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Lake High would like to make a few things clear to all the KFC Masterpiece aficionados out there:
- Barbecue sauce does not turn meat into barbecue.
- You cannot say you’re having barbecue when you’re actually having grilled chicken with barbecue sauce slathered on it.
“I once saw a barbecue ad that was a picture of some guy pouring sauce from a pitcher onto a piece of meat,” says High, president of the South Carolina Barbeque Association. “I thought, ‘Well, where is the barbecue under that?’”
That’s not to say barbecue sauce has no place at the picnic table. In fact, South Carolina is the only state where all four types of barbecue sauce found in the U.S. are made and served, High says. It’s just that any of those sauces should be merely a finishing touch to the real thing.
“If you’re eating barbecue that’s covered in sauce, it’s probably an indication that it’s not very good barbecue,” he says.
More Monthly: 'The last bastions of real barbecue": Inside the (messy) world of the South Carolina Barbecue Association
High knows a thing or two about what he calls “the dying art” of barbecue. And around here, the main ingredients are pork and pride.
“The only places left in the nation where you can get barbecue still cooked the way it was 200 years ago is South Carolina and North Carolina,” High says. “We’re the last bastions of real barbecue.”
The basic premise behind barbecue is to cook a piece of pork “slow and low” — which means generally you want the smoker to be kept between 210 and 250 degrees, High says.
So what’s the secret to great barbecue? Depends on who you’re asking. First there’s the rub, which typically includes salt, pepper, paprika and some cayenne pepper, with many cooks including cumin, chili powder, ground-up poblano peppers, garlic powder, coriander, and other spices and herbs,as well.
Then there’s the wood used in the smoker, which seems like it should be the means to an end, but is actually a Very Big Deal.
“For it to be done right,” High says, “there has to be smoke. And the smoke has to be wood. You’ve got to have hickory or oak. There’s white oak, black oak, blackjack oak. You can use pecan but it darkens your meat up a great deal. You can use peach and apple, or cherry. You can’t use any resinous wood like pine or poplar. It makes it taste just terrible.”
Many cooks opt for a combination of different woods in hopes of billowing just the right smoky sweetness through their meat as it cooks — for a very long time (up to 20 hours for a whole hog).
The meat is regularly checked and moistened, usually with a vinegar and pepper-based sauce. “About every two hours you’re squirtin’ somethin’ on it or sprinklin’ something on it,” says Jason Dangerfield, a barbecue cook from Beaufort.
Though Dangerfield has a favorite wood (oak) and a favorite sauce (combination of mustard-based and vinegar and red pepper), he says the key to great barbecue isn’t anything that goes in the smoker.
“I think the secret is having fun. If you’re having fun and enjoying it, then you’re going to produce a good product,” he says.
“Barbecue is not just about the meat, it’s about the whole experience. That’s what you spend most of the time on, the meat, but it’s about a lot more than that.”
