I have to stop reading lists of great barbecue restaurants around the country. I love great barbecue. Heck, I'd even pick mediocre barbecue over a lot of good non-barbecue restaurants. So when I see one of the million lists on the 'net of places with great barbecue, I click and read…and I keep wondering why I do this to myself.
Take this one, for instance. I've only been to one of the ten places listed. It was Arthur Bryant's in Kansas City and frankly, I was not impressed. I've had better, less famous barbecue. In fact, I had better barbecue (I thought) the next night at Jack Stack in the same city.
But look at the other nine. Lockhart, Texas? Chapel Hill, North Carolina? Owensboro, Kentucky? When in the name of Tony Roma am I ever going to find myself in Owensboro, Kentucky? I can't imagine any scenario that takes me within 100 miles of Owensboro. Maybe a comic book convention…but I turn down most invites to comic conventions these days and when I do go to one, I usually don't see much more of the city it's in than the airport, the convention center, the freeway between them and either a Marriott, a Hyatt or a Hilton.
While in Phoenix a few weeks ago, I did get away from the con for one barbecue expedition. My friend Phil Geiger had a car so we grabbed up Len Wein and drove to a Famous Dave's about twelve miles away. But that was twelve miles and Phil had a car and anyway, I'm not going to Owensboro, Kentucky. So what does it matter to me that the Moonlite Bar-B-Q Inn there serves "hickory-smoked, pit-cooked mutton?"
And I'm not going to have them ship me an order, either. Barbecue was meant to be eaten hot off the grill. Even the best of it doesn't make it as leftovers the next day. (By the way, Famous Dave's ain't bad for a chain but the best barbecue is eaten in restaurants that don't have a lot of locations.)
When our friend Dave Stevens passed, his fellow artist Bill Stout and I drove up to Modesto for a day to attend the funeral. Before the service, we went to a barbecue place that may well be the best I've ever tried. I had brisket and chicken and they were both about as good as could be. I didn't try the ribs because I am incapable of eating ribs neatly and I didn't want to speak at the memorial with barbecue sauce all over my face and clothes.
My enjoyment of the meal was tempered by the knowledge that I would probably never return to the area. Modesto is 300 miles from Los Angeles and about a hundred miles from San Francisco or San Jose or any other city in which I might someday find myself.
So I'm going to stop reading lists of and articles about great barbecue restaurants in some distant corner of South Carolina. It's for the same reason that my friend Ricky back in high school decided to stop reading Playboy magazine. He used to say, "Why torture myself with visions of places I'm never going to visit?"