Lip Smackin’ Good: Southern Barbecue

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August 2, 2013

Lip Smackin’ Good: Southern Barbecue

By Stephanie Butler

Few American foods are as evocative of summer as a plate of good, old-fashioned Southern barbecue. Whether it’s Eastern North Carolina chopped pork with vinegar sauce or Memphis-style pork spareribs, hungry diners have been devouring traditional barbecue feasts for generations. But where did this love of all things smoky and porky come from? This week we’ll take a look at the rich history of Southern barbecue, and all its delicious regional variations.

 

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Long before the Civil War, the hog was the staple of the Southern diet. Cheap to raise and incredibly low maintenance, farmers could let young pigs loose in their fields to run wild until it was time for slaughter, usually in the late fall right as temperatures dipped. This ensured not only fat hogs, but the cold was a natural preservative for newly butchered hogs in the years before refrigeration. Of course, no part of the animal was wasted. Meaty back legs were salted and hung in cellars to become Easter hams. Heads were boiled until the tender cheek meat fell from the bone, to be chopped and mixed with spices and turned into headcheese. Even the intestines were saved, to be rinsed and turned into sausage casings or chitterlings. http://www.history.com/news/hungry-history/lip-smackin-good-southern-barbecue