The invaluable Barbecue Bros website has a post identifying the top five barbecue places in Nashville. This adds to their existing rankings for Charlotte, Lexington (NC), and Austin, and is a great resource for anyone planning to go through, anywhere near, or to Nashville — as everyone should.
The Barbecue Bros – Monk, Rudy, and Speedy – grew up in High Point, North Carolina. You met Monk, who lives in Charlotte, here. Rudy put together the Austin list while he lived in Texas, but he now lives in exile in Holland, Michigan. The Nashville list was compiled by Speedy, who lives there. Each list includes links to full reviews of each of the top places, to which all of the Bros contribute, and the interchanges among the Bros are a pleasure to read. You should read the Nashville Top 5 post yourself at the link here, so you can get a taste of the Bros’ work.
I haven’t spent much time in Nashville, alas, and I’ve only been to two of the places, The Peg Leg Porker and Martin’s. One place, actually — the Peg Leg Porker, which, unfortunately, I visited on what clearly was an off night. You can see the review here. It includes the time I actually saw a pig with a peg leg.
The Martin’s at which I ate was the branch down in Cahaba Heights, Alabama, south of Birmingham.
That review is here. I really enjoyed it — excellent barbecue, and some good sides.
I’m eager to get to Nashville to try the original Martin’s, to re-check Peg Leg, and to try the other places in the Top 5. I’ll also take a drive west to Parsons, Tennessee, for another meal at the truly outstanding Ramey’s, and I guess I might as well mosey over to Lexington to B.E. Scott’s. And then to Memphis and …
I look forward to more Barbecue Bros reports from Tennessee and elsewhere. You should follow them, too.
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I’m sorry to say that while I have enjoyed Peg Leg Porker a couple of times at the Windy City Smokeout in Chicago, when we had a Roadfood Crawl of Nashville in 2018, a few of us went to the location there and we were really not impressed. In addition, I would say that there was a lot of disappointment with the downtown location of Martin’s. It was good, but nothing great. The few days I spent in Memphis before this Crawl had much better barbecue, although except for Payne’s and Helen’s (on the way to Nashville), I didn’t really think there was anything spectacular, like so many places in North and South Carolina. Just my opinion, of course.
In case you’re interested, here is a link to my report on dropbox of this Crawl.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/w74dha3dbaiimhr/April%202018%20Memphis%20and%20Nashville%20Roadfood%20Crawl.pdf?dl=0
David Sanders
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David,
How do I follow your blog? I was very impressed by you post — although Question your wasting all that room on pastries when you could eb eating barbecue or tamales. And some greens. But you devotion to biscuits and bacon is spot on. Have you been to the Oak Level Cafe? Flo’s? Lindsay’s Chevron?
We obviously have similar tastes. I don’t know if you read my Payne’s and Helen’s posts (and other less fortunate Memphis posts). They really do tend to smother the barbecue with sa lot of substandard sauce at a lot of big name places in Memphis (Central, Corky’s). Nad Was underwhelmed by Peg Leg Porker. I’m constitutionally suspicious of babrebceu places run by contest stars. Read my review of Myron Mixon’s in Alexandria VA.
You really should try Ramey’s and BE Scott’s, which are closer to NC style –as is the excellent Dixie Pig over in Arkansas. And I think that the Murfreesboro branch of Martin’s is the original. I plan to try that one.
Give a shout when you’re near near DC.
Best, John
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Hi John,
Thank you so much for responding! I have to say I”m honored. I don’t have a blog, but I have done quite a few trip reports over the past 7 or 8 years, and I can send you the links for them if you’d like. I posted quite a bit on the Roadfood.com forums, which have now been obliterated in the much heralded “improvement” at the end of last year. All the reports on RF are now gone, and I’m thankful that I also uploaded them to dropbox. Of course it was nice to get the comments on RF. I wish there was another forum that would allow for the posting of trip reports.
I wanted very much to go to Scott’s-Parker’s, but I just couldn’t manage Helen’s and Scott’s on the way from Memphis to Nashville. At that point I had to meet up with some other Roadfooders and just couldn’t do it. As I write this I’m kicking myself, really hard, and wondering why I didn’t make more of an effort!
I don’t know Ramey’s or Dixie Pig (I’ve only been to Little Rock and Hot Spring, and De Valls Bluff in Arkansas, back in 2016). I also don’t know Oak Level Cafe or Lindsay’s Chevron. Is the Flo’s you mention the one in Wilson, NC? I’ve been there twice, but don’t know if there’s a different one.
By the way, I’ve been a cellist in the Chicago Symphony for almost 47 years, and really just started serious roadfooding about 7 years ago. What really got me started was in January, 2012, when my girlfriend and I visited her sister outside of Richmond, as part of a trip to Charleston and Savannah, the first time for all of us. I became overwhelmed with the desire to go to Savannah after listening to the audio book of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil for the second time, and Charleston was just a stop the night before Savannah. In the planning of the trip, I was told we would be driving through North Carolina at lunch time and to find a barbecue place where we could stop along the way. I started researching NC bbq, and found the website the Barbecue Jew. I spent a lot of time on the reviews and found that we wouldn’t be too far away from Grady’s at lunchtime. While I hate Yelp reviews, I did notice it was the only place I looked at that had nothing but positive reviews, and the review from BBQ Jew was basically: go there. So we did. I had never experienced anything like it, having grown up in Miami, and then Chicago. But the kicker for me was the fried chicken. On first bite I really thought I had died and gone to heaven.
Sorry to run on like this!
As I look ahead and hope that the vaccine will really help control the pandemic, I think about all the trips I’m going to want to be doing, and wondering if I’m just going to have to retire so I can spend more time on the road.
David
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David, thank you for the detailed road trip chronicle. Very very useful And I agree with you about Payne’s and Helen’s. Both are among the very best in the country.
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David,
Please do send the links – as a comment or to johntannerlaw at gmail. I’d love to see them.
And, yes, Flo’s is the Wilson Flo’s. The Oak Level Cafe is up the road a way near Rocky Mount, more or less. Like Flo’s, they serve delicious cat head biscuits. Ramey’s is in Parson’s, TN, not far from BE Scott’s, aka Scott’s-Parkers. I think it’s actually better than BE Scott’s. The Dixie Pig is upriver from Memphis in Blytheville AR. Lindays’s Chevron is in Oxford, MS. I have posts on all of them.
I’ll check out the Roadfood forums. I used to post on Chowhound a lot, but they were purchased by CBS or someone and it’s now worthless except for Paris. There’s a site, The Hungry Onion, that I follow some, but it’s very heavily tilted to the Northeast.
Cellist with the Chicago Symphony! Wow! That’s tall cotton. I’m a big music fan, although I’m under court order not to attempt a musical act in 23 states and the District of Columbia, and y’all are my favorite symphony.
Keep in touch, and let me know next time you’re headed to Richmond (or DC, of course). There’e been some good barbecue developments there.
Best, John
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