November 8th - Fox Brothers Bar-B-Q

Many may be under the impression that living in the south means that all of us live a stone's throw away from a church, a gun shop and a good barbeque spot. That's simply not true. The nearest church is just under a mile away. I can't throw a rock that far. The gun shop is within a five minute driving distance and closes early on Sundays. As for good barbeque spots..that's a bit more tricky. Many folks, including me, have family BBQ sauce recipes that have been passed down from generation to generation. You want BBQ? Fire up your own grill and grab a beer. It's on!


The only people I know down here without a respectable barbeque grill is us. I blame that on the fact that my boyfriend is an immigrant hailing from a culture where the men don't understand that their genetic coding means that they must grill. (!!!) I still love him. I've almost entirely convinced him that we need to invest in our own grill. He's tasted the sauce. He likes. I've even gotten him to hold my mighty grilling spatula. He smiled a little. Plus, a fellow Nigerian scored his own grill for his birthday a couple of weeks ago. (Thanks, George.) The seed has been planted. Until we roll that baby home, however, we've wondered where in the heck can we get some ribs?

Oddly enough, my grill resistant boyfriend has a rib addiction. Thus, it was he who launched his own investigation into a respectable BBQ emporium. This past Friday, he was informed by a coworker that he needed to stop by Fox Brothers Bar-B-Q in Decatur. He promptly texted me and advised me that we would not hesitate to dine there this weekend. Come Sunday morning, he put on his military pants and I wore my military boots and jacket in preparation for our battle with the beef! And it was a beautiful day for meat eating, I'll tell you what. The sun was shining. There was a slight breeze in the air. Though Fox Brothers was fairly busy, there was still a table for two with our names all over it.

We scanned the menu and carefully plotted out our course. The plan was to try as much of the meat as humanly possible. Sweet Love needed to have ribs but he couldn't decide between the half or whole rack. I wanted to try both the chicken and the brisket but I didn't want to be greedy. Additionally, we both wanted a taste of the Brunswick stew, tater tots, onion rings, fried okra and perhaps a green veggie like collard greens. The waitress (we called her Bennifer) saw the anxiety on our faces and gave us more time to consider. We decided that to fulfill our chicken wishes we would score an appetizer of six hickory smoked wings with ranch dressing. Sweet Love would get the whole rack of ribs with the Brunswick stew and onion rings, while I got the sliced beef brisket with tater tots and collard greens. Sadly, the fried okra would have to wait. We were so happy with our plan that we high-fived. We're such a great team.

The food came. Okay...it was good. I mean it was damn good ....and there was so much of it. Oh America! Sweet land of gluttony. There's no way we should have eaten as much as we did but the taste kept callin' us and callin' us and callin' us. The smoked wings were so tender and the sauce had just the right combo of brown sugar and vinegar. The hickory flavor in the ribs was undeniable. Again, the meat fell away from the bone like butter. The beef brisket was just the perfect consistency and refrained from getting stuck in the back molars. Oh the sandwich that it would make! They put Lawry's on the tater tots, God bless'em. The onion rings were the size of my fists and yummy. I wasn't too keen on the collards. No, Mom makes them better. Anywho, there was no room for dessert. I don't know why Bennifer fixed her mouth to even ask us that.

We packed up the lagniappe, left Bennifer a 20% tip and waddled to the car. The plan was to walk around Piedmont Park, holding hands, discussing how savory and sinful our meal had been. However, we couldn't find a parking spot and we started talking about...stuff. By the time we did find a parking spot, we were tired. We both agreed that a nap would be the best possible decision we could make at that juncture. We went home and watched Krush Groove pretty much willing the fat to accumulate on our respective bodies. Love will kill you. Two thumbs up, Fox Brothers.