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: to black owned barbecue joints that had superior barbecue and
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: get their take out and go um. And the reason
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: they were able to do this is because at the
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: time and still in some places today, but at the time,
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: barbecue joints were almost exclusively take out. And the reason
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: they were take out was because they were the evolution
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: of a barbecue pit. And the pit master role, especially
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: in the Annabellum uh South, usually went to a slave.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: So you if you were a slave who was the
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: pit master on a whole plantation, you know how to
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: cook some meat and you know how to cook it
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: really well for a lot of people, both um enslaved
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: and not. You probably didn't care about running a restaurant. No,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: but after after reconstruction, for during reconstruction after the Civil War,
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden you found yourself with extremely unique talent.
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: And so maybe like during the week you would go
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: to work, maybe as a sharecropper, and then on the
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: weekend maybe you would be the pit master for your church.
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: And then people would say this is so good, you
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: should you know, you should sell this, So all of
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: a sudden you build a shack around your pit, and
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden you have a bit of a joint.
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: So you put up a couple of stools, and people
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: come and you have a window, and they get their
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: take out and go, and then the car comes along,
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, your barbecue joint is like
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: a destination that people are going to on their road trips.
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: And then that's how the barbecue joints developed. Yeah, I think,
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's one of the coolest things about it
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: to me in the South is that despite our very
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: checkered in dark past um and uh, even though a
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: lot of that racism obviously is still around. Um, if
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: you go into a barbecue joint in Atlanta, you're gonna
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: find all stripes of people, all classes of people, um,
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: sitting side by side, enjoying food together and being really
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: friendly to one another and talking about the food. Um.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: Like you know, you'll see some like Wall Street dude
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: with his tie flipped over so he didn't get it dirty,
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: next to a guy that's um just come back. You know.
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: Fishing with a bunch of catfishing is cooler, uh, feeding
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: each other, drinking sweet tea. Um, it's just like, I
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: don't know, it's cool, man, go to like a a
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: tailgate at the Falcons game sometime if you think, like
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: the South is so divided still and you'll see people
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: getting along for the most part. In that case, the
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: only losers the pig who are way smarter than we
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: tend to think. That is probably a T shirt at
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: some barbecue restaurant. The only loser here is the pig,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: which and this has struck me for a very long time.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Using a pig as a mascot for a barbecue places
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: so sad. It's so sad. That's like if McDonald's instead
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: of the Golden Arches had just a big cow. Yeah,
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: a cow serving a platter of hamburgers. That's what they do.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Were the ones that have wings because they're dead because
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: you're eating them? Uh, it's talking about civil rights movement though. Um.
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: In Atlanta, we had a very famous restaurant here that
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: was uh kind of one of the headquarters for Reverend
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: Martin Luther King Jr. Yeah, have you heard of that place? Yeah,
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: alex A. L. E. C. K. Barbecue Heaven was legendary
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: Atlanta place that. Um is this still around well? No,
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: I want to know what it is now. No, I don't.
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: Imminent domain came in and took it over and it's
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: now a Walmart. I know. It's like you literally couldn't
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: have written a worse outcome. I don't know. They could
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: have put up a Texas barbecue place instead. Wow, that's true. Uh.
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: And here's the thing, though, they had a for many
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: years after uh, doctor King died that was a I'm
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: sort of a shrine to him in this restaurant still,
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: like this is kind of where they met and that
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: is where it happened. And um, for many years that
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: was maintained and maintained and I think uh and Walmart.
