Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ

Linkdown: 10/7/15

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-Buxton Hall is now open 7 days a week for lunch and dinner

– Wilmington’s got a new eastern, whole hog barbecue food cart that hopes to turn into a brick and mortar place

– Queen City Q remains busy – in addition to their Matthews location opening up in the summer and announcing a partnership for the Hornets, they are eyeing a third location in Concord

– An article on food trucks in Gaston County features Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ

– John Mueller’s barbecue pit was stolen

– In what I hope becomes a new trend, Melvin’s Barbecue in Charleston returns to all wood smoking

– The Simpsons did it: a barbecue episode (they apparently did their homework too)

Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ (food truck)

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Name: Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ (food truck)
Date: 8/10/15
Order: Pork platter with beans and cole slaw, soda (link to menu)
Price: $12

Monk: Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ is an accomplished competition team from Belmont that has two top 10 finishes at Memphis in May, two top 15 Memphis Barbecue Network (MBN) finishes, and two grand championships at the Charlotte barbecue festival (per their website). They have been catering in the Charlotte area for a while but started a barbecue food truck in the past year or so. Speedy and I had previously tried it out, albeit under different circumstances as a vendor with a limited menu at last year’s Charlotte BBQ Championship, and hadn’t been blown away. I figured I’d give it another shot during a normal lunch service at an office park in west Charlotte.

As was the case then, the pork was pulled in coarse chunks and was a bit bland. It appears that Ranucci’s forgoes a strong rub or smoke flavor on the pork and relies instead upon the three or so sauces available on the side to flavor the meat. Ranucci’s does use a Myron Mixon smoker and there were wood piles in the back of the trailer but for some reason there just wasn’t much smoke in the pork. The one positive this time, however, was that the pork was more moist whereas last fall it was a bit dry. But overall, the pork was still not all that memorable this time around.

Unfortunately, the sides were even more disappointing. The mayonnaise-based slaw was fine but average but the beans tasted as if they were poured straight from the can without any accoutrements or added flavors.

Speedy: I think this is part of the problem with competition barbecue. For competition, you’re trying to come up with one great bite. Obviously that strategy doesn’t work when you’re cooking in bulk. The flavor profile needs to be different (generally less sweet), and you can’t pick and choose just the best meat. This is why competition barbecue champions are hard to trust (unless it’s Tuffy Stone).

Monk: With such an accomplished resume, I would have hoped for more from Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ but likely this second time I tried them will be my last.

Ratings:
Pork – 2 hogs
Sides – 1 hog
Overall – 2 hogs

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Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ and Rocky Top BBQ Company

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For this year’s Q-City Charlotte BBQ Championship (our photos and some thoughts here), they had several more barbecue trucks than they did last year. This, in turn, allowed Speedy and I to check out a couple more Charlotte-area barbecue vendors that we hadn’t been able to try yet. It may be harsh to judge each of these vendors based on their output at a barbecue festival, but nonetheless here’s some of our quick thoughts on the two sandwiches that we both tried that day.

Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ – Belmont, NC (link)
Pork sammy – 3 hogs

Monk: Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ has won a lot of competition trophies on the Memphis Barbecue Network, including grand champion of last year’s version of the Q City Championship (when it was a Memphis Barbecue Network event; this year it was sanctioned by the NC BBQ Association). From what I can tell, they mostly do private events and catering, so this was a fairly rare opportunity to try their barbecue. Their pulled pork sandwich was coarsely pulled pork strands as opposed to chopped and had decent smoke. But ultimately I found it a little dry unless I added their eastern style sauce, which I dashed on before leaving their truck and sitting elsewhere. Not bad, but I wasn’t blown away like I was hoping from such an accomplished barbecue competition team.

