Barbecue is like pizza: you can get it anywhere in the country, and only like 20% of the country is good at it. In southern NH, the most reliable barbecue for me has been Willie Jewell’s, a chain—which isn’t an endorsement of them per se (I like the brisket) so much as a reflection of what else is on offer. (Up at the Lakes there’s a better option, Cider Bellies or whatever they’re called in Center Harbor.)
Which is why we drove an hour and a half to the Purple Pig.
This is a takeout joint, Texas style barbecue (which is where I first got accustomed to good barbecue; it focuses on beef, especially in the forms of brisket and sausage; no, I don’t know why this place is named for a pig except that the Purple Cow would be confusing). They have two small tables and a smaller counter against the wall, but it gets crowded quickly and I’m not sure we’d’ve had a place to sit if we hadn’t been there at opening on Saturday. I was not sure what to think, because the parking lot doesn’t smell like smoke; it smells like garlic from an Indian place in the same strip mall. I’ve had very, very few excellent barbecue experiences where the parking lot didn’t smell like smoke. Maybe it’s not smoked on site? Maybe they have ridiculously good ventilation, like that place in NYC with the mile-high chimney or whatever?
Even if this place didn’t turn out to be good, it was a nice fall day, hadn’t rained yet so the trees were still dressed, and the trip brought us half an hour away from Bazaar in Framingham, so we’ve now got six kinds of pelmeni, pine cone syrup, and salo. So one way or the other: a successful trip.
But I am happy to report that the Purple Pig justified the gas on its own merits. And they have oxtail.
Service was a bit slow, for the record. When we got some stuff to go at the end of our meal, it took another 20 minutes or so. And nothing is cheap, but right now, what is? So with the negatives out of the way, here’s what we’ve tried:
The oxtail, better start with that. Terrific and tender. How often have you been served oxtail that wasn’t stewed in some way? Smoked oxtail! Why aren’t we all doing this? $30 a pound, but you know what, we’re probably going to get it every time. (No photo because we got it to go and I didn’t think to take a photo at home.)
Brisket and pulled pork. Look, I’m descended from umpteen generations of Low Country South Carolinians. My allegiance is supposed to be to the pig. I get that. I will excuse my love of barbecue brisket by pointing out that I have never been offered brisket and whole hog barbecue at the same time, and so never had to choose one over the other. I will also acknowledge that my aunt Patty would probably not be okay with this rationale.
But brisket is well suited to barbecue for the same reasons whole hog is: collagen and fat. Purple Pig’s is great, falling apart tender, moist, flavorful. When I have mixed feelings about barbecue places around here, it’s often because the brisket and pulled pork are inconsistent, with one bite being perfect and the next dry and hard to chew. That didn’t happen here. Both meats were just right. My write-up here favors the brisket, which is largely because I think pulled pork (when it isn’t whole hog!) often doesn’t offer a lot of flavor on its own, and becomes a medium for smoke and sauce.
(Has the US actually been around long enough for umpteen generations to have passed? I guess I’m just descended from ump generations.)
Mrs C got spicy collards, mac and cheese, and cornbread with her brisket and pulled pork combo. The sides were fine. The cornbread is sweeter than I like—I like cornbread to be either the tough unsweetened kind you have with greens, or full-on blondies—and the mac and cheese is undersalted, but maybe that’s intentional since the menu offers a lot of “mac and cheese topped with meat” options.
Burnt ends. Burnt ends aren’t originally part of the Texas portfolio, they’re a Kansas City thing, but everything is everything now. And they definitely fit in with what Texas barbecue does well, since they’re brisket, after all. Here, they’re served in cubes, even on the sandwich. It was a bit unwieldy after the first bite, but man are those burnt ends good. Crispy melty, extremely smoky. The house pickles on the side are nice too. The sandwich, unlike the combo, doesn’t come with sides (but the combo for some reason doesn’t come with pickles).
Sausage mac and cheese potato skins. The other day I was talking about how potato skins aren’t on as many menus as they used to be, and rarely excel. Maybe they never did, maybe I was just young! I am a big fan of the smoked baked potato that some barbecue places do, and the Purple Pig lists a baked potato on their menu, but I don’t think they’re smoked, so I figured, try the potato skins.
They’re … fine. They’re huge. Each of these is the length of my hand. They were hard to eat with the plastic cutlery, and the mac and cheese falls right off if you pick them up. But it was also an opportunity to try the sausage, which I’ll be honest, is the least interesting of the meats I tried. I don’t know if this is a house made sausage or just house smoked; if the latter, maybe the problem is just that they don’t have access to the same sausages they’d have in Texas, I don’t know. It’s not bad at all, but I think it would probably disappoint someone looking to recreate a Texas barbecue memory, by being merely good.
The menu lists a lot of specials—it was beef ribs on Saturday—and unfortunately, the most interesting ones (chile relleno and pastrami short rib) are on weekdays when it’s really unlikely we’ll have the time to drive to Marlborough and back. But hey, good for the locals. The regular menu has a little bit of everything, which like the lack of smoky parking lot, did give me pause: is the jambalaya really going to be good? is the smashburger really a smashburger, or just a thin burger?
(I will be honest: even as I am singing the praises of this place, I am very skeptical that the jambalaya is good, for much the same reason that barbecue often isn’t good. You have to have had the good stuff to recognize what’s good about it and what you’re supposed to shoot for. Now, if it turns out the cook’s grandma is from east Texas and he’s making it in her cast iron pot, or they used to live in Lafayette, or they’ve at least been to Coop’s … okay. But I don’t know if I’m likely to order it without a testimonial.)
Among the things we didn’t try, what I am most curious about is the smoked chicken thigh sandwich, because I forgot to ask whether it’s a whole thigh (as the name makes it seem) or pulled chicken (like every other smoked chicken item on the menu). If it’s a whole thigh, I gotta try that. I should’ve tried dessert too—they had Boston cream churros and apple pie eggrolls. The fuck is that? I don’t know. Should’ve found out.
Oh, and! They have RC cola in the cooler! No Big Red, and a damning lack of Dublin’s own Dr Pepper, but nevertheless. Outside of a Cracker Barrel you don’t see RC up here much.
