Monkey Wrench Smoke House: It's About the Meat

             

Legacy: Monkey Wrench resides in a building that once held the

 iconic Martha's Hardware Store.

         I’ve been wanting to visit this place despite its rumored pricey menu since it opened in 2018. Due to some internet comments about the service when it first opened, I decided to let things settle down a bit.

        The first thing I noticed was that it was dark inside, which made me wonder if my old eyes would be able to discern the menu. The décor is standard BBQ joint with exposed rafters and rustic pine furniture. For decades the building housed a hardware store that was a local landmark, hence the name.

        They have a lunch menu that offers a chopped sandwich and a drink for eight bucks, which we both went for. They offer four sauces: Kansas City, mustard, Lexington, and a Carolina favorite, Cheerwine sauce. (If you lived here, you’d know). There were no noticeable pigs in the place, but they did have a huge mural of a bovine skull which it seems would be more at home in Colorado than Carolina

A lotta bull: There were no visible pigs inside but the 

wall is decorated with this huge mural. 

The sandwich was served on a substantial bun almost guaranteed to hold up under heavy saucing, if that's your thing. The fries looked to be hand cut and were cooked pleasantly well done. The pork, while juicy and flavorful, had barely a hint of smoke. It could have been cooked in a crock pot for all I know.

       We decided the lunch special was only about a dollar more what we pay at one of our favorite places down the street. Is it enough to bring us back? Maybe for the Brisket.

           

Lunch Special  Eight bucks gets you a sandwich and fries with a drink.

🐷🐷🐷

In Search of the Illusive Q Tater

Stationed at the entrance to the Pisgah National Forest in Brevard, NC, amid the bars, ice cream parlors and tube rental kiosks is Hawg Wild Barbecue. It has become a place near and dear to my heart, and one of the three restaurants we regularly visit on our frequent trips to the mountain city.

North Carolina is a big state, and like SC, there are different barbecue traditions for different sections. Hawg Wild Barbecue offers a choice between the vinegary Eastern sauce and the more tomato-ey Western version.  

As special as is the BBQ on a bun, the thing that brings me back is a rare delicacy that is becoming hard to find: The Barbecue Potato.

The barbecue potato is hard to find and hard to beat

 The barbecue potato or "Q tater," as I call it, is a large baked potato piled high with succulent pulled pork barbecue topped with sauce, shredded cheese and sour cream. It is my version of barbecue heaven: a combination of flavors and textures that will please any Q connoisseur.

The décor is Q-joint chic with license plates from around the country nailed to the board walls, and tables topped with glass plate under which is a map of the area, and where customers have jammed their business cards. A big effigy of that great glutton of the ether waves, Homer Simpson sporting a HW T-shirt dominates the lobby.

We like the place so much that when our daughter graduated from Brevard College, and inclement weather dampened our plans for a Pisgah picnic. We knew it was the place to have the celebration. My brother-in-law, who hails from the Lexington NC area was not pleased that the Q was pulled, not chopped as it is around his place, but other than that, all went well.


The Q, the atmosphere and the location make this place a good bet for travelers and locals alike.

🐷🐷🐷🐷

Death by Nachos

Chicora Alley has been a downtown Greenville, SC destination for years, so when they opened a place in the nascent foodie haven of Travelers Rest, I had to give them a try. They occupy a building that was once the city firehouse, ergo the name “Firehouse" on the store front.

It is nice to walk into a place and see the wait staff smiling when they don’t have to. A large U-shaped bar commands the main room. We were ushered into the long narrow side room which once housed the fire trucks.

I opted for the barbecue nachos (12) and my partner went with the fish and chips special (14) I also ordered a Highland Brewing Company Oatmeal Porter from nearby Asheville (4).

After about an average wait, the server arrived with a mountain of nachos so large that I almost looked for the busts of dead presidents carved into the side. When she saw the look on my face she said, “With nachos we don’t play.”

"With nachos we don't play."

They had thoughtfully provided two plates so I could share. There was no barbecue on the chips, meat was extra.  Instead they were covered in a nice fresh pico along with black beans and corn, meximelt cheese and barbecue sauce, which added a slightly odd, but not totally off-putting twist. Another waiter stopped by and joked that if I finished the plate, I would get a free T-shirt.

My partner raved over the fish and chips (she’s still talking about them a week later) and offered me a sample. The cod was tender and flaky, and the beer batter was well balanced.

