The day after our Eastern-style barbecue at Allen & Son, we headed west to Lexington - the home of Western North Carolina barbecue. Our destination was Barbecue Center:
Unlike Allen & Son, here there were many options when ordering your barbecue. We settled on a small tray of coarsely chopped outside brown.
The tray, as advertised, was small but it was *packed* - there was a solid layer of pork underneath the slaw. The meat was in nice-sized chunks, with lots of charred outside goodness. Best pork so far.
We liked the hushpuppies better here than at Allen & Son. They were rather funny looking, but much less sweet and they were good dipped in sauce.
We also had a sandwich, but this time tried it with sliced pork instead of pulled. It was good, but not as good as the sandwich from Allen & Son. I am definitely coming to believe that different styles are best suited to sandwiches vs straight barbecue.
The extra sauce served hot at the table was thin, spicy and tomato-vinegar based.
It is hard to compare Barbecue Center with Allen & Son as we had different items, but overall, I would give the nod to Barbecue Center because of the variety of options available and the taste of the chopped outside brown we tried.
We had planned to stop in at Lexington #1 as well, but just didn't have the stomach room (I told you there was a lot packed into that "small" tray...)
Barbecue Center 900 N Main St. Lexington, North Carolina (336) 248-4633
Excellent article. Thanks for sharing your experience.
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