Quote:
Originally Posted by Mule
What tabs was attempting was smoking. Not quite the same as bbq and definitely not Chinese. It developed in the South, not San Francisco.
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Ahh, more pearls of wisdom. Mule is on to something here. Barbeque is a somewhat bastardized word, usually used incorrectly to include a whole host of things that have nothing to do with true barbeque, from the meat that is used, to the method of cooking, the cooking apparatus, etc. Let's start at the beginning:
American barbeque, as opposed to Chinese, Mexican, Mongol, or what have you, is very simple. A pig, cooked on a grate or stick, over the coals of a hardwood fire in a pit in the ground. It dates from the 1500's or 1600's, more or less originated on the east coast in the Carolinas and can be traced to either the American indians or the Carribean indians, depending upon who you ask. At any rate, the indians had the method. Europeans brought with them the pig and the indians knew immedialtely what to do with it.
If you were to dig a pit in the ground, build a fire in the pit and then, when the wood is reduced to coals, suspend a pig over the pit, you would create barbeque. If you were to baste it occasionally with a vinegar, salt and pepper "sauce," so much the better.
If you cover the pit with dirt and wrap the meat in banana leaves or burlap, you would be doing it like the Mexicans do (or the Hawaiians, or whomever) but this is not barbeque, as it is a form of moist heat cooking. That's why the leaves or burlap are soaked in water. Part of the cooking is from steam. Call it a braise, if you do it in an oven, ala Alton Brown.
Build a fire in a lower chamber of an offset smoker and cook the meat in a separate, higher chamber, ala Tabs the Master Buffeter, and you will be smoking, not barbequeing. What's missing is the radiant heat from the coals. It will still cook the meat and impart a smoke flavor but it win't be the same.
Fire up a Weber and toss on the pig and you will grill the meat, unless you can get enough distance between the coals and the meat to get the temperature right. Grilles usually burn too hot.
See the photos below, for illustration. The second one shows a way to create a pit of sorts, without digging the hole. Many modern barbeque "pits" are based upon this.
There's a lot of crap out there calling itself barbeque and the real stuff is getting harder to find every year. None of the BBQ joints in my neck of the woods do it right. Even in North Carolina, many places have reverted to gas or electric heat, simply because to do it right is a bunch of hot, nasty work and as a country, we are gettin too damn lazy too do anything right. In my family, when we ate barbeque, we started cooking it the day before and tended it all night. Not exactly fun.
Those of you that have not had (Eastern) North Carolina BBQ first-hand should plan a road trip soon, before the good stuff is gone for good.
It is sad, when a rabbel-rousing foreigner (svandamme) argues about BBQ with Americans and gets it right.
Carry on with your arguments,
JR