The Fish 'n Chips special

Imaginary or not, a T-shirt was not in the offing due to a bit of bad planning on my part; I had already consumed over half a tray of the chips they had served as an appetizer, so after a heroic effort I had to reluctantly push the plate away. They asked if I wanted a carry out box, but I demurred. Nobody likes soggy nachos. Next time I’m going for the Jerk Shrimp.

Rating: 🐷🐷🐷🐷

Backcountry Barbecue

My friend Marc Hoffman has been nagging me to check out this restaurant for a couple of years. Over the recent holiday weekend, I finally got a chance. Backcountry Barbecue is located just off I-85 at the Linwood exit near Lexington. Which any Lexingtonian will tell you is the barbecue capital of the world. It is also the home of the world famous Lexington Barbecue Festival held in October, which draws thousands of people to the area.

Lexington is where I cut my teeth on barbecue, so to speak, when I was living in nearby Salisbury and through my girlfriend at the time, I was introduced to “The Monk”, which was the local name of the  world famous Lexington Barbecue restaurant, where I experienced my first “lean brown course chopped tray.” For aficionados, memory of their first real barbecue often ranks up there with memory of another first (if you know what I mean.)

One of the features of Lexington barbecue is that you can get the regular “chopped” meat or “course chopped.” Mentioning the word “pulled” is likely to have the same effect as the guy who used to say “Would you please pass the jelly?” on the telly.

Back Country Barbecue is in a non-descript building by the side of State 43. Like most good BBQ joints around here, interior decoration seems to have been an afterthought, but, as I always say, you don’t eat atmosphere, you only pay for it.

Like the rubes we were, we sat out front on the Formica®, while the locals opted for the cozy dining room with its red (painted) brick wall and faux mantel. There was also a counter, but it was crowded with papers, menus, spoon and fork dispensers and the like.

I ordered the course chopped sandwich and received a bun full of thumb-sized chunks which, though slightly dry, had excellent smoke and the bark(which is the reason you order course chopped) was immensely acceptable.

The hazard of ordering course chopped pork on a bun versus the tray mentioned earlier, is that the watery Piedmont sauce soaks through the bottom of the bun much faster than with the regular chop, giving it the consistency of mucilage. This is a feature which I had forgotten in the thirty years since I had eaten my last course chopped Q.  As I mentioned before, turning the bun over mitigates the issue to some degree, but alas, by the time I remembered this, it was too late.

An indication of the quality of the meat is perhaps reflected in the fact that I can usually count on eating one and a half sandwiches at these places because my wife seems never to be able to finish hers, but here I was out of luck. I looked up from my plate to see my wife wiping the last morsel from the corner of her mouth.

It’s tough in the BBQ business in these parts because the competition is fierce and the expectations are high. Backcountry Barbecue is in for the long haul.

Diner rating:

  

Doing The Lord's Work

Bucky’s Barbecue is a true American success story. About ten years ago Wayne Preston’s machinery business was going under. Nearing bankruptcy, he needed $500.00 immediately to keep the lights on in his house. He didn’t know where he was going to get it. In a fit of desperation he fired up his smoker in his back yard on Roper Mountain Road near Greenville, SC and began selling barbecue. He got his $500.00 and embarked on a path that would change is life forever.
He was a welder by trade, and continued his welding business while selling pork on the side. Then, in church one Sunday morning, his preacher challenged the congregation to try something they thought was impossible and trust in the Lord to see them through. Despite Jesus’ anti-swine bias, --he was a Jew, of course, and he did cause a bunch of hapless porkers to dive lemming-like into the sea, while he simultaneously invented the verb “to demonize”--Wayne took his preacher’s sermon as a sign from God and decided go into the barbecue business whole hog (so to speak.). After a brief struggle with the zoning board, and some help by members of his church family, Bucky’s Barbecue became a reality. (He chose the name because it had a catchy sound to it.) Now Preston has three restaurants, the original on Roper Mountain Road, near where he sold his first shoulder off his back yard smoker, and a second at the Donaldson Center of US 25 South of Greenville, and one in Fountain Inn, SC.
The Bucky’s on Roper Mountain Road is usually packed at lunch time. Men in suits and ties eat and rub shoulders with guys with their names over their shirt pockets. The walls are covered with pig paraphernalia, ball caps, and patriotica. Bucky or his son, a graduate of the Economics program at Anderson College, often man the counter, where the plate comes with pork and your choice of sides, including sweet potato crunch, and my personal favorite, pleasantly spicy Cajun pintos. Plates are accompanied with that epitome of gastronomic efficiency, sliced bread. The table squirters allow a choice of Wayne's own vinegar, or tomato-based sauce plus a mustard –based condiment created by his son-in law who’s from the Shealy clan, the last name in barbecue in the South Carolina Midlands. Drinks are self service, and the ice is dipped out of a portable plastic cooler--the kind you take to the beach.
The quality of the food and simplicity of service have made Bucky’s an icon of the local lunch crowd. It seems Wayne’s prayers have been answered. Maybe Jesus was only joking about the pigs…. (Photo by Chris Lipp)
Diner rating: 4

