Pappy's Smokehouse - St. Louis, MO

Have you ever walked into a restaurant and immediately fallen in love?  I mean like the kind of place that you would agree to give up your first-born son for one more meal.  The place that you dream about when you are sleeping and the place that you rearrange your entire life to go grab a meal there.  Whenever I go to St. Louis,  I have such a place.  A place that makes my mouth water, just at the thought of a meal there.  For me that place is Pappy's Smokehouse and this is what makes me drool.

I've said before that barbecue is close to my heart.  I have a professional barbecue team that competes throughout the country and I work hard to perfect my own barbecue.  So usually when I travel, I like to find barbecue restaurants.  Admittedly, I often find that my expectations aren't met because restaurants tend to overcook barbecue thinking that things falling off the bone is the way to go.  In fact, that means that the meat is mushy and overcooked.

After seeing Pappy's Smokehouse featured on several TV shows, I thought it was time to make the trip and check it out.  I had been told that lunchtime is the time to go eat at Pappy's because, unlike most restaurants, Pappy's only cooks a certain amount of food each day and when they sell out of an item it gets pulled off the menu.  So if you want ribs, which are excellent at Pappy's, then you have to be there for lunch.  I arrived at 12:30 and saw a line out the door and wrapped around the building.  A good sign, yet a scary sign.  I kept my fingers crossed that they wouldn't run out of ribs all the way until I made it up to the front of the line to place my order.  To my excitement, they still had ribs.  I ordered a half rack of ribs and sides of deep fried corn and potato salad..

Then I was off to find my seat.  At Pappy's you order your meal at the front counter and then find a seat and they deliver the food to you.  The decor is an eclectic mix of St. Louis sports and music memorabilia and the majority of the seating is family style at long counters or at huge picnic tables.  One wall is covered with menus autographed by celebrities who have dined at Pappy's while they were in town and near the front counter Pappy's displays the barbecue credentials that prove his stock.  While he hasn't competed in years, back when he did Pappy competed well.  In 2000, he became a world champion when he captured first place in the whole hog category at Memphis in May.

My food arrived almost as quickly as I found my seat and I was ready to dig in.  I always try barbecue without sauce first because I like to see how the meat is by itself.  I can honestly say that after my first bite of ribs, I didn't stop eating until the rack of ribs was nothing but a pile of bones.  I never touched a sauce and I never touched my sides.  The rub Pappy's puts on their ribs is tangy and savory and the smoke flavor courtesy of the mix of apple and cherry woods they use was great.  I licked every bit of it off my fingers.  The ribs were cooked correctly.  They were moist, tender and most importantly they didn't fall right off the bone. 

The sides were impressive as well.  I enjoyed the potato salad.  It was cold and not laden with mayo.  The potatoes were firm and it was delicious.  The corn was interesting, but not my favorite.  I have been to other restaurants with deep-fried corn on the cob and I have learned that you have to use a specific hybrid variety of corn to prevent it from being soggy.  I am not sure that Pappy's uses that and so the corn was a bit soggy to me.

Every single time I go to St. Louis I go to Pappy's.  I tell everyone I know to go there.  And now I am telling you to go there.  I guarantee you won't be disappointed.  Hands down, Pappy's provided me the best barbecue meal ever and it is the only barbecue restaurant that I have truly had competition-quality food at every time I set foot in the door.

Boccalone - San Francisco, CA

Disclaimer:  What you are about to read is NOT a restaurant review.  It is a review of a boutique food shop where a master chef displays some of his finest works of art.  So please spare me the emails about the fact that I didn't review a restaurant.  Read on.  You'll get it and if you don't, then I doubt you ever will.

Inside the Ferry Building in downtown San Francisco is a market where many locally produced items are sold.  Within its walls there are shops to purchase high quality cheese, ice cream, seafood, coffee chocolate, and meat.  Long before I walked the halls of the Ferry Building, I knew the one shop that I had to visit.  The shop beckoned me from thousands of miles away.

Chris Cosentino is the chef at San Francisco's Incanto restaurant and has been featured on TV numerous times.  Cosentino was also on the Food Network show Chefs vs. City.  Aside from becoming a bit of a celebrity in the restaurant world, Cosentino has become a master at the art of salumi.  'What is salumi,' you ask?  Well, it is the Italian word for cured meats.  Whether cooked, cured or fresh, salumi is an orgy of meat.  And that's one kind of orgy I can get into.

So when the opportunity came to travel to San Francisco, I knew that Boccalone would have to be worked into my schedule.  Walking up to the shop, my mouth was already watering.  Just looking at all of the options in the shop was overwhelming.  I scanned all of the meats over and over again.  The staff there was very helpful and while I was trying to select some sausages to bring back home with me, I decided to purchase one of their signature meat cones.  It is a paper cone you can get pre-filled with a mixed selection of their meat or you can get 6 slices of meat from your own choice.  I opted to get their pre-filled meat cone and a cucumber soda.

The meat cone had pancetta, mortadella, and prosciutto in it when I was there.  Two heavenly slices of each.  The mortadella was so silky smooth with all the right bits mixed in.  The prosciutto literally melted in your mouth with each bite.  So full of fatty flavor.  Each bite was wonderful and before I knew it my paper cone was empty, leaving me with the feelings of a four-year old who just ate the last bite of a sno-cone (I have a four-year old so I am qualified to make this assumption).

The cucumber soda was a cool, refreshing companion to the meat cone.  The Dry Soda Co., makes the soda out of their Seattle, Washington, office.  The soda had just the right amount of sweetness, but the overwhelming flavor of cucumber was in every sip.  Boccalone carries several of the Dry Soda drinks and I can imagine that all of them are tasty based on the delicious taste of the cucumber soda I selected.

So after taking a respite for my meat cone and soda, I was back on the hunt for my meats.  I decided to get a pound of their cappocola and a pound of their Ossabow prosciutto.  The Ossabow is expensive to say the least, but it is made using pigs from the Ossabow island in Georgia and it is widely considered the best prosciutto made in the United States.  I got a taste of one slice while I was standing there and I nearly fainted.  Words here can't really describe how delicious the Ossabow is.  It is so buttery and salty.  It melts in your mouth and has such an old world feel to it.

I also opted to get the Salami Sampler.  The sampler is four 6-8 ounce chubs of uncut salami, each with their own distinctive taste.  My sampler had Orange & Wild Fennel salami, Brown Sugar & Fennel salami, Soppressata, and Salame Pepato.  I couldn't wait to get back home and try each of these meats.  I made them last as long as I could and I truly enjoyed every last bite.  My favorites were the Brown Sugar salami and the Soppressata, but each had their own unique flavor profile.

And now for the best part.  If you want to partake in some of Boccalone's best salumi offerings, you don't have to plan an emergency trip to San Francisco.  While going there in person is certainly a unique experience that is unmatched, you can get Boccalone delivered right to your door since most of their products can be shipped.  The aforementioned Salami Sampler is one of those products.  You can check out all of the options on their web site at www.boccalone.com. You can even get your own Tasty Salted Pig Parts t-shirt.  I wear mine proudly at all of my barbecue contests.