David Howard Gelin - BBQ joints : stories and secret recipes from the barbeque belt

Buddy and I would like to single out Hamlin Endicott, Harvey Rubin, Barrett Batson and Candice Dyer. Without their advice and encouragement, this piece of work would never have been realized. Their acts, though seemingly small, have made all the difference in helping us get over the top. (Image C)

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Ray Lampe and John T. Edge, who I am now proud to call colleagues.

Buddy would like to single out Laura Dobson, Anja Tigges, Mitzi Cartee and Eric Mills for taking him in when it was just too hot to hang out in an unairconditioned pickup truck.

Not in any particular order or function: J. Bradley Deal, Sheral Frohberg, Tim Springfield, John Donham, Scott Coleman, the Young family (homes in Texas and North Carolina), The Littwitz Family, Ken Lambert, Jack Fisher, Laurie Connor Jarrett, Mike and Jennifer Morrison, Mark Greenberg, Casey Coyne, Francis Parks, Nancy Bolling, Mitchell and Roni Moskowitz, Sadler Taylor, Stan Woodward, Walt Rogers, and all those wonderful librarians in towns big and small who didnt need to reference anything to steer me to the best barbecue around.

The good folks at Gibbs Smith, Publisher, not the least of which are Gibbs Smith, Pete Wyrick, Suzanne Taylor, Melissa Barlow, Kurt Wahlner, Jessica McKenzie, Renee Wald and Madge Baird.

My wonderful family who makes everything possible. My sisters (in chronological order) Beth, Deborah, Rachel and Martha. And especially my parents, Jack and Margaret, who would hope against incredible odds that their idiot son would someday find himself, which he did, somewhere on the open road between the pages of this book.

Barbecue has long been among the Souths most democratic foods, cooked and served (and eaten) by all classes and hues. Today, that democracy is in flux. Once a working mans or womans vocation, once a trade in which the underclass defined success, nowadays barbecue is often portrayed (and practiced) as a middle class avocation.

Increasingly, excellence is not measured by dedicated local customers who, through their patronage, pay homage to a neighbors life of work in the pits. Part of the blame lies with the popularity of the barbecue competition circuits, where weekend warriors deem success to be a three-foot trophy bedecked with a plastic hog, presented on a bunting-draped stage by a lapsed Hooters girl, who, in advance of crowning the grand champion, shoehorned into a slinky sow costume and bobby pinned a pink-eared tiara to her hair. (Image D)

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David Gelins BBQ Joints: Stories and Secret Recipes from the Barbeque Belt serves as a gentle corrective to this trend. Herein you meet the personalities behind the pits. You hear their family stories. Most important, you see their faces, creased by smiles full of pride in self, pride in place, and pride in tradition.

You might not agree with all of Gelins subject choices, or even his geographical definitions of the American South. Based upon my own internal barometer of barbecue taste, Gelin and I are in accord sixty percent of the time. But a consensus of excellence is not this authors intent. He aims instead for a family portrait of Southern barbecue, and he delivers as much.

Thumb the pages that follow. Meet Susie Headrick, whose late husband Leo, of Leo and Susies Famous Green Top Bar-B-Que in Dora, Alabama, was famous for singing along with the jukebox while using a hot sauce bottle as a microphone. Come face-to-face with Coleman Anderson of A&B Bar-B-Q in Jasper, Florida, who tells a tale of community fidelity when he says, I dont buy firewood. It just shows up. Look closely and you will recognize a South where barbecue is a kind of national dish and the people who cook and serve it are, well, national heroes.

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Only the truly mediocre are always at their best, and that certainly applies to barbecue. After all, barbecue is an art, not a science. Im sure that even Michelangelo was not cranking out Davids every day. Heck, even Willie Nelson spewed out To All The Girls Ive Loved Before. It was probably said best by the seemingly invincible Hall of Fame pitcher Jim Catfish Hunter after he lost a World Series game: The sun dont shine on the same dogs ass every day.

Barbecue is not a pretentious food. The more simpler the better. Basically, it is meat slow-cooked over hardwood coals for hours. It is that simple. Different places have their own variations on that theme, but if you dont have those essential elements, you dont have barbecue. Or as Pete Jones put it, If its not cooked with wood, its not barbecue.

That might seem obvious, but you would be surprised at what some try to pass off as barbecue. As in any art form, there are no rules, but there are a couple of red flags that you should be aware of:

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