"Highly Seasoned Food."

Stephen & Gerri Grady of Grady's Barbecue, Dudley, NC.

Click to see our original text and photo profile of the Gradys: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2011/12/gradys-barbecue-this-day-is-last-this.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"We Just Didn't Ever Stop."

Bum and Larry Dennis of Bum's Restaurant, Ayden, NC.

Click to see our original text and photo profile of Bum's: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/03/first-barbecue.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"Dad Put Barbecue Grease in My Milk Bottle."

Samuel Jones of Skylight Inn, Ayden, NC.

Click to see our original text and photo profile of Skylight Inn: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/03/standard-bearers-of-barbecue-skylight.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

Bruce and Samuel Jones of Skylight Inn, Ayden, NC.

"It Goes Over Pretty Good."

Randy Russell of Bunn's Barbecue, Windsor, NC.

Click to see our original text and photo profile of Bunn's Barbecue: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/02/survivalist-cue-bunns-barbecue-windsor.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"A Taste of the Past."

Tommy Moore of Moore's Olde Tyme Barbeque, New Bern, NC.

Click to see our original text and photo profile of Moore's: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/01/new-bern-north-caronlinas-king-of-cue.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"You Just Gotta Know that Smell."

Rudy Cobb of Jack Cobb & Son Barbecue Place, Farmville, NC.

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of Rudy Cobb: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/01/rudy-cobb-place-is-space.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

Barbecue by Consensus.

William Morris, Jr. of Morris Barbeque, Hookerton, NC.

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of Morris Barbeque: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2011/12/saturday-in-pork.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"I Gotta Keep It Going."

Debbie Holt of Clyde Cooper's Barbecue, Raleigh, NC

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of this nearly 75-year-old institution: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/01/defend-barbecue-clyde-coopers-in.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"Redhead Mama B."

Natalie Ramsey & Chase Webb of Red Bridges Barbecue Lodge, Shelby, NC

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of the sister and brother of barbecue: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/02/brother-sister-barbecue-red-bridges.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"Getting your daily fix of barbecue sauce."

David Wilson & John David Wilson of Short Sugar's Pit Bar-B-Q, Reidsville, NC

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of the Wilsons: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2011/11/short-sugars-bar-b-q.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert.

"Evolving Out of Necessity and Good Taste."

Chip Stamey of Stamey's Barbecue, Greensboro, NC.

Click here to see our original text and photo profile of Mr. Stamey: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2011/11/stameys-barbecue-root-of-it-all.html

Recorded and cut by Rien Fertel. Shot and chopped by Denny Culbert. 

"Still Smokin' and Gonna Keep on Kicking at It. "

Brandon Cook of Cook's Barbecue, Lexington, NC.

Click to see our original profile of Brandon Cook: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2011/12/cooks-barbecue-born-in-pits.html

Cut by Rien Fertel and Chopped by Denny Culbert

"We call it dip because we're always dipping stuff in it."

Sonny Conrad of the Barbecue Center, Lexington, NC

Click to see our original Barbecue Center profile: http://www.thebarbecuebus.com/2012/02/sonny-conrad-barbecue-center-when-you.html

Audio: Rien Fertel / Photographs: Denny Culbert

The First Barbecue?

Latham "Bum" Dennis and Larry Dennis, owners of Bum's Restaurant in Ayden, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert)

According to lore, the Dennis family follows a tradition set half a million years ago when man first roasted a wild animal over wood. Most of humanity quit smoking pigs and other creatures over burning embers, but “We just didn't never stop,” says Larry Dennis, manager and pitmaster at Bum’s Restaurant in Ayden. His father, the namesake “Bum,” opened his place back in 1963, thus placing himself in the innumerable company of Dennis barbecue masters.

Brother, Sister, Barbecue - Red Bridges Barbecue Lodge

Natalie Ramsey, center, and the rest of the Red Bridges Barbecue Lodge crew chat between shifts, at the restaurant in Shelby, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert)

Natalie Ramsey and Chase Webb, sister and brother, have inherited their mother’s smile, finish and start each other’s sentences, and together operate Red Bridges Barbecue Lodge, one of North Carolina’s oldest barbecue houses. Guided by mom, Lodge owner
Debbie Bridges-Webb, Natalie oversees the front of the house, with its plush blue-vinyl booths; Chase sits up all night watching the pork shoulders roast-tender over hickory coals.

