Best of Charlotte Barbecue

Best of Charlotte Barbecue: Ribs

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment
Queen City Q
Ribs from Queen City Q

We initially started this blog in order to find the best barbecue restaurant in Charlotte. While we feel pretty comfortable with our current rankings on the big board having visited 40+ restaurants, what more logical next step than to explore the best meats and dishes in the greater Charlotte area? This is the third post in our series. Click here to find the other posts.

Between the two of us in Charlotte, Speedy is much more the rib guy. Not that Monk doesn’t enjoy a quality rack; it’s just not his preferred meat. Plus, its debatable whether or not ribs are really truly considered barbecue in NC. And while Mac’s Speed Shop does offer a beef rib, this list is strictly a pork ribs list.

  1. Queen City Q
  2. Midwood Smokehouse (Original location; Ballantyne location)
  3. Sauceman’s

What do you think? Have we missed the mark? Leave your comments below.

Best of Charlotte Barbecue: Brisket

/ Barbecue Bros / Leave a comment
The Smoke Pit – Concord, NC
Brisket from The Smoke Pit
Midwood Smokehouse
Brisket from Midwood Smokehouse
Boone’s Bar-B-Que Kitchen
Pork, brisket, ribs, wings, brunswick stew

We initially started this blog in order to find the best barbecue restaurant in Charlotte. While we feel pretty comfortable with our current rankings on the big board having visited 40+ restaurants, what more logical next step than to explore the best meats and dishes in the greater Charlotte area? This is the second in our series. Click here to find the other posts.

Speedy once stated that he was done with brisket in NC. That being said, there are some passable  briskets in the Charlotte region (fantastic, even). The brisket from Midwood Smokehouse was named the sixth best brisket east of the Mississippi by Johnny Fugitt of Barbecue Rankings. But it turns out that we like the brisket at The Smoke Pit (which only opened a little over a year ago) even better. I would put those two at the top tier of briskets in the Charlotte region. At a notch below, Boone’s approach is unique in that he finishes the brisket on the grill and ladles it with a mustard-based sauce. Certainly not the Central Texas way of doing it, but it works nonetheless. After these three, there’s not too much more to be said about brisket in Charlotte.

  1. The Smoke Pit (Concord)
  2. Midwood Smokehouse (Original location; Ballantyne location)
  3. Boone’s Bar-B-Que Kitchen

What do you think? Have we missed the mark? Leave your comments below.

Best of Charlotte Barbecue: Pork

/ Barbecue Bros / 2 Comments
Boone’s Bar-B-Que Kitchen
Combo from Boone’s Bar-B-Que Kitchen
Midwood Smokehouse

We initially started this blog in order to find the best barbecue restaurant in Charlotte. While we feel pretty comfortable with our current rankings on the big board having visited 40+ restaurants, what more logical next step than to explore the best meats and dishes in the greater Charlotte area? This is the first in our series. Click here to find the other posts.

We naturally start with pork, which in North Carolina is synonymous with the word “barbecue”. Because Charlotte is a city of transplants and “other people’s barbecue”, you don’t find much barbecue that you might expect of the region (that is, Lexington-style) and you actually find far more eastern-style restaurants. In fact, two of the three below serve eastern-style barbecue (with Boone’s serving his own family’s style recipe that doesn’t easily  classify in Lexington or eastern).

  1. Boone’s Bar-B-Que Kitchen
  2. Midwood Smokehouse (Original location; Ballantyne location)
  3. Bill Spoon’s Barbecue

Honorable Mention: The Smoke Pit (Concord)

What do you think? Have we missed the mark? Leave your comments below.