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Slingin’ Hash

Updates from Destination BBQ

07/11/22

Kindling

Hey <<First Name>>

Hope all is well and that you’re having a great summer.

Summer should be a time when things slow down and family and friends have time to commune and share time and experiences.

In the world of SC BBQ, this is both true and false. The volume of official barbecue competitions definitely slows to a crawl, but restaurants gear up for things like Memorial Day, the 4th of July, and eventually Labor Day, in addition to heavier traffic from folks dining out.

Here, work continues earnestly on the next edition of our SC BBQ cookbook. I believe at last report, I had written my way up to page 211 and had about 50 more introductions to write.

I’m pleased to report that I have made it to page 245 and have only about three recipes remaining in the Desserts section. Next, there looms a set of recipes I set aside to include as features sprinkled throughout the book.

Photo courtesy of Home Team BBQ and Holy City Handcraft

For instance, Home Team BBQ provided me a set of recipes they use to make their brisket tacos. It’s comprised of something like five recipes for everything from their Salt and Pepper Brisket to their homemade corn tortillas. Thought instead of spreading those out, I’d make a special feature to bring them all together in one place.

There are about 14 or so recipes from a handful of pitmasters/restaurants set aside for possible features like that. We’ll see.

But, other hurdles remain.

Later this month, I’ll begin my annual project of putting together the Fort Dorchester High School football program. (As some of you may recall, I recently retired after teaching there for the final 22 years of my career. The first 6, I served at Andrews High in Georgetown County.)

Fort Dorchester’s football program seems simple enough on the surface, doesn’t it? I mean, it’s just a football program, right?

But really, it’s a 130-page full-color magazine with lots of moving parts that come together at what is literally the last minute to be printed and shipped to arrive at school in time for the first home game. And I get to design every element (like the cover above). Good times…and sure to bring work on the cookbook to a pause.

Maybe the lack of a solid deadline explains why the second edition of the cookbook will come out so many years after the first!

However, if you’re getting this on Monday, July 11, I have hit the deadline for this newsletter.

In this issue, we take “Joy” in a beef hash recipe that is full of memories, take a look at a decent USA Today piece on hash and other SC BBQ dishes, check out a few “mouthwatering” SC BBQ restaurants that made the list, read about the importance of family history, and spotlight a place of Joy.

Cheers,

Jim

PS: If you’re looking for a good newsletter covering food across the South, consider former Post and Courier Food Editor Hanna Raskin’s The Food Section. Her reporting is both exemplary and interesting. I have been a subscriber since its inception.

Lookin’ Good

Time to feature a “scroll-stopping” image.

How about this one from John Haney, the brains and brawn behind Alveron Custom Cookers in Summerville?

Playing with Fire

Beef hash is unique to the Upstate of South Carolina. Patrick Phillips shared his father’s recipe with me. His father, Representative Olin R. Phillips, was the owner of a legendary dining spot in Gaffney, in the heart of the beef hash region.

“My hash recipe is handed down from my father,” Patrick told me. “It’s the same, unchanged concoction he and his good friend Fire Fighter/Chief Charles Petty came up with back in the early ’60s, long before I was born.

“My father owned a local restaurant in Gaffney, SC, called the Joy Drive-In, and he served this hash recipe only on the 4th of July because also located in Gaffney was Bill Willard’s place ‘Willard’s Hash & BBQ.’

Olin Phillips takes a plate of hash from Bill Willard.

“He was also a very close friend and my father was the type of man who did not want to infringe on another man’s livelihood. Bill was famous for his hash, and it was served every day in his hash and BBQ restaurant.

“My father was famous for foot-long hotdogs and burgers. He also sold BBQ at his hotdog stand that was prepared by his friend Bill Willard.

“This recipe is the style and flavor of hash you will find in Cherokee County. The same hash you would have found at Willard’s or the Joy Drive-In; both are now closed and just memories, pieces of the past that will live through this small-batch recipe that I hope you try and enjoy.”

Click for Olin R. Phillips' Upstate Beef Hash Recipe

Smoke Signals

—Distinct Dishes

Mackensy Lunsford, writing in “Southern Kitchen” for USA Today, pens a pretty decent piece entitled “Carolina barbecue: Agricultural traditions influenced distinct dishes.”

