Of course after you drive through the pristine wilderness, you have to drive through Gatlinburg Tennessee. Which is a little  like Niagra Falls, Branson and Las Vegas all smushed together and sprinkled with crystal meth. The town seems to be comprised exclusively of motels,  “museums” of the Ripley’s and Guiness varieties, theme restaurants and fudge shops. Apparently, there is a national touristy crap shortage and Gatlinburg is picking up the slack.  Come on America, step it up.  Gatlinburg can’t possibly keep up it’s current pace of fudge and air-brushed t-shirt production. 

But why else would we be driving across America, if not to see  the best of the worst this country has to offer.  That’s why we had no choice but to visit the world’s only salt and pepper shaker museum.  The cynic in me would like to pretend that I hadn’t researched this particular museum months ago and wasn’t thoroughly excited about the prospect of seeing tens of thousands of salt and pepper shakers…but I can’t.    As promised on the internet, it was indeed  a museum filled with salt and pepper shakers of every imaginable variety and it was awesome.  

We headed to Knoxville for lunch.  I didn’t go up in the sun sphere but I hear that it is no longer full of wigs.  I did however research some barbecue joints in town.  Knoxville’s bbq scene doesn’t get the attention of  Memphis or North Carolina and finding reviews of local places was a challenge. Leesy and I eventually decided  that M&M BBQ and Catering, a tiny take out only  joint in the hinterlands of Knoxville, offered the best chance for great barbecue.   The pork sandwich was wonderful and the beans were full of fatty porky goodness.   It’s worth figuring out which of the three addresses on the website is the right one.  I’m not telling, you can call and find out for yourself.  

But  we should have known we were going to be in trouble when an incredible rain storm nearly forced us off the highway outside of Nashville.  Apparently the weather was trying to warn us that all the best hot chicken restaurants in Nashville were closed for the holiday weekend.  Unfortunately, our hubris and our stomachs forced us to drive to Prince’s Chicken Shack only to discover it closed.  I called four other places and got the same result.  Closed. Damn you Nashville!  I forced half a dozen people to watch a video about your hot chicken and now I’m going home empty handed. Hungry, tired and disoriented from a lack of hot chicken we headed to our hotel downtown where we spent a frantic thirty minutes determing that all the restaurants I had researched before we left were closed.  We decided to skip the fireworks and raced to an Ethiopian restaurant that was, of course, only open for another half hour.  After driving past it three times, we discovered our destination hidden in a strip mall.  As strange as the cirumstances were, the food was wonderful.  It was easily some of the best Ethiopian food I’ve ever had.  We had the vegetarian platter with seven dishes including an interesting Ethiopian  take on collard greens.  Full of food and recovering from our hot chicken depression. we spent the remainder of the evening in a nearly empty move theater seeing The Hangover for the second time.  As we watched a tiny naked Asian man beat Zach Galifanakas with a tire iron we laughed and wondered what kind of day tomorrow would be.

Interior - Lexington Barbecue

Hush Puppies - Lexington Barbecue

Eating - Lexington Barbecue

Incredible barbecue.  I almost forgot to take pictures before I ate it all.  I think there has a been a lot of debate about the slaw that they make here because they add some of the barbecue sauce which gives it kind of a brown color.  I hate mayonnaise and the kind of white gelatinous mess that passes in most places for slaw in most places so I thought the slaw here was a real treat.   It was tangy and flavorful and  went really well with the meat.  As for the pork, it was fantastic.  This has got to be some of the best pork barbecue I’ve ever had. There’s not really a lot of sauce on the meat because it’s not basted during cooking so you’re mostly tasting the flavor of the meat.  And that’s the best part because this is some damn good pork.  I did add a little sauce to part of my tray but I thought it quickly overwhelmed the natural flavors of the meat.

Also, the hush puppies here are the best I’ve ever had.  They’re like  little bits of fried heaven.  Mmmm…..heaven.

1. There is no insider information anymore that is not widely available to curious investigators.  There are reviews of every restaurant serving hot chicken in Nashville and every hotel in Asheville North Carolina.  There are blogs dedicated to rating  barbecue in every town from Memphis to El,Paso.  There are forums for airing views about every conceivable kind of food in every city in America.  There is very little that is able to fly under the radar.  If someone is smoking a superior pork shoulder in Western North Carolina, you can be sure that someone else is writing about it on the internets.  When I discuss this with friends, they often point out that you can’t really trust all this information posted anonymously on the internet.   While  I agree that when it comes to the subjects of  Obama’s birth certificate and  JFK conspiracy theories, the internet is filled with  unatributed and anonymous information, the world of food, tourist traps, and hotels is VERY well covered ground.  What the internet lacks in trust, it makes up in volume.

2. It’s easy to get carried away planning a trip like this.  I could look for roadside attractions and barbecue shacks for a year if I wanted and come upon something new every day.  I am trying to avoid doing any more planning until we leave.  I already have a huge selection of bookmarks and a ginormous spreadsheet.  I’m curious how much of my research actually winds up being useful and how much was really just a waste of time.

3. Rental car companies suck.  If you have a Brooklyn, Bronx or Queens license and rent in the New York area you will be hit by hundreds of dollars in fees that apparently assessed because non-Manhattan boroughs are full terrifying monsters. Will  these fees will be added when you reserve online?  Of course not.  You only find about them if you call the number in the fine print at the bottom of your e-mail confirmation.

4. Google StreetView is awesome.  Want to check an address in west Texas?  Google has you covered.  Want to see the difference between driving a local road and the interstate?  No problem.  Call it a harbinger of our bleak dystopian future if you must, but for the anxious traveler  a better tool has not been invented.

5. The following websites have proved invaluable: Roadfood.com, TripAdvisor, RoadsideAmerica.com, Chowhound.com, SouthernFoodways.com, Yelp.com and SeriousEats.com(specifically their excerpts John T. Edge’s Southern Belly).  In the future  I hope to publish a more complete list of regional blogs that I’ve enjoyed.