Posted on 08/24/2015 1:30:34 PM PDT by Albion Wilde
The US is in the midst of a barbecue boom. But as television programmes and restaurants celebrate mostly white pitmasters, are the cuisine's African-American roots being forgotten?...
...the Brantleys have enjoyed a great deal of success with their traditional St Louis-style barbecue. There are lines out the door, as well as accolades from both local and national media...
But things aren't as good as they used to be. Daryle once had three locations and sold the sauce bottled at local supermarkets - today he only has the original shopfront.
The decline happened as factory jobs left St Louis and the recession of the 1990s took its toll. Once the outlook improved and he wanted to expand or make improvements, he found no bank would loan to him.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
When all you know is racism, all there is to say is ‘Black and White’
From the article:
That’s what Ryan Mitchell, Ed Mitchell’s son, says he experienced first hand. He was helping in his father’s restaurant from an early age, but then left for college on a football scholarship and then pursued a career in banking after that. He says his initial reluctance to get into the family business had everything to do with painful history. He remembers listening to his grandmother’s stories about working on a plantation.
I don’t think I’d eat there. The owner admits he’s a racist.
Now for my other thoughts:
Arthur Bryant’s in KC was a disappointment.
The best pulled pork in Memphis BBQ in Horn Lake, Mississippi. It’s owned by a white woman.
The second best pulled pork is a place north of Tyler on I-20. I can’t remember the name of it. The pit master is black. He knows just the right amount of fat to mix into the sandwich. We’re looking forward to going out of our way to stop there in a few weeks on our way to Oklahoma.
Interstate BBQ in Memphis is awesome. Owned by a black man.
I’ve always thought brisket was started on the cattle drives in Texas.
I do believe if I had to choose between two restaurants and one had a black pit master and one had a white pit master, I’d choose the black guy.
Believe me.
Hogs were not cooked over the fire used to cure tobacco.
We cured our tobacco by building small fires *in side* the barn the tobacco was hanging in.
Anything that burned would affect the tobacco.
Cook a hog over the same fire you cured your tobacco with and you would be stuck with a barn full of tobacco you couldn’t give away.
We used only oak to cure our tobacco.
No hickory or softwoods were allowed in the barn.
The worst BBQ I ever had was at Dr. Hogley’s Wogley’s Tyler Texas BBQ in Van Nuys, California. They must smoke the meat about 2 hours. Tough as nails. And the “smoke” flavor was lighter fluid.
I judged a BBQ cook off in Texas once. I tasted some of the worst crap I’ve ever spit out. Some of the chicken was rancid. Lots of the brisket smelled and tasted like lighter fluid. I asked myself “Don’t these guys taste this crap before they chopped off a piece to send to the judging.”
I grew up poor in the South. Only a few years ago I learned that I’d grown up eating “soul” food.
STUBBS?!?
One (or actually many) of my favorite BBQ products.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I’m a cook” :)
That right there is west Texas at its finest, right out there where I growed up.
God bless old Mr. Stubblefield.
Oh, it’s on now!
A very serious case can be made that black cowboys invented BBQ. Right here in my beloved Texas. When a cow was butchered the brisket and various other unwanted bits were considered inedible, even by ranch hands, so they gave all that stuff to the black guys. Well, them black cowboys would bring that brisket back and let the ranchers have the leftovers. They could not believe what them cowboys did with that old tough fatty piece of beef.
That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
Actually, I was referring to home loans, and since banks have been required to gather this data since the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, it is available, at least on mortgages.
And I am not surprised they default at a higher rate, because banks probably have to lend to them regardless of income, and also because a smaller percentage of blacks who begin college, finish it. (I presume that is the case from what I have read over the years, but have not researched it)
Income had little to do with it. Based on the passage I quoted, the defaulters' debt as a% of income was similar - it's just that black default rates per capita were way higher. Obviously not all blacks welsh on their debt. But the rate is way higher, even for a given level of income, just as for a given income level, an all-black town will have a per capita crime rate several times that of an all-white town.
In Kansas City Arthur Bryant and Ollie Gates are looked upon as barbecue deities.
Arthur Bryant's is an acquired taste. But if you don't like their offerings then here's a List of about ninety other barbecue restaurants in Kansas City you can choose from.
To open a restaurant one must be 100% dedicated. Even live on site if he must. Theft has always been a problem, this is a known fact - from receipts to food disappearing out the back door by nefarious means. To be a chef in one’s own business is even more responsibility. Lots of headaches.
No matter if sit down-family drive thru. Much credit to the owners is due.
OY VEY! and now the help demands $15.00 an hour? No way will they/can they stay in business.
Great BBQ ribs at Bubba Baker-Q in Avon Ohio. Al “Bubba” Baker is a former Cleveland Brown whose 15 minutes of fame on The Shark Tank was amply repaid by a successful restaurant specializing in boneless ribs. He is of course African-American.
I still think a major component of it it probably has to do with a higher percentage of blacks simply don’t finish college.
Ah. I missed this key sentence: “...Black students who graduated...”
I still think a major component of it it probably has to do with a higher percentage of blacks simply don’t finish college.
“Black students who graduated in 1992–93 school year had an overall default rate that was over five times higher than white students and over nine times higher than Asian students. The differences for Hispanic students are not as large, but are still substantial. Hispanic students’ overall default rate was over twice that of white students and four times higher than Asian students. And these differences cannot be fully explained by differences in borrowing patterns or salaries. The 1994 percentage of monthly income going to student loan payments—an indication of both how much debt a student has and their earnings—was actually lowest for Hispanic students and only slightly higher than average for black students. ...
The median monthly loan payment as a percentage of monthly income in 1994 for recent 1992–93 graduates was 6.7 percent for the United States as a whole, 7.4 percent for Asian students, 7.2 percent for black students, 5.3 percent for Hispanic students, and 6.8 percent for white students.”
Yes, the next post down indicated I saw that after the fact.
How come I never see any Blacks on Jeopardy?
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