CL: Where do you usually get your meat?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: We get our meat directly from the wholesale market, from the source. We know the butchers, and we know where the meat is coming from, so we can pay attention to the safety factor.<\/p>\n
CL: What are your plans for the menu?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: The next priority is we want to get some good cocktails on there. Get the alcohol going again. We want to add some chicken as well. But the chicken is a little tricky. So we want to be more confident before we roll that out.<\/p>\n
CL: What makes the chicken more difficult?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: I think it is the skin. I don\u2019t like it when it\u2019s dry. And that is the thing that we are trying to get \u2013 moist, succulent skin, as well as the flavor inside. I am working on a couple recipes. We also want to set up a grill, so that we can do hamburgers and steak.<\/p>\n
CL: Before you put the cuts of meat out there, do you marinate your meat or baste it?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: Actually, it all comes from the rub. It\u2019s a dry rub. It has 5 or 6 different spices in it. You rub it into the meat, and then you leave it overnight.<\/p>\n
CL: What cut of meat does the pulled pork come from?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: In the states we call it Boston butt, or pig butt, but it\u2019s not from the butt, it\u2019s from the shoulder, right above the leg. And the beef brisket comes from the chest area. That is usually the hardest, toughest meat, so you have to cook it very carefully, low and slow.<\/p>\n
CL: It must be challenging to have a restaurant where it takes a five-hour lead time to prepare a dish. Not to mention, you have a full time job. How do you have time to do that and open up the restaurant at the same time?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: It\u2019s a lot of weekends and a lot of late nights. Just trying to find the time. If you love it, you make the time for it. It\u2019s good food and I like that people can enjoy it.<\/p>\n
CL: How long has the idea for this restaurant been marinating in your head?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: Six months.<\/p>\n
CL: Really? That seems really quick. You are men of action.<\/em><\/p>\nJB: Well, we built the thing (the smoker) and in late November we finished it. In December we were trying to figure out where to put it. We had a place we were looking out downtown. But the rent there is ten times as much as it is here, so we decided to put it here first.<\/p>\n
CL: Are you thinking about opening a location in the city? Would you imagine doing it in two locations?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: I would love to have two locations. Some place that is still in the countryside, where you can be outside and not breathing the polluted air. And then also having a place downtown.<\/p>\n
CL: The food is delicious. It seems like the challenge is expediting the delivery mechanism, so that people can satisfy their craving for it.<\/em><\/p>\nJB: That is one thing we have been thinking about a lot. Maybe it makes sense to open up a small place in Tongzilin, and we could cook the meat here, and truck it over there to do delivery. But on the other hand, when you come to a barbecue place, you want to see the pit, want to see people walking around. It is perfectly fine to have a place downtown, but you lose some of the environment.<\/p>\n
Another thing is that in order to be able to cook more, you have to have enough business so that every day I\u2019m cooking a couple slabs of ribs. If the demand is there, and I\u2019m confident I can sell it, then I\u2019m going to be cooking every day.<\/p>\nFollow Iron Pig on WeChat<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nCL: Any model that allows you to produce a lot at one time sounds good. Either bringing people here for a specific event, or bringing the barbecue to the city to distribute it. You could consider doing delivery, or catering. I would love to be able to get barbecue take-out after work. Even if it was reheated, it would still be good.<\/em><\/p>\nJB: We could do something like set up a storefront and then we set up a schedule, like available on Fridays and Saturday. One thing that we didn\u2019t do today, that we are interested in doing, is sandwiches. Pulled pork sandwiches, brisket sandwiches, with coleslaw on top.<\/p>\n
CL: We\u2019ve always thought that Flower Town was very cool. People are friendly. It\u2019s not crowded. There is foliage everywhere. It would also be cool to do a weekend B&B out here, do you have any plans for that?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: Yes. We are in the process of cleaning up and redecorating the upstairs. Once we prepare the rooms, we will be opening them up for guests to stay in as well. We want to make full use of the open space and nice environment.<\/p>\n
CL: Last question, when is your official opening? What are your operating hours?<\/em><\/p>\nJB: We\u2019ve had a couple events, but we plan to have an official opening next weekend. We are going to be open at selected times for a while. If you want more information, you can check our official WeChat account.<\/p>\n
Thanks a lot to Iron Pig for the fantastic food. Scan their QR code above to get all their information.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\nUpdate: Below is\u00a0a map of the location of the Iron Pig, which is directly across the street from Dojo<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Recently we sat down with Justin Barrow, the proprietor of Chengdu’s first authentic American smoked barbecue restaurant.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":46036,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[96],"tags":[122,254],"yoast_head":"\n
Behind Chengdu's Best American Barbecue: Iron Pig<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n