Sweet Cheeks BBQ
I've been told by my friends from the south that I don't know what "real BBQ" is. Well no offense to those people, but that's a stupid, idiotic statement to make. I understand where you're coming from, I really do. If you try to talk to me about bagels or pizza, I'll probably throw a temper tantrum. But I'm done letting people south of the Mason-Dixon push me around about BBQ, and that's because I think I've finally experienced the real deal.The fact of the matter is that when you taste something authentic, you know it. And Sweet Cheeks BBQ on Boylston Street in Fenway Park's backyard is as real as it gets. And I'm not the only one that thinks it. A Forbes Column called Sweet Cheeks' southern-style biscuits the best around, and it's the very DNA of the restaurant to be real. Chef Tiffani Faison, former Top Chef contestant, refuses to mess around on this issue:
We trucked through the Texas BBQ trail for food inspiration by the best and brightest. We fell in love. Hard. Dan [Raia] said it best when we got back. He said, very simply, “A short rib changed my life”. What we ate in Texas changed everything. It keeps me up at night. It set the bar. It’s our job to bring that to you at Sweet Cheeks everyday.
Faison and her team's dedication to their craft is obvious at Sweet Cheeks. All the meat is slow-cooked over a wood stove, wood that's stacked right in the dining room. The meat is also cooked sans-sauce, opting instead for dry rubs to give the meat flavor. You can sauce the meat yourself with the unlabeled house sauces at the table.I've slow-cooked meat at home before, but my god I've never slow-cooked anything like they do at Sweet Cheeks. Tender doesn't begin to describe the meat. In fact, there are no words to describe how the perfectly seasoned meat melts in your mouth. None. Eating the pork at Sweet Cheeks immediately filled me with pure joy, and complete inadequacy at the realization that I'd never be able to cook meat as perfect as the meat at Sweet Cheeks.The food's great, and they give you plenty of it. The menu says the basic tray is intended to be a complete meal for one person, but I only got about halfway through my pile of pulled pork and sides before I ran out of gas. The tray comes fully loaded with what feels like a pound of meat alongside pickles, onions and two slices of white bread. If you've never tired making a white bread-meat-pickle-onion sandwich, stop what you're doing, go to Sweet Cheeks and do it now. It's not weird. It's delicious.
Like I said off the top, I'm not a BBQ expert, and that may be why I was surprised by the sides on my tray. This isn't to say they were bad by any stretch, but they definitely were unexpected. The sides are called scoops at Sweet Cheeks, and you get one hot and one cold with your tray. The Heirloom Baked Beans are a chili if I've ever had chili. And that was damn-good chili. The second surprise came when I tried the potato salad and got slapped in the face with vinegar. Along with the homemade vinegar sauce on the table, I'm relatively sure this has to be a thing.
On top of all of this, Sweet Cheeks has a mammoth drink menu, and maybe the best part of all is that they serve you drinks in Ball Jars. It may seem like a small detail, but it's all part of the decor that makes Sweet Cheeks such a comfortable atmosphere to stuff your face with smoked meat.If you live anywhere near Sweet Cheeks and you think you're a BBQ fan, you owe it to yourself to make the trip. And if you still don't think I can make a positive ID on good BBQ, I'd love to hear from you.Also, check out the feature on Chow Down Beanton on Boston.com for more on Sweet Cheeks.
