YOU CAN ALMOST BREATHE THE CHOLESTEROL

Blue Ridge Barbecue Festival
Harmon Field, Tryon, NC


Each year around mid June Barbecue aficionados from all over the south and points beyond converge on the little town of Tryon, NC for a festival of music, art and pork. Smoke and music fill the air in equal parts. You can almost breathe the cholesterol. At one end of the park is the stage where local blues, rock and folk acts ply their trade to a willing and somewhat lubricated audience. Under the shade trees at the back, artists and artisans line up their stalls and hawk their wares from the arcane to the sublime. In between, food stalls line the field where you can choose from several award winning purveyors of pork, beef and chicken in eastern, southern or western styles, or sample several if your arteries are up to it.

The barbecue is good, as one would expect. I’ve never been disappointed. But the treat for me is touring the competition area on Friday night, where well cooks imbibe their beverages of choice and tend their grills in preparation for the judging. Each team has its own recipe, of course, but their creativity is not confined to their food. Their tents and trailers are decorated in styles ranging from tacky to hilarious. The last time I went (2008). There were “The Silence of the Hams” complete with a rip-off banner from the old Jodie Foster movie, “Butts and Breasts,” “Pigs in Paris” with a mock up of the Eiffel Tower, “Sue E. Pigg”(“Cooking everything from butts to guts.”) and my personal favorite, the guys from “Buttrub.com.” As a rule, the men tend the smokers, the women chat and organize, and the children play games in a placid family atmosphere reminiscent of my childhood days of camping with family and friends.

It’s a fun and lively couple of days. The festival is only open on Friday and Saturday. On Sunday everyone packs up and heads for the next festival, and Tryon goes back to being a sleepy and picturesque little mountain town for another year. The 2010 festival is tentatively set for June 11-12. Barbecue lovers mark your calendars.

Diner rating: 5

I DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY DO TO THE GRITS, BUT I WISH THEY'D TELL ME

The Boathouse
101 Palm Boulevard
Isle of Palms, SC
843-886-8000

The Boathouse stands at Breech Inlet

I was torn between the (tilapia) fish tacos and the shrimp and grits. The waiter inquired as to whether I enjoy spicy food. When I responded in the affirmative, he suggested the ($12.00) shrimp plate. I’m glad I took his advice. I seldom pass up this plate when it’s listed on a menu, but I doubt I’ll find a better sample of this old standby, which rivals she crab soup as the signature coastal South Carolina dish. The substantial serving contained slivers of fiery andouille and a rainbow of sautéed peppers with red onions, and plenty of succulent shrimp. The mixture is double sauced with a hearty brown sauce and a lighter, buttermilk based sauce on the top.

But it’s the grits that make this meal stand out. In most shrimp and grits plates the grits are slopped on the plate almost as an after thought. Often they are bland and soupy, relying on the rest of the dish for support. Not the Boathouse grits. These grits are buttery, light and fluffy, they refuse to lay down on the plate but pile themselves around the edges; a substantial scaffold for the rest of the dish. I’ve never had grits like these, and I don’t know their secret, but I wish I did.

The restaurant is on a spit of land only a few hundred yards wide on the edge of the breach inlet, where God decided one day that there needed to be another opening to the sea between South Carolina’s barrier Islands; and from where the Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley left on its heroic and fateful voyage in 1864, to give what for to the USS Housatonic during the War of Northern aggression. Both vessels ended up on the bottom of the sea with a loss of good sailors (Yankees 5, Rebels, 9), yet another Pyrrhic victory for the Cause.
Behind the Boathouse restaurant is an actual boat house where boats can be rented. You can watch the boaters come and go on the Intra Coastal Waterway while sitting on the restaurant’s screened porch enjoying your beverage of choice. I was there for Sunday brunch, but they say at supper one can enjoy a fantastic view of the Carolina sunset. I hope some day I get to see it for myself.

Diner rating: 5

THE PLACE DESERVES A CLIENTLE

Station 22
2205 Middle Street.
Sullivan’s Island, SC
843-883-3355

An employee solicits customers outside Station 22

The pub across the street was packed on this Sunday noon as we squeezed into a parking space on the cramped and diminutive main drag at Sullivan’s Island, but crowds don’t always equal good food, so we opted for this place across the street. Perhaps because the building is being renovated and it was hard to tell if it was open (more about that later) the place was nearly deserted. Soulful sounds of an alto saxophone greeted us as we walked in the door played by an actual live musician who never took a break while we were in there. He played old standards (Misty, Stardust as well as more recent melodies like Wind Beneath my Wings.) accompanied by canned orchestra music. The place is nicely appointed with bead board wainscoting and an interesting ceiling made I think, to mimic a boardwalk Dozens of pictures line the walls including a blown up color photo of the island taken from about 10,000 feet. I had Shrimp and Grits ($12.00.) My partner had the chicken salad croissant with sweet potato fries. ($9.00). Both were very good. Shrimp and grits is a favorite of mine and I hate it when restaurants skimp on the shrimp, but I kept finding the succulent little crustaceans buried in the grits. I was slightly taken aback to see that the andouille sausage that usually accompanies the shrimp had been replaced with country ham, but the pork was julienned and tender and added a good flavor, if not heat, to the plate.

Perhaps because it was Sunday brunch the appetizer was not bread, but pound cake, store bought from the looks of it, and it would have been nice to have some bread to soak up the creamy sauce. The chicken salad had a strange but pleasant almost soapy flavor that I could not place. We had rushed in to get ahead of the church crowd but almost no one was there. Only a few tables were occupied, including a ladies day out group over by the Roman shades featuring a mother and daughter arguing about the propriety of having mimosas with their brunch.

I hope they get there remodeling finished soon. The place deserves a clientele. When we left one of the staff was standing on the steps holding up a sign that said “Open.” It seemed to be a sign of desperation.

Diner rating: 4