Lexington Barbecue Festival

Happy Birthday Marilyn!

Six siblings and their spouses gathered in North Carolina this weekend to celebrate Marilyn’s significant birthday.  Tim did a great job of organizing golf, transportation, and accommodation so our only job was to have a lot of fun.  While we were there, we watched Tim’s loop of barbecue shows, and a particular one about last year’s Lexington Barbecue Festival piqued our interest.  When we found out that this year’s event was to take place the very next day we changed all plans to make a pilgrimage to that barbecue mecca.  To say that it was an interesting cultural experience doesn’t quite capture it.  

“Barbecue” in the southern US is what smoking is to Canadians.  It means there is a BIG piece of meat cooking low and slow, with a mop and a sauce.  Each region has its own style of barbecue sauce which they proclaim to be the very best.  In the case of Lexington Barbecue, the sauce is thin and vinegary, and the pulled pork is served with “Red Coleslaw” where the salad is tossed with the same sauce.  The meat and cabbage were both very finely chopped, and the sauce was very tasty.....just enough spice to compliment the meat without overwhelming it. 

We went with expectations of seeing the pulled pork cooking over the fire, but in fact the 5 participating restaurants agreed on a recipe, prepared the meat in advance, and shipped it out to 3 different locations around the festival where volunteers assembled the sandwiches.  The only cooking we witnessed was deep-frying.  The 100,000 visitors to the town of 20,000 were wandering the streets nibbling on deep fried turkey legs, deep fried pie, deep fried chocolate bars, deepfried-chocolate-covered bacon and even deep fried butter.....REALLY!  

Lexington Barbecue Dipping Sauce

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• 3/4 cup distilled white or cider vinegar
  
• 3/4 cup ketchup
• 3/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes; crushed 
• salt and pepper; to taste
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1/4 cup water

• Combine all ingredients in a small sauce pan and bring to a simmer. Cook, stirring, until the sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and let stand until cool. Spoon sauce over barbecued meats or poultry.
• Let it simmer slowly, it will keep refrigerated for a while but is best when served warm over your favourite meat.

See y'all next year!