Roadfood_ Revised Edition - Jane Stern [81]
This is some beautiful chicken with a thin crust that flakes off in delicate strips. You can get breast, leg, or wings, and side dishes include vigorous turnip greens, sweet coleslaw, strangely soupy mac ’n’ cheese, and that Nashville soul-food favorite, spaghetti. In addition to chicken, Bolton’s sells a whiting sandwich that is available garnished in the locally favored way, with mustard, onion, pickles, and enough hot sauce to make your tongue glow.
A tiny east Nashville shop with a carry-out window to its side and a dining room with a handful of tables (oilcloth-covered), Bolton’s is an essential stop for anyone in search of a true taste of the Music City.
Bozo’s Hot Pit BBQ
342 Hwy. 70
901–294–3405
Mason, TN
LD Tues–Sat | $$
In the eighty-five years since it opened, Bozo’s has earned a sterling reputation for barbecue. Slow-smoked shoulder is served white or dark, the former unspeakably tender shreds, the latter more chewy and crusty outside meat. (Many savvy eaters get a combination of the two.) You can have it the classic Memphis way, in a sandwich with slaw (although here the slaw has a pronounced vinegar tang), or on a plate with beans and/or onion rings. Sandwiches are immense, loaded with more meat than any bun could possibly contain. Tables are armed with three sauces, mild, sweet, and hot. The hot is very hot.
Although barbecue is the must-eat meal, Bozo’s menu also includes steaks, shrimp, and wicked pies, including pecan, coconut, and chocolate.
Named for founder Thomas Jefferson “Bozo” Williams, the restaurant was engaged in a trademark battle with Bozo the Clown back in the 1980s that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. But Bozo’s is still Bozo’s, its well-worn Formica tables showing only about a half-century of use. (The original Bozo’s was destroyed by fire in 1950.)
Cozy Corner
745 N. Parkway
901–527–9158
Memphis, TN
LD | $$
When we come to Memphis hungry for barbecue, the Cozy Corner is the first place we go. The spare ribs are big and deep-flavored; baby back ribs are nearly too tender, their meat virtually evaporating on your tongue. Pork shoulder is our favorite meat, sliced into thick pieces that have a devilishly blackened crust that is blanketed with spice, their centers velvet soft, sweet, and moist. We’re also fond of barbecued bologna, a thick oinky disk bathed in profound red sauce, available on a platter or on a bun with coleslaw dressing. The best-known specialty of the house, and an item found in few smoke pits anywhere, is barbecued Cornish hen—a small bird with burnished skin and meat of ineffably delicate texture.
The beeline we make for the Cozy Corner isn’t only for its food; we love the place, which has the quiet, colorful character of a truly grand barbecue parlor. Its front room clouded with haze from the smoker behind the self-service counter, it is a storefront that does a lot of take-out business but also has a small dining room to the side where Memphis blues provide a suitable beat for pork-eating. The place was established back in 1977 by Raymond Robinson with $2,500 he borrowed from his mother; and until his death early in 2001, Mr. Robinson presided over his small, sweet-smelling empire from behind the order counter, haloed by the glow of his smoke pit. When we first stopped in, over a decade ago, his mother was holding court on the couch near the order counter. Mrs. Robinson rhapsodized about the health benefits of eating barbecue as often as possible, pointing to a row of effulgent aloe vera plants growing in plastic spice buckets along the window. “They have been here for years,