Pepper's Ole' Fashion BBQ

Recently I had the opportunity to try Pepper's Ole' Fashion BBQ that is located at 303 San Pedro. This place used to be where Almost Gourmet used to be. I do not know the story of what happened, but it is no longer there. I am going to make the assumption that this is a hard location for a restaurant. This location is not in a modern strip mall by any means. The location saw better days about 50 years ago. It's a clean restaurant, but it is was not built to house a restaurant like the one that occupies it currently. Pepper's does serve "Soul Food" that is similar to what Almost Gourmet served, but it also serves BBQ.

One of the old sayings I've heard about BBQ joints is that you can tell a lot by the pile of ash at a BBQ joint. I agree with this statement, but ash is normally kept out of sight to the patrons. Based upon me not seeing the ash piles, I have to start with the beginning of where the ash comes from, the wood. The wood will tell you what type of meat you can expect to taste; for example, apple wood is mild and will make meat that is a little sweet and mesquite will burn hot and will make meat with a really strong flavor. Above is a photo of one of the piles of wood at Pepper's BBQ. When I came upon the counter to place my order, I was able to identify the pile of wood as mesquite. I asked the owner, Daniel "Pepper" Morgan if my assumption was correct and he confirmed my observation. I then proceeded to ask him about the other piles and he said he couldn't tell me, but he does use a blend of three woods to smoke. I can respect not disclosing certain details about how your BBQ is made. I ordered the combo plate that came with ribs and brisket. I got a choice of two sides and I went with the mac & cheese and the fried cabbage. I had never heard of fried cabbage until I ate at Pepper's. I looked it up later on and it is a Soul Food classic. As I understand, it's basically cabbage cooked with bacon. The mac & cheese was excellent. It had some cheddar cheese baked on top that gave it nice touch. The dish came with white bread and a sweet potato corn bread. The sweet potato corn bread was amazing. It was sweeter than normal corn bread and it was very moist. Brisket came in two forms: chopped and sliced. I opted for the sliced brisket. The brisket was tender and flavorful. The ribs were spare ribs and very good. I felt the sauce was not your traditional Texas style sauce.

Pepper's is cool because of the variety they offer in Soul Food and BBQ, side dishes, and daily specials. They have Soul Food Saturday where they serve things like ox tails and pigs feet. Pepper's is pretty good BBQ, but the total package is not great. I would give Pepper's Ole Fashion BBQ a rating of two out of five stars.