In the article, she touches on the blurring of the traditional sauce lines and the gradual expansion of barbecue dishes that were originally very regional in nature. Like I often do, she leans on the teachings of food historian Robert F. Moss (get his newsletter) for much of the article. Always helps to have an authoritative source.

While mustard sauce isn’t relegated to the Midlands and Lowcountry anymore, even SC BBQ hash and chicken bog have stretched a bit beyond our borders.

In fact, Elliot Moss, chef/owner of Buxton Hall BBQ, serves both in his Asheville restaurant. But don’t get too excited, Moss — no relation to Robert — was born and raised in Florence.

“At Buxton Hall, chicken bog is a fixture,” writes Lunsford. “The dish comes together much like a purloo, the word for rice pilaf in the Lowcountry, where rice-growing traditions run deep.

“Chicken bog is traditionally a communal feast of chicken and rice, likely cooked in lard-rendering pots at whole hog roasts, another South Carolina tradition. The fact that chicken bog borrows from African traditions suggests it could have been created at the hands of enslaved people.

“It's the same story for barbecue hash, a South Carolina dish that arose from a completely different agricultural tradition: raising hogs.”

(The article includes Buxton Hall’s recipes for both hash and chicken bog. Having tasted both in the restaurant, I have to confess, I honestly wasn’t a fan.)

While foreign traditions like barbecued beef may have become more common in South Carolina, you can still find that authentic, regional flavor we’ve long enjoyed.

By dining around the state, you’ll quickly sense that the BBQ of Williamsburg County is typically different from that you find in Orangeburg and different still from the experience you’ll have in Columbia or Anderson.

That regional variety is the thing that makes South Carolina BBQ special.

Hot ‘n Fast

— Charlotte-area ‘Cue — Normally, I wouldn’t really touch on reports focused on BBQ joints outside of South Carolina, but this one will be an exception.

The Charlotte Observer published a story about “13 places to get barbecue around Charlotte.” As those of you in the area can attest, Charlotte has effectively annexed part of South Carolina, making suburbs of Fort Mill and Rock Hill.

But the list spread even beyond those nearby towns, and these SC-based BBQ restaurants made the list “with mouthwatering barbecue menus.”

• 521 BBQ & Grill

• The Improper Pig

• Midway BBQ

— Smoke Gets in your…Blood? — “Whether it was prepping meats, making slaw, or cutting pecan wood for their father’s quarterly fire department fundraisers, Justin said competition cooks now bring back fond memories for him and Patrick, of helping their father.

”When he passed away, we were given his helmet badge, which is on the sides of my cook trailer, with a dedication to him and that badge is with us at every cook,” Justin said. “Smelling the smoke, it brings back memories of late nights with my dad. ... Patrick is always the first person I call or text as soon as awards are done.”

This article in the Index-Journal was published prior to the recently completed South Carolina Festival of Discovery held each year in Greenwood. Reporter St. Clair Donaghy explores the story of Justin and Patrick Holt, the Holt Brothers competition BBQ team. (Not related to Holt Bros. BBQ in Florence, who also leaned on their father’s BBQ background.)

While these brothers are from that other Carolina, you always have to appreciate a good story centered on BBQ and bloodlines.

The Smoke Ring

In each edition, we’ll metaphorically spin the SCBBQ globe and randomly select an SC BBQ joint to spotlight.

This time, the globe stopped spinning on The Jiggy Pig in Gaffney.

While normally the restaurants chosen for this feature are indeed randomly chosen, this one breaks the rules a bit. You may recall from the hash recipe above that Olin R. Phillips ran the Joy Drive-In in Gaffney.

Today, that location retains a sign of the past, but it has been reborn as The Jiggy Pig. Like Phillips before him, Jiggy Pig owner Jeff Finley offers a beef hash on the menu.

“Also on the menu at The Jiggy Pig, you’ll find hot dogs and footlongs, hot wings, chicken strips and sandwiches, chicken salad, a bologna burger, and grilled cheese.

“Sides include chili, slaw, French fries, onion rings, cheese fries, and chili cheese fries. And they serve some amazing burgers.”

If you’re looking for BBQ while traveling Interstate 85, The Jiggy Pig is about 2 miles from Exit 95.

Check out The Jiggy Pig

We’d love to hear your opinion of this stop on the SC BBQ Trail in our

I Love SC BBQ Facebook Group