All About Barbecue

As we all know it, the word “barbecue” defines both a method and an apparatus for cooking food, often meat, with the heat and hot gases of a fire, smoking wood, or hot coals of charcoal and may include application of a marinade or basting sauce to the meat.

The origins of both the activity of barbecue cooking and the word itself are somewhat obscure. However, most specialists believe that barbecue derives ultimately from the the language of the Taíno people of the Caribbean. Eventually, the word moved from Caribbean dialects into Spanish, then French and English.

Generally, when we talk about barbecue, we refer to a social gathering where food is served, usually outdoors in the early afternoon. In the South outdoor gatherings are not typically called barbecues but rather cookouts. And when southerners talk about barbecue, the conversation, at least, initially revolves around the cooking of pork.

Each Southern state, or even the city, has its own particular variety of barbecue, particularly concerning the sauce. The Carolinas, for example, tend to prepare tangier vinegar based sauces. Memphis barbecue is best-known for tomato- and vinegar-based sauces.

South Carolina is the only state that includes all four recognized barbecue sauces, including mustard based, vinegar based, light and heavy tomato based. In some Memphis establishments and in Kentucky, meat is rubbed with dry seasoning and smoked over hickory wood without sauce; the finished barbecues then served with barbecue sauce on the side.

In Texas, meanwhile, barbecue is often eaten with no sauce at all so as not to distract from the natural flavor of the meat in question (which, in Texas, is generally beef, however chicken is also common, a meat not often found barbecued in other states).

The barbecue of Georgia and Tennessee is almost always pork served with a sweet tomato-based sauce. A popular item in Memphis is the pulled pork sandwich served on a bun and topped with cole slaw. Pulled pork is prepared by shreading the pork after it is barbecued.

The World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest is held annually in Memphis, Tennessee during the Memphis in May festival. Other barbecue competitions are held in virtually every state in the United States during the warmer months, usually beginning in April and going through September. These events feature keen competitions between teams of cooks and are divided into separate competitions for the best pork, beef and poultry barbecue and for the best barbecue sauces.

The term barbecue is also used to designate a flavor added to foodstuffs, the most prominent of which are potato chips. This term usually implies a strong smoky flavor, and often denotes a flavor reminiscent of barbecue sauce.