When enjoying a fantastic product like ours, it never hurts to know the history of it, starting with the very basics. Please enjoy this article written by our staff about the history of BBQ.
BBQ has been around for many years even back in the time of the Stone Age. True, they did not have the awesome sauces and other recipes that we have grown to love but the art of BBQ and cooking meat over an open fire began in those days. Classic barbecue is said to have originated in North Carolina towards the end of the seventeenth century.
Pigs of course are always intertwined with any story about barbecue. Pigs were known as a staple food in the South both before, during and after the Civil War. Growing and feeding hogs was easy. You could feed them any type of feed or scraps and could keep them in a small pen. Many farmers would have tons of hogs on their property each year. Many times a slaughter of a pig would be a town wide celebration with everyone in town celebrating the meat that would be coming in. The more people gathered the more recipes they shared and this is where it is believed that BBQ was born.
Of course no BBQ is great without some awesome barbeque sauce. Preserving meats in the times before refrigerators were hard. People had to become very inventive so they could have their meat for long term use. Meat curing became very popular. Meat was cured by a mixture of salt, pepper, vinegar and water. As time progressed many found that this mixture made a great tasting BBQ sauce. This is still known as the main BBQ sauce in all of North Carolina. Another BBQ sauce recipe originated in South Carolina which adds mustard to the sauce mixture for another taste sensation.
As time progressed BBQ recipes became more prominent and many people started to have BBQ parties. Many people would sit down and roast an entire pig and have a large picnic for everyone. In the times before the Civil War many plantation owners would have pig pickings where they would feed everyone around including their slaves. By the nineteenth century BBQ had made its way into church rallies as well as political happenings. Now BBQ finds itself in many different restaurants with tons of different recipes and different sauces. You can find great BBQ all over the South and in many other locations now. Many restaurants specialize in BBQ and adding great tastes to BBQ. You can order BBQ to eat on a bun or you can just sit around and eat it straight off of a plate.
Recently, Charlie and Jakes was proud to cater the food for the Brevard Community College Titan Tailgate Kickoff Party. There were games, food, and overall great times!