Adams Tom - Pitt Cue Co : the cookbook

Perfecting barbecue (BBQ) is a slow process. It takes time to get it right. From smoking a whole hog to finding the perfect sweet-to-spicy ratio in a sauce, it can take years to reach satisfying results. In the American South, BBQ is something of a bragging right. Families hold decades-old secret recipes dear to their hearts. Considering the commitment and individuality of a truly great BBQ recipe, it is inspiring when a new restaurant introduces something distinctive and delicious. The undertaking is even more impressive when the restaurant isnt in the US, as most are, but in London.

Pitt Cue, by far, serves some of the most refined BBQ I have ever eaten. Simply put, the meat is cooked to perfection. The smoke is elegant and the meat is so juicy and tender that it melts off the bone with each bite. I appreciate the English charm that comes through in the manageable portions served on white-enameled trays with sides served in pickle jars. Delicate but packed with flavor.

I really appreciate Pitt Cues take on BBQ. You can tell that they care. It is especially obvious in the way the hickory chips have been burnt off to just the right point. Its that moment when you see the thin blue line of smoke with its intoxicating aroma and all thats left is the sweet layered smoke that has gently laid itself over the copious amount of beef ribs, pork shoulders, and sausage. Pitt Cue makes one of the most amazing sausages, almost like cotechino; delicately smoked and lightly charred. And the spicy short ribs are something I often crave. They are cooked in a spicy-yet-sweet vinegary sauce with hints of overly blackened peppers that makes them moreish and totally addictive.

There is no mistaking Pitt Cues attention to detail. The pride they take in the food they produce is reflected in all the recipes they share with you here. This book will be loved again and again and the pages will undoubtedly be coated with the sweet, smoky residues of tenderly made BBQ. And who knows, maybe some of the recipes will become family secrets of your own.

At some point in history our ancestors discovered that meat tastes better when cooked, and soon after they worked out that grilling is best done over the glowing coals of a dying fire. The evolution of man is intrinsically linked to cooking meat over fire. The manipulation of fire by Homo erectus provided early humans with warmth, protection and a point of social contact, but most importantly brought with it a radical change in the way dinner was served. Our ancestors had the means to evolve only so far until they realized their ability to cook hunks of animal meat to make it digestible, and with this massive change in the way we could assimilate protein our brains grew considerably. Barbecue is unequivocally the oldest form of cooking and is quite possibly the very thing that made us human!

Barbecue as we know it sprouted from the Caribbean in the form of barbacoa and was spread by Spanish explorers throughout the region. They also introduced the pig into the Americas which in itself is a pretty awesome achievement, and the American Indians in turn introduced the Spanish to the concept of true slow cooking and preserving with smoke. Eventually this smoking went from a method of cooking or preserving food to a way of flavouring food when these Spanish colonists settled in South Carolina, and it was in that early American colony that Europeans first learnt to prepare and to eat real barbecue. During this period, poverty in the Southern states of America meant that every part of the pig was eaten or saved for later including the extremities and offal, and because of the effort to rear and cook these hogs, pig slaughtering was a time for celebration and merriment, and the neighbourhood would be invited to join in.

If only more of these gatherings were seen today. These feasts were called pig pickins and traditional Southern barbecue continued to grow out of these gatherings.

Every part of the Southern United States has its own particular variety of barbecue, particularly concerning the sauces, but also extending to the cuts, spice rubs, wood and types of meat they use. But of course, barbecue is not solely a culture and cuisine of the US, it is a technique used all over the world, the very first technique to be mastered in fact! Almost every culture and country has their own form of barbecue, from the asador found in northern Spain, the asado in Argentina, the ocakbasi of Turkey, or robatayaki in Japan. All these forms of barbecue inspire and inform us and we are guilty of that very British tendency for mixing styles from wherever it is we feast and fatten ourselves.

In 2011 Tom and Jamie formed Pitt Cue, named after the small village where Tom grew up near Winchester. They started with very few expectations, and seemed destined for failure. Everything kept going wrong, and had they not developed an invaluable talent for winging it the history of Pitt Cue could have been a lot shorter. The smoker was stopped at customs (apparently they had to check no families or bombs were hiding inside) and arrived the day before they were due to open. Given the fact that our pork shoulders needed a solid 15 hours to cook, this was a significant cock-up. It was promptly housed under a DIY rickety lean-to in the back passage of a friends deli.

It was sods law that the caf across the road was a vegan stronghold with many of the surrounding residents members of the dark side. Those divine meaty smells that our smoker put out through the night were not so enticing apparently. It would be nice to think we converted some people with those smells. In reality, very few of them saw the light and we had weekly complaints. Even those residents of the meatier sensibility kicked up a stink as we kept them awake with middle of the night pork prep, washing up sessions and Captain Beefheart stuck on repeat.

The second-hand catering trailer was twice the size as expected, and our shitty 44 compiled the already mounting problems when she gave up the ghost the night before opening. Fortunately, an RAC recovery vehicle took pity on us. About a week later than anticipated we opened the trailers hatches for the first time on Friday 20th May; fortunately there had been enough group texts and emails to guarantee some custom.