Archive for August, 2010
Do-It-Yourself Santa Maria BBQ
So maybe you can’t make it out to the beautiful Santa Maria Valley but still want to try your hand at preparing your own Santa Maria Style Barbecue? Well, have no fear, because several local purveyors offer products that can help you make Santa Maria Style Barbecue like a pro.
For example, Susie Q’s Brand of the Santa Maria Valley offers a full suite of products dedicated to our local culinary tradition, including seasoning, pinquito beans and red oak grilling chips. Susie Q’s Brand was established by Susan Righetti, whose parents founded landmark barbecue restaurant The Far Western Tavern in 1958.
Meanwhile, Cowboy Flavor of Los Alamos offers its own signature seasoning, as well as pinquito beans (pictured here) and barbecue tools. Cowboy Flavor was established by famed local barbecue master Billy Ruiz, whose catering company is renowned for preparing epic barbecue feasts.
F. McLintock’s is another local barbecue establishment that offers signature lines of barbecue products, including seasoning, beans and salsa.
As for the actual making of your Santa Maria Style BBQ, we encourage you to click here for tips on the traditional Santa Maria BBQ preparation and methods, and here for a how-to video created by Chef John of Food Wishes.
Soon enough, your friends and family will be awed by your barbecue prowess, and you will become known as a neighborhood barbecue hero!
P.S. If you aren’t quite ready to prepare your own Santa Maria Style Barbecue from scratch, you can always place an order with BBQ2You, which offers pre-prepared Santa Maria oak-barbecued tri-tip. BBQ2You was established by the Ostini family of the famous Hitching Post restaurants in Casmalia and Buellton, and also offers seasoning and other savory treats.
Santa Maria Barbecue: A Taste of Terroir
In the world of wine, the French term terroir is used to denote the taste of place, the unique flavors expressed by the vineyard and its region, as determined the convergance of conditions such as soil and climate.
In a broader sense of the term, Santa Maria Barbecue could be described as a form of terroir. After all, it’s a uniquely regional cuisine based on native methods and ingredients, including pinquito beans and red oak. It tells the story of a place, its land and its people.
This notion is supported by the new book called American Terroir, in which author Rowan Jacobson makes the case that “foods that are what they are because of where they come from.” Similarly, the book Renewing America’s Food Traditions calls Santa Maria Style Barbecue “a mainstay of California’s culinary heritage.”
In some ways, Santa Maria Style Barbecue could be considered “old school,” as its origins date back to the 19th century. At the same time, however, Santa Maria BBQ belongs to the new wave of local cuisine, as more and more people embrace regional authenticity in their food and see the value in nurturing our nation’s culinary terroir.
We like to put it this way: Santa Maria Style Barbecue proves that good taste never goes out of style.
If you haven’t already, make plans to visit the Santa Maria Valley for a taste of our terroir, in the vineyards, the strawberry fields and the many restaurants serving Santa Maria Style Barbecue.
Three Questions with John Porter of Alamo Farming
There’s more to Santa Maria Style Barbecue than the main course. Indeed, in addition to seasoned tri-tip or top block sirloin, no Santa Maria barbecue meal is complete without a side of locally grown pinquito beans. Pinquitos are small pink beans that are native to the Santa Maria Valley, and that remain a commercial crop exclusive to the Central Coast. To get the ground-level scoop on these little beans, we spoke with John Porter of Alamo Farming in Santa Maria, whose family has been growing pinquitos for three generations.
You come from a longtime local farming family—when and how did pinquitos become one of your family’s specialties?
My grandfather started growing pinquito beans in the mid 1950s when a friend of his brought him a small amount of beans from Mexico, he thought they would be perfect for his barbecue restaurant (note: the friend was George Knott, of Jocko’s Steak House fame). From then on, it has been a family tradition for the Porter family in the Santa Maria Valley, going on three generations. Pinquitos have become a perfect addition to Santa Maria Style Barbecue menu.
Can you describe the growing season of pinquito beans, and how they are harvested?
Planting takes place in mid to late May, Growing takes around 120 days, and harvest takes place in late September. Harvest is done with a specialized bean harvester, and also needs to be done when the weather is warm and dry. Santa Maria has the perfect climate for Pinquito beans .
How many acres of pinquitos do you grow, and to whom do you sell your beans?
We grow 25 to 50 acres per year in the Santa Maria Valley. They are grown, harvested, cleaned, and supplied to customers like Susie Q’s Brand, Jocko’s Restaurant, J.R.’s Drive-In, Rancho Bowl, and other individuals in the Santa Maria Valley, along with customers in Texas and Arizona.
Thanks, John! To watch John harvesting pinquito beans, click here to watch a Santa Maria BBQ segment produced by California Country Television (see video at bottom of page). Also, click here for more information on pinquito beans.
