BBQ regions and their wood

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GoolsbyMD

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For me when I think of the different regions of American BBQ I think of traditional stick burners and what they use most of. What would you consider is the most traditional wood?
Carolinas. Pecan/Oak
Texas. Mesquite/Oak
Tennessee. Fruit woods
Mississippi. Hickory
St. Louis. Oak

Slow rainy day at work.
 
As much as I like pecan, growing up my whole life in North Carolina the only woods I saw used around here were hickory and oak.

Pecan, apple, peach, mesquite and most any others were considered exotic or a "secret" to somebody's favorite bbq until the last 5-10 years when BBQ has become more of a subject on TV.



Dangit N8man! You beat me to it! I got distracted during my post.:wink:
 
Just to throw in something a little further afield - Germany's traditional smoking wood is Douglas fir and / or beech from the Black Forest region, and Poland's wood of choice is/was juniper. Across Europe in general alder is used a lot for smoking
 
:shock: lots of softwood. Didn't think those were the best for smoking.

Do ya'll even have any trees left on that island?:laugh:
 
Interesting topic...not sure we'd have anything traditional in Illinois... Lots of maple trees around...maybe oak or elm?
 
N8man said:
Traditionally in North Carolina we use hickory/oak...
Click to expand...

Agreed. I burn through a LOT of hickory. There are also a lot of apple orchards in my neck of the NC woods, so I burn some of that with pork whenever I can get my hands on a load.
I do like a little mesquite when I smoke chicken though...
 
Just a bit north of NC I burn a lot of hickory and oak. Don't find much Pecan around here. Lota of oak.
 
Pin and bur oak is common as well as maple for cooking woods. Some of our most common hards woods aren't ones to cook with, locust and cottonwood. There is also mulberry and apple for common fruitwood trees.

A very small part of the state has shagbark hickory too.
 
smoke ninja said:
:shock: lots of softwood. Didn't think those were the best for smoking.

Do ya'll even have any trees left on that island?:laugh:
Click to expand...

Yeah we have a few ;) the park just over the road from me is filled with silver birch and oak, and I just noticed some had been trimmed. I'll have to go collect the pieces that have been left
 
In The Netherlands we got alot of oak and fruit trees.

-oak
-apple
-cherry
-pear
-beech
-birch
-hazel
-willow
-alder
-maple
 
lantern said:
As much as I like pecan, growing up my whole life in North Carolina the only woods I saw used around here were hickory and oak.
Click to expand...

Going back to the: What would you consider is the most traditional wood?

loaded question: "most traditional".

I actually use that in our MBN presentation and talk about BBQ authenticity, back to the days of the 1600's. Slaves wouldn't have used fruit tree wood (ordinarily), but would've used what was readily available and abundant; oak and hickory on the southern east coast.
 
"Traditional" bbq comes from the south, so their woods are going to be different from mine. If i had to pick a "preferred" wood for my region. Id have to go with apple given all the orchards in ny.
 
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