Pigging Out

High Marks. Hite's Barbecue occupies a small cinderblock building on a two lane road in West Columbia, SC. Note the smoke emanating from the rear of the building and the pickup, which obscures a large pile of wood by the back door.

The Caroliner Diner's Rules for Spotting a Good Barbecue Restaurant

It’s a shame to go to a ‘Q joint and plunk down good money for sorry meat. So how do you know if a BBQ place is good or not before having to pay nine or ten bucks for a plate? Below are some guidelines that have served me in the past. Think of your favorite place and see if it doesn't fit several of these criteria.

1) SMOKE. Al Gore be damned! There must be smoke, and to hell with the carbon footprint! Real barbecue is cooked with smoke, and the smoke has to come from good hardwood trees. You should see it, and smell it when you pull into the lot, or at least when you get out of the car.

2) WOOD. There should be a wood pile on the premises, and it should be used for cooking. Oak will pass, but Hickory is king. Mesquite will do in a rush if you’re out west. Other viable woods are apple and pecan, though these are scarce and expensive and usually only used to put a finish on the meat. Beware of “decorator wood” that is only for show where the pork is actually cooked on a gas flame.

3) FAT PEOPLE. Fat people love to eat and usually know good food when they taste it. If there are no fat people eating there, the food is probably only so-so. Beware of a restaurant filled with skinny people in exercise gear. Those people don’t know how to eat.

However fat people can’t be the sole indicator. They sometimes indicate food that is simply cheap.

4) PORTABLE COOKING RIG parked outside. Serious barbecue cookers love to compete with their fellows to see who can make the best barbecue at a given time and place. This is where their skill is honed to a high art and where they learn secrets from other cookers about how to improve their product.

5) TROPHIES. If you’re gonna compete, you better be able to win at least once in a while.

6) PIGS. Like the ancient Minoans who worshipped bulls and kept images of them around house, True BBQ aficionados keep porcine totems around them. The more pictures, statues and stuffed pigs in the dining room the better the restaurant. One of my favorites is a sign hanging on the wall at Henry’s Smoke House in Greenville, SC. Inside the outline of a pig, it says, “People Eat People’s Meat."

Nice Rack. Stacks of decorator wood outside Maurice's Piggy Park in Cayce, SC. The Barbecue is actually cooked next door.
7) COUNTRY MUSIC has to be playing on the speakers. Anyone who cooks pork in the presence of any other mode, except gospel or bluegrass has no sense of proportion.

8) PICKUP TRUCKS in the parking lot. A lot full of BMW’s indicates the pork is either too expensive or too artsy or both.

9) SAUCE ON THE SIDE, not on the meat. If they have to sauce the meat to make it palatable, there’s something wrong with it.

10) THE BUILDING. Don’t even slow down for one of those cookie cutter fancy brick and steel facades that look like they were built last year. Somebody has to pay for that building. Real barbecue cookers build the pit first and then as an afterthought put some kind of enclosure around it, perhaps getting the idea when they hear the first raindrops sizzle on the grill. Look for a simple wood or cinderblock building, preferably out in the country. The fewer lanes to the road that goes there the better. Extra points are given if it has a gravel parking lot, tables in the yard, or a porch to eat on. Barbecue is meant to be eaten outside where the smoke in the air enhances the smoke in the meat for a complete barbecue experience. Screens are optional.

11) THE MENU should have barbecue as the main, or only item. If the menu has the barbecue listed somewhere down there between the Fiesta Chicken and the Shrimp and Sausage Penne, It probably comes to the restaurant frozen in a tub or plastic bag.

12) A SINGLE ENTITY. Beware of chain restaurants. A man runnning a pit out in the country is free to live his dream. Chains come with a large beauracracy whose main job quickly becomes maintaining the status quo vs. making excellent food.