Speedy: I actually didn’t notice the sauce before leaving the truck, so I had to do without. Like Monk, I found it to be a little dry and a little lacking on the flavor. At the end of the day, competition barbecue is so different than churning out a bunch of sammies for a festival crowd. I just feel like it this setting, vendors should pick a flavor and go with it instead of having festival goers choose and sauce their own sandwich.
Ranucci's Big Butt BBQ
Sandwich from Ranucci's Big Butt BBQ

Rocky Top BBQ Co. – Monroe, NC (link)
Pork sammy – 3 hogs

Speedy: The Rocky Top BBQ Company is a catering and competition team out of Monroe, NC. They’ve been competing since 2009 and have even appeared on BBQ Pitmasters. Monk and I both ordered the barbecue sandwich from Rocky Top as well. I thought the sandwich was pretty good, but not great. I did enjoy it more than Ranucci’s – it was sauced, so dryness wasn’t an issue. It did taste a bit sweeter than I am accustomed to, so I probably would prefer a little more vinegar-y tang. Overall, I thought it was enjoyable.

Monk: To me, something was a little off on this sandwich, texture-wise. And I agree with Speedy on the sauce being a little sweeter than I’d like. Of the two sandwiches I tasted, I preferred Ranucci’s to this one, but as you can tell neither knocked my socks off.
Rocky Top BBQ Co.
Sandwich from Rocky Top BBQ Co.

Linkdown: 5/21/14

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– Texas really isn’t taking TripAdvisor’s list that listed them #3 behind Georgia and NC barbecue very well; no really, they aren’t taking it well at all

– The Charlotte Observer Archive Twitter account (@Observer Archive) has this archive photo about Stanton’s Barbeque and Fish Camp Fly-In Restaurant in Bennettsville, SC (across the NC/SC state line from Laurinburg) that is still in existence today:

– Trucking Info is definitely not my usual source of barbecue content, but here’s an article entitled “I Came to an Engine Teardown and Learned About Barbecue”

Inspired by Shell’s relationship with the BBQ Pitmasters show on Destination America, the barbeque pit will be used for industry and customer events. The pit, which can cook enough barbeque to feed 100 or more people, was built by champion barbeque grillers, Pitt’s and Spitt’s.

Houston-based, Pitt’s and Spitt’s has more than 75 years of combined experience designing and fabricating custom competition barbeque trailers, grills, pits and smokers. The Pitt’s & Spitt’s World Champion Cooking Team has won over 30 barbecue and cooking awards, and Shell Rotella is a sponsor of the team this year.

– “The Best Barbecue I’ve Ever Had Was Made by a Bunch of Damn Yankees”

– Alex and Zoe Ranucci of Ranucci’s Big Butt BBQ, Grand Championship-winning team of the 2013 Q City Championship, were featured in the first issue of a new magazine called Barbecue America

– Bill Spoon’s is featured on this list of “great barbecue restaurants” from USA Today as part of their National Barbecue Month coverage

– Both Rodney Scott and the SC Barbecue Trail get a mention in this article entitled “SC barbecue business gets a boost from social media” (h/t bbqboard)

– The Blue Ridge BBQ & Music Festival is looking for between 300 and 500 volunteers for June 13 and 14

– Elliot Moss’ previous barbecue concept, Buxton Hill, is dead. Long live his new concept, Buxton *Hall*

Moss’ thing is whole-hog, wood-fired barbecue. “He’s bringing a really artisanal, traditional approach to barbecue that he feels has been missing from a lot of barbecue in the south,” said Irani.

Many Asheville barbecue restaurants, including 12 Bones, Luella’s and Little Pigs Bar-B-Que, use smokers fired with both gas and wood, a system that makes it easier for cooks to control time and temperature while cooking.

– Charlotte-based food writer Keia Mastrianni accompanied two restaurateurs from San Francisco on an epic Carolinas barbecue tour (research for their now-opened barbecue restaurant Smokestack) which included Lexington #1, Wilber’s, B’s Barbecue, Scott’s Barbecue, and several more; part 1 and part 2

– The Charlotte couple behind The Great NC BBQ Map gets interviewed in Charlotte Magazine this month and shares a few more details about the map coming next month

AA: You promised to be comprehensive. That’s a big statement.

AAF: We have talked about the national chains and statewide chains and things like that. And definitely statewide chains are going to be on there, but we’re leaning toward not doing the nationwide ones because that feels a little different and it’s not so much about North Carolina history and heritage and everything.