To barbecue, or BBQ, means to slow-cook meat at a low temperature for a long period of time over wood or hot coals. The word “barbecue” most likely derives from the word “barabicu” which originated in the Caribbean with the Taino people. It later became known as “barbacoa” in the European languages. The word translates to “sacred fire pit” in English and is a way to slow cook with hot coals in an “open pit” to amplify and direct the smoky heat up to the meat. Bon Appetit magazine informs its readers that the word comes from an extinct tribe in Guyana who enjoyed “cheerfully spit-roasting captured enemies.” The Oxford English Dictionary traces the word back to Haiti, and others claim (somewhat implausibly) that “barbecue” actually comes from the French phrase “barbe a queue”, meaning “from head to tail.” Tar Heel magazine concludes that the word “barbecue” comes from a nineteenth century advertisement for a combination whiskey bar, beer hall, pool establishment and purveyor of roast pig, known as the BAR-BEER-CUE-PIG.
The word “barbecue” means different things to different people, depending on where you live. On the East and West Coasts of the United States and Canada, it describes any sort of live-fire cooking outdoors. In Texas, the South, and parts of the Midwest, it refers to a specific kind of meat that’s slow cooked and heavily smoked, usually via the indirect method. Thus, to a North Carolinian, barbecue means pulled pork; to a Texan, it is beef brisket. Elsewhere, barbecue may refer to a piece of cooking equipment (the barbecue grill), a social gathering, or simply a meal outdoors.
In the southern United States, barbecue initially revolved around the cooking of pork. During the 19th century, pigs were a low-maintenance food source that could be released to forage for themselves in forests and woodlands. When food or meat supplies were low, these semi-wild pigs could then be caught and eaten. It was the Spanish who first introduced the pig into the Americas and to the American Indians. The Indians, in turn, introduced the Spanish to the concept of true slow cooking with smoke. The Spanish colonists came to South Carolina in the early 16th century and settled at Santa Elena. It was in that early American colony that Europeans first learned to prepare and to eat “real” barbecue. So, people were eating barbecue in South Carolina even before that name had been applied to the area by the English. Later, in the early 1800s, when cowboys were employed for moving cattle to the West, they were given meat that was hard and impossible to chew. They found out that slow cooking meat, directly on the fire for 5-7 hours makes the meat tender and edible.
Prior to the American Civil War, Southerners ate around five pounds of pork for every one pound of beef they consumed. Because of the poverty of the southern United States at this time, every part of the pig was eaten immediately or cured for later use (including the Ears, feet, and other organs). Because of the effort to capture and cook these wild hogs, pig slaughtering became a time for celebration, and the neighborhood or community would be invited to share in the offering. These feasts are sometimes called ‘pig-pickin’s’. The traditional Southern barbecue grew out of these gatherings.”
Who Invented the Charcoal Briquette?
Ellsworth B. A. Zwoyer of Pennsylvania patented a design for charcoal briquettes in 1897. After World War One, the Zwoyer Fuel Company built charcoal briquette manufacturing plants in the United States with plants in Buffalo, NY and Fall River, MA.
Henry Ford created a briquette from the wood scraps and sawdust from his car factory in 1920. Later E.G. Kingsford bought Ford’s briquette and placed it into commercial production.