Barbecue spaghetti
American pasta dish
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Barbecue spaghetti is a dish from Memphis, Tennessee, that combines spaghetti with a sauce made from shredded smoked pork or pulled pork, vegetables, and barbecue sauce.[1][2] It is served as a side dish in some Memphis barbecue restaurants.[3] Southern Living called the dish iconic and "perhaps the city's most unusual creation".[4] HuffPost called it "a Memphis staple".[5]
| |
| Place of origin | Memphis, Tennessee, US |
|---|---|
| Created by | Brady Vincent |
| Main ingredients | Spaghetti, barbecue sauce, pulled or smoked pork |
| Ingredients generally used | green peppers, onions |
| Similar dishes | Cincinnati chili, Filipino spaghetti |
Preparation and serving
Barbecue spaghetti can be made with pulled pork[6] or shredded smoked pork. The sauce is "half marinara and half barbecue sauce",[7] sometimes with onions and peppers included, and is simmered before adding the pork; the consistency is close to that of barbecue sauce.[6] The spaghetti is cooked until soft, then tossed in the hot sauce.[7][8] This dish is served as a side.[2][5]
History
The dish was invented by former railroad cook Brady Vincent, who opened a barbecue restaurant called Brady and Lil's.[4] In 1980 Frank and Hazel Vernon bought the restaurant and renamed it The Bar-B-Q Shop. Vincent also taught the recipe for barbecue spaghetti to Jim Neely, who opened Interstate Bar-B-Q in the late 1970s; Interstate modified the sauce recipe adding the "extra back flap meat" from a rack of ribs and cooking it in a pot with peppers and onions.[4]
State Park restaurant in Cambridge, Massachusetts, serves a "Memphis BBQ spaghetti" that uses pulled pork in a marinara that uses a barbecue sauce as its base.[7]
Similar dishes
According to John Shelton Reed, "Barbecue spaghetti is to spaghetti Bolognese as Cincinnati chili is to the Tex-Mex variety".[9]
Filipino spaghetti is spaghetti noodles, tomato sauce mixed with banana ketchup or other sweetener, and topped with hot dogs and cheese.[10]
See also
- List of foods of the Southern United States
- List of pasta dishes
- List of pork dishes
- List of regional dishes of the United States
- Culture of Memphis, Tennessee
- Cincinnati chili, another example of a fusion-cuisine spaghetti dish
- Filipino spaghetti, another example of a fusion-cuisine spaghetti dish
- Haitian spaghetti, another example of a fusion-cuisine spaghetti dish