Sonny Conrad — Barbecue Center: When You Dip I Dip We Dip.

Sonny Conrad at his restaurant the Barbecue Center in Lexington, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

In Lexington, North Carolina barbecue eaters don’t squirt on sauce, they dip in dip.

New Bern North Carolina's King of Cue: Moore's Olde Tyme Barbeque

Patrons line up at the counter for lunch at Moore's Old Tyme Barbeque in New Bern, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

History abounds at Moore’s Olde Tyme Barbeque. John Leonidas (LJ or John) Moore’s pithouse, operating in various incarnations over seven decades, might be most famous as a footnote in the subsequent states’ rights fight over the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Rudy Cobb: The Place is the Space

Rudy Cobb at Jack Cobb & Son Barbecue Place, Farmville, North Carolina. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

No chairs, no tables, just a counter. Take your food and go. Its name is the stuff that could have been dreamed up by a Hollywood script department: Jack Cobb & Son Barbecue Place. It’s a joint where even the owner, Rudy Cobb, can’t pin down exactly how old the establishment is. Could be sixty years, might just be seventy.

Saturday in the Pork

William Morris, Jr. outside his smokehouse in Hookerton, North Carolina. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

To find Hookerton’s only barbecue joint follow 1st Street southeast as it leads out of diminutive downtown Hookerton. The name of the cotton field-lined road you’re now driving along is named for the half-century-old plus smokehouse down a mile on the left. Yes, that’s right, Morris Barbeque is of such local import that the town went and named a highway after it.

Cook's Barbecue: Born in the Pits

Cooks Barbecue at the end of Valiant Drive in Lexington, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus



In 1969, Doug Cook built his barbecue stand by hand, in a cul-de-sac plot down the road from home. There wasn’t much to Cook’s Barbecue at first: a pit/kitchen, a wooden chopping block, and drive-up window. When customers wanted a place to sit and eat their chopped barbecue plates, Doug Cook felled trees from the surrounding oak grove, and built himself a dining room. 


Brandon Cook and Cook’s Barbecue were born just one year apart. Friends and family jokingly tell the younger Cook that he was born in his father Doug’s barbecue pits. He remembers crawling in the fireplace as a child, flirting with the waitresses as a teenager, and eventually, under his the elder Cook’s tutelage, learning how to tend the pits, shovel-sling the cherry-red hickory coals, and slow smoke the Lexington-style shoulders.      


For years Brandon Cook avoided Cook’s; he viewed the future of barbecue—not just the business but the art form—with skepticism. In 2001, he returned to his family's restaurant, inheriting the role of pitmaster. Fitting for a man born in a pit.

- Rien Fertel/ The Barbecue Bus


Brandon Cook at Cook's Barbecue. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

Cook's Barbecue dining room. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)



Brandon Cook holds a shoulder fresh from the pit at Cook's Barbecue in Lexington, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

Wood coals glow in the pit at Cook's Barbecue. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)





Pork shoulders on the pit at Cook's Barbecue. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

Brandon Cook takes a break before adding wood to the pit fire. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

The cat named Barbecue rubs against a statue outside Cook's Barbecue. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

The dining hall at Cook's Barbecue. ( Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)



Cook's Barbecue hush puppies. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)



Young cooks fry hush puppies and chop barbecue in the kitchen. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

The lean meat is separated from the bone, the fat and the skin before chopping. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)



"Dip" is added the chopped barbecue at Cook's in Lexington, NC. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

Cook's Barbecue, Lexington, North Carolina. (Photo by Denny Culbert/ The Barbecue Bus)

Cook's Barbecue
 366 Valiant Drive
Lexington, NC 27292


(336) 798-1928

Hours of Operation:

Wed - Thurs 11am - 2pm & 3:30pm - 8:30 pm

Fri - Sat 11am - 9pm

Sunday 11am - 8:30pm