As warm weather descends on the Black Prairie and the Columbus, Starkville, West Point area, it is hard not to think of barbecues. Interestingly the first “barbecue” in Mississippi occurred in December 1540 probably in the Starkville area. It would have been a celebratory meal by the Hernando de Soto expedition which had with it a herd of hogs as supplemental food.
Be it with pork, chicken, beef or lamb, from 1540 until today this area has had a love affair with barbecue. And everyone has their favorite barbecue sauce. The early history of barbecue sauce is as cloudy as the sauce itself.
When examining the history of barbecue sauces, one finds regional prejudices as strong as any opinion of Ole Miss, MSU or Alabama football. I recently came across a nationally published article claiming that Memphis barbecue sauce was just a higher-vinegar content variation of the classic Kansas City sauce. I know an awful lot of people who firmly believe that the Kansas City sauce is just a sweet, high-tomato content imitation of Memphis sauce. As for my opinion, it is hard to beat the dry rub ribs from the Memphis restaurant, The Rendezvous.
A major problem with tracing the early history of barbecue sauce is that until the early 1900s, few cookbooks included any recipes for it. Barbecue sauce, as we know it, has not been around that long.
Years ago, many people considered pork to be an undesirable meat. In “Practical Cooking and Dinner Giving,” which was published in 1888, the author said, “I confess to having a decided prejudice against this meat (pork), considering it unwholesome and dangerous.” Early barbecues around Columbus usually included lamb but with pork or lamb there was little mention of a sauce. The 1849 “Modern Housewife” listed 62 sauces but not one of them was what we would consider a barbecue sauce.
When an early sauce is found, it is generally what we would use as a basting sauce. In the 1800s, barbecued meat usually referred simply to meat roasted over coals and seasoned only with salt, pepper and its own juices. The earliest date that I have found for a true commercial barbecue sauce was 1909. It was probably the 1940s before commercial sauces were common.
The old regional differences in barbecue sauces still exist but are fast losing their regional context. Commercial marketing has given people a wide selection of sauces to choose from. What were once regional sauces can now be found almost anywhere. Since everyone is entitled to and has their own opinion about barbecue and sauces, here is my view of what the regional sauces are.
Some Carolina sauces are mustard-based. Deep South sauces are vinegar-based with some tomato paste or sauce. In north Alabama and south Tennessee, there is a unique white sauce that is often used on chicken. It is mayonnaise-based with some vinegar and is said to have been developed at Bob Gibson’s Barbecue in Decatur, Alabama. Northern and Midwestern barbecue sauce is tomato-based and is sweet with some vinegar. Southwestern sauce adds chili peppers, cumin or both to the Midwestern sauce.
The best way to trace the barbecue sauces used in our area is by the recipes that were used in Columbus. The earliest I have seen is in an 1825 cookbook from the Billups family in Columbus. It is more of a baste than a sauce and calls for a pint of water, two cloves of garlic, pepper, salt, two gills of red wine and two gills of mushroom catsup. It may be thickened with butter and brown flour.
Sally Govan Billups” cookbook, dated Sept. 16, 1867, has a sauce recipe that calls for “very strong seasoning of vinegar, salt, red and black pepper, and three quarters of a pound of lard or butter. Baste the pig using a mop.”
In east Mississippi barbecue probably reached its zenith at Magowah Gun Club which is located about 12 miles south of Columbus. It evolved out of a 1906 birthday party for Collier Hardy that grew into a monthly barbecue with skeet and trap shooting. Lenore Hardy Billups’ father T.W. Hardy was one of the original members of Magowah. In her 1940 cookbook was the Hardy family recipe for barbecue sauce for a gathering of 100.
This is the 1940 Hardy family recipe, which serves 100:
Ingredients: A pound of chopped onion; four pounds of fat, bacon or ham, melted; two quarts of vinegar; a quart of water; a pint of mustard, prepared; 1 1/2 quarts catsup; four ounces of brown sugar; salt; red pepper; chili powder (optional); and two ounces of Worcestershire sauce, (optional).
Directions: Fry onions in melted fat until tender and slightly brown. Add remaining ingredients; mix thoroughly. It was simmered all day over an open fire in a cast iron pot.
Rufus Ward is a Columbus native a local historian. E-mail your questions about local history to Rufus at [email protected]
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Ask Rufus: Barbecue sauce - The Commercial Dispatch
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