I went to the Lexington (NC) BBQ festival this past weekend and we met our inlaws there. We actually went to the wine garden first and they met us there. I wanted to go sample some of the BBQ but my Father-in-law told me it was all made by one company, the lines were long at every stand, and the food wasn't good. Plus he said he had a favorite local place that we should go to on the way out. So I said OK and kept drinking wine
We arrive at the restaurant and it has a nice full parking lot, a good sign. We get our table and menus, no pulled pork on the menu (which is common in Lexington), but they had chopped, coarse chopped and sliced BBQ on the menu. One coarse chopped plate please with fries for me!
The food comes quickly (too quickly it seemed) and the plate consists of some decent crinkle-cut fries, white cole slaw with lots of pepper, a basket of marble sized hush puppies, and about (8) 1-1.5" cubes of pork bathed in a reddish sauce. First for the positives, the hush puppies and fries were great, nice and crisp on the outside and soft and warm on the inside. The slaw was my favorite part of the meal - the heavy black pepper component gave a nice contrast to the slightly sweet slaw.
OK, on to the pork. Sauce was almost like a diluted ketchup, had some sweet flavors but overall really no spice or flavor at all and the pork was swimming in it. The pork had no bark whatsoever, was very tough and several of the cubes were almost entirely fat. It appears that this restaurant cooked the butt like a pork roast to a minimally acceptable temperature then cubed it up. It was awful. I ate part of the first cube, did some exploring on the remaining cubes, and ate everything else on the plate. My F-I-L got sliced BBQ and while it looked no better, he ate every bit and commented on how delicious it was. He asked me how mine was, and while I wanted to be truthful, I didn't want to hurt his feelings so I told him I wasn't as hungry as I though I was. Good thing they had a salad bar.
I should have followed my M-I-L's lead and got the hamburger steak, the waitress said it was the best thing on the menu.
We arrive at the restaurant and it has a nice full parking lot, a good sign. We get our table and menus, no pulled pork on the menu (which is common in Lexington), but they had chopped, coarse chopped and sliced BBQ on the menu. One coarse chopped plate please with fries for me!
The food comes quickly (too quickly it seemed) and the plate consists of some decent crinkle-cut fries, white cole slaw with lots of pepper, a basket of marble sized hush puppies, and about (8) 1-1.5" cubes of pork bathed in a reddish sauce. First for the positives, the hush puppies and fries were great, nice and crisp on the outside and soft and warm on the inside. The slaw was my favorite part of the meal - the heavy black pepper component gave a nice contrast to the slightly sweet slaw.
OK, on to the pork. Sauce was almost like a diluted ketchup, had some sweet flavors but overall really no spice or flavor at all and the pork was swimming in it. The pork had no bark whatsoever, was very tough and several of the cubes were almost entirely fat. It appears that this restaurant cooked the butt like a pork roast to a minimally acceptable temperature then cubed it up. It was awful. I ate part of the first cube, did some exploring on the remaining cubes, and ate everything else on the plate. My F-I-L got sliced BBQ and while it looked no better, he ate every bit and commented on how delicious it was. He asked me how mine was, and while I wanted to be truthful, I didn't want to hurt his feelings so I told him I wasn't as hungry as I though I was. Good thing they had a salad bar.
I should have followed my M-I-L's lead and got the hamburger steak, the waitress said it was the best thing on the menu.
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