NCpedia — State Library of North Carolina, from the Encyclopedia of North Carolina

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2026-08-22

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Original document

By Wynne Dough, from the Encyclopedia of North Carolina edited by William S. Powell and published by the University of North Carolina Press in 2006, hosted by NCpedia at the State Library of North Carolina. It is the source that lets BBQHQ describe the two North Carolina sauces without deciding between them: eastern whole hog 'basted with a mixture of cider vinegar, red pepper, and salt', and the Lexington and Piedmont style of 'chopped or sliced pork shoulders or butts' with 'a thin, tomato-based sauce' that 'is served at table'. The application difference — one basted during the cook, one served at the table — is stated by the source rather than inferred, which is what makes it usable as evidence for how the sauce behaves under heat, and not merely for flavour.

Culture, History, Culinary practice

• Explicitly not safety: An encyclopedia entry on regional cooking states no endpoint and no safe practice.

• “a split hog roasted over a pit of coals [...] basted with a mixture of cider vinegar, red pepper, and salt”

  The Encyclopedia of North Carolina describes eastern North Carolina barbecue as a split hog basted during cooking with cider vinegar, red pepper and salt.

  BASTED, which is application DURING the cook. The source states the timing itself; it is not inferred from the sauce's composition.

  Two fragments from the same passage, joined with a bracketed ellipsis rather than silently run together.

• “chopped or sliced pork shoulders or butts with a thin, tomato-based sauce [...] it is served at table”

  The same source describes the Lexington and Piedmont style as chopped or sliced pork shoulders or butts with a thin tomato-based sauce that is served at the table.

  Served at table, which is the opposite end of the cook from the eastern sauce. The two styles differ in when the sauce meets the meat as much as in what is in it, and that is the fact BBQHQ needs.

  Two fragments from the same passage, joined with a bracketed ellipsis.

• North Carolina is documented as having two barbecue sauce traditions that differ in when the sauce is applied as well as in what it contains: an eastern whole-hog style basted during cooking with cider vinegar, red pepper and salt, and a Lexington and Piedmont style served at the table with pork shoulder, thin and tomato-based.

If this source changes, these are the claims that need rechecking. That is the point of recording provenance per claim rather than per page.