Bar-B-Q King, Lincolnton, North Carolina

After I’d finished my breakfast at Mooresville Family House and Nancy had finished up at the gym, we headed for an early lunch on Day 2 of our trip from DC to Blowing Rock, North Carolina. I chose the restaurants with an eye to updating my list of the Ten Best Piedmont Style Barbecue Places. The idea was to check on some places that were on the bubble, and I was also thinking of adding a tier rating, much like the Barbecue Bros have for Lexington spots, or even try to list the Ten Best in rank order instead of alphabetically. Day two therefore focused on three greats, beginning with Bar-B-Que King in Lincolnton.

We arrived just before 11:00 and Nancy decided to stay in the car and read. Nancy is wise. If you don’t want to eat, stay away from delicious food. I strolled in and up to the counter and placed my order. The young woman took my order — a barbecue tray (pork, slaw, and hushpuppies), and then I saw some onion rings on another plate, so I added a modest half order. She asked if I wanted regular or spicy sauce and, noticing a suspicious look in my eye, added that the spicy was a vinegar sauce. I chose spicy. The petite young lady turned around and hollered — that’s the only word to describe it — my order back to the kitchen. It’s startling but endearing and fun.

The kitchen began preparing my order before the echo, and had it out by the time I could extract my credit card, pay, and return my card to the wallet. Now that’s impressive! So is this.

Let’s start with the onion rings, which I’d never tried there before.

These were exceptional onion rings. The batter adhered to the onion, and the onions themselves had a distinct sweetness. Well done, King!

Also new to me was the spicy sauce.

Bar-B-Q King adds pickled jalapeño rings to a small container of its already high quality Lexington-style dip. I liked it! The jalapeños added their own good flavor as well as some heat. The pickling vinegar and heat certainly would help certain other restaurants offer an option that avoids the excessive sweetness of their primary. sauces.

With the warm-up acts concluded, let’s move on to the star attraction, the tray itself.

Wait! How did I get white slaw? I had red slaw last time. I checked, and this is red slaw country. Do you think they saw the DC tags on our car and thought, “Here comes another one, bless his heart.” The white slaw was perfectly fine but it was a bit disorienting. Another hushpuppy and a bite of pork brought me back around. This was good, fresh, moist, tender pork kissed with hardwood smoke. It really is good enough to holler about.

I’ll highlight one more thing. The pickle. A simple hamburger dill chip is a great addition to a barbecue sandwich. It adds a nice light touch of vinegar to balance the pork’s richness, and a little texture. It’s almost as good as adding chopped raw cabbage (not slaw) to a sandwich as at the Dixie Pig. Sometimes I add both. Yum!

I won’t forget the hushpuppies! They were very good, and I started wondering who has the best hushpuppies. Even as I chewed I decided that getting it down to 10 Best would be not only impossible but really, really fattening. After all, North Carolina has the best hushpuppies in the country, and they’re so pervasive I wouldn’t be surprised to get them with a set of tires. They even have them at the Barbecue Church. Not in communion, although it’s a thought.

Ah, another great visit to Bar-B-Q King! It remains solidly among the best among Lexington style places. I’d like to go once when I could try their much-vaunted burger, just as I would at Jimmy’s, but that would mean skipping breakfast or limiting lunches to one or two. The Piedmont places are quite a drive, and it’s hard to decide what to leave out. Lincolnton requires a detour for most of it, but Bar-B-Q King is well worth a hundred miles each way. Give it a try.

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