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: Originally they had that was in the middle of Boys Apparel.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: I don't know where it was, but I think they
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: actually reference at or had photos commemorating that or something
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: for a little while, but then took it out because they, man,
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: what was the quote. They didn't think it represented the
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: brand in in the right way or something. I need
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: to look it up. I wish i'd been there. But yeah,
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: it's a Walmart. It's right over sort of in the
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: Atlantic University Center near kind of right near downtown. Okay. Yeah,
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: like right next to uh, Morris Brown and Clark at
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Land and come on, I know, Uh, do you got
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: anything else? No, I mean we hit a little bit
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: on barbecue around the world. Um, we're not gonna get
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: too much into it, but obviously if you've had jerk
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: chicken or um barbeca or yeah, or Korean style barbecue,
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: which supposedly we should say. Barbeca is the word that
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: De Soto reported back to Europe about barbecuing, and they
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: think it's a corrupted Tano word, but they don't have
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: any tano Anyans to ask because the Europeans killed them
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: all off, so no one thought to ask them first
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: before they all died. That's said, yeah, yeah, I got
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: nothing else. Okay, Well, if you want to know more
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: about Martin Luther King Jr. The Tano, Indians, pigs, barbecue, Texas,
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: all that stuff, you can type those words in the
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: search bar how stuff works dot Com. Since I said
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: search bar's time for listener mail. Hey guys, just wanted
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: to share with both of you a Vice News short
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: documentary that came out tonight. It includes lots of great
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: footage and first hand accounts of the streets of Charlottesville.
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: He's this is in real time where the events in Charlotte'sville,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: Virginia have just happened. Um, he sent, Have you seen
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: this documentary yet? No, I haven't. By this time it
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: will have aired on HBO on The Vice Show. But
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: it's out online now. And I encourage everybody who's Chuck
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: speaking it. Yeah, it's only twenty minutes long, sit through
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: it all. It's extremely hard to watch, very very upsetting. Uh.
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: And I'll watch it just before we came in here
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: to record, which is a big mistake. Is it sensationalized
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: or true true life? No, I mean it's it's They
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: got a camera and a young woman to report kind
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: of right in the middle of it all. So she
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: interviews white nationalists, She interviews people um fighting back against
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: white nationalists. It's um just in their own words, basically, like,
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: here's a microphone. What do you have to say? Yeah,
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: it's not uh not fun. Racism and ignorance back to
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: the mail, Racism and ignorance on this scope are abhorrent
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: and things that just h need to be widely denounced
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: in American discourse. As the uv A alum, I just
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: want to say this rally does not represent the feelings
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: and attitudes of the university or surrounding city, which is
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: actually garnered a reputation as a refugee city in recent years.
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: And I think most people know that this. These people
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: came from all over the country and other countries. These
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: white nationalists, well, the whole reason they came is because
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: Charlotte feels taking down their Confederate memorial right to Robert E.
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: Lee that that was the uh the guys under which
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: they met, but it was clearly much more than that.
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: That's where they met up, at least with their yeah,
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: Walmart tiki torches, which as hysterical and said, I have
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: been avidly listening to your podcast for about a year now,
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: and sarendipitously enough, I happened to find your episode on
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: free speeches Friday of the protest on campus. I'm not
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: one to strike down American liberty by liberties by any means,
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: but it does make me wonder how things might be
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: different in our society. We did have some kind of
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: restrictions on things like hate speech in broadcasting certifiably false
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: information just as a thought experiment. While I have been
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: an open advocate for environmental protection at many times in
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: my life. It's the first time in my life that
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: I've openly posted for a cause involving racism and bigotry.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: I shared both the Vice News video and your Free
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: Speech podcast all my Facebook prints, and I seek to
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: be more more public advocate for equality from here on out.
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: Keep on doing great things. You're empty humor and curiosity
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: or greatly appreciated. This is from John Uh in Washington,
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: d C. Nice John, Thank you very much, and I
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: encourage everyone just google Vice News Charlottesville watch that twenty minutes,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: and I would really be interested if anyone can write
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: in and defend anything that was going on there. Uh
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: And if, like John, you want to let us know
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: about something you think we should see, We're always down
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: for that. You can tweet to us at s y
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: s K podcast or Josham Clark can hang out with
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: us at Facebook dot com, slash stuff you Should Know
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: or slash Charles W. Chuck Bryant. You can send us
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: an email to Stuff Podcast to how stuff Works dot
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: com is always join us at our home on the
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: web Stuff you Should Know dot com for more on
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: Works dot Com