Barbecue Tour 2009...St.Louis and Beyond

OK.. so the whirlwind trip back across most of America ended a couple of weeks ago and I had every intention of posting on the road during this thing, but you know the internets... sometimes you got it... sometimes you don't. Anyway, it was a great (short) road trip and subsequent BBQ tour. As posted earlier, our first stop on the tour after leaving Denver was Kansas City and the tasty offering at Gates Bar B Que. Good ribs in the wet tradition... not my favorite but they were a good way to start the tour. Funny thing about our visit to Gates, I looked up the restaurant on the interwebs and found the location that I thought was the original. As you can imagine, it was in the hood and we had to drive about 20 minutes from our hotel to find it. Turns out there was another location one exit up from our hotel but our little trip into urban America did help us to re-evaluate our BBQ criteria. Extra points were awarded for the fact that there was an armed guard in the parking lot and we felt that any minute we could be mugged on our 20 foot dash into the restaurant. Also adjoining the eatery was the "Cozy Lounge" which was rolling on this late Sunday evening.
The following morning we made our way to St. Louis and Pappy's Smokehouse. It pains me a little even say this but these may have been the best ribs we had on the tour. Maybe we hit on just the right day... they definitely had their A game that day. Great dry ribs. Great sauce. They also had three very large "Memphis in May World Championship BBQ" trophies sitting by the counter. Well deserved awards by the taste of their Q! While the ribs were good, points were deducted for only offering Pepsi products and lousy sweet tea. Also, I never felt in danger while standing in the parking lot.




Nothing like a 4 1/2 hour drive to digest some good food and prepare for yet another plate of BBQ goodness. We left St. Louis "belly full and skin tight" and headed south to Memphis. The plan all along was to bypass the Rendezvous (it's closed on Monday's by the way) and visit what is perhaps the best BBQ in the world... Jim Neely's Interstate BBQ. Good intentions but as we got closer to Memphis we realized that we might find ourselves at the South 3rd location after dark. EVERYONE we spoke with said its better to NOT be down there after dark and we watched enough First 48 to know the freaks come out at night in Mempho. So without even tasting the Q, Interstate was awarded maximum points for location alone. Rather than being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time we headed to Central BBQ. I have always had a wonderful experience at Central, save one time. Last year I made a trip to Memphis and came home claiming that I had just enjoyed perhaps the finest rib ever served. I chatted these ribs up for months. On a return trip, my friend and I made a bee line for Central. I told him to prepare himself for heaven on a plate. We must have just hit it at the wrong time...not good at all. This was to be our redemption. Luckily thats just what we were served... a sweet plate of redemption. Fat Tire on tap might be just the thing to catapult Central to the top.



All in all the BBQ tour was a great success. Every stop was wonderful...maybe not healthy... but wonderful just the same. If you are familiar with the Appalachian Trail you might have heard of something called "trail magic". If you've ever spoken with someone who's hiked the entire trail they will probably share stories of magical encounters with folks along the trip that went out of their way to help them along... perhaps a hot shower, a ride to the store or a home cooked meal. This is trail magic. While the food was wonderful and was the driving force behind this adventure, our "trail magic" was found in the friendships formed and the people we spent time with as we crossed the country.