This in Arky I presume?
Yes.
Reeking of smoke from head to toe, we pressed onward to Marvell, AR and the legendary Shadden’s BBQ shack. Shadden’s, once a frequent hangout of The Band’s Levon Helm, gets high marks for its atmosphere alone. Talk about days gone by! This joint looks like the quintessential country store/filling station. A black woman was seated on the front porch as we pulled into the gravel lot out front. She slowly rose to her feet and nodded at us before disappearing into the kitchen. Her break from work was over --- if just for a while.
A young white girl sporting a ball cap greeted us as we gazed around the well-aged interior of Shadden’s. Jars of giant dill pickles, pickled sausage, and floating pickled eggs rested atop a rattling metallic cooler. Yellowed pictures of smiling families and once-young enlisted men could be seen everywhere, making Shadden’s look like a cross between a roadside grocery and museum.
The black woman soon emerged from the barely-lit kitchen with our sandwiches, each one swaddled in wax paper and pierced with a lone wooden toothpick. Remarkably, we still had the appetite and room in our bellies for this last salvo of savory smoked pig meat. Yet it was clearly the sheer character of Shadden’s that would make this stop one of the highlights of our day.
As we exited the rickety old structure, the black woman had taken a seat alongside a broken down jukebox and the young girl was back on her cell phone. Rex, Jay and myself exchanged some final pleasantries on the drive back to our original rendezvous point. We then shook greasy hands, folded ourselves back into the two vehicles, and wheeled back on the lonesome raindrop-speckled highway. But not before plans were suggested for another road trip --- next time to the Little Rock area. Today’s “work” was done, but more dining adventures were just down the road. “So much swine, so little time!”
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Shadden’s BBQ Sauce
¼ cup oil
½ stick butter
2 small onions (chopped very fine)
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
½ bottle A-1 Sauce
¾ bottle ketchup
1 tablespoon chili powder
2 tablespoons brown sugar
½ tablespoons Tabasco
¼ lemon (grated; including rind)
Salt and pepper to taste
Cayenne pepper to taste (for added heat)
--Sauté onion in butter and oil until tender
-- Add other ingredients, mix well and cook for 30-45 minutes.
(SHADDEN'S BARBECUE, MARVELL, AR; from the book “High Cotton Cookin'.”)
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