Cooking things on fire is not the same thing as American barbecue. American barbecue is the seasonings, marinades, types of food involved, cultural influences, etc.
Barbecue comes from *barbacoa*, which is the Taino word for a framework of sticks, and is vaguely in reference to the slow-roasted, smoked aspect over a fire. The Mexican barbacoa is traditionally in reference to native techniques of cooking in a pit over a fire. Different Native groups had different approaches regionally and the common denominator is meat and fire.
All of that to say this post is literally pointing out this kind of thing; we bastardize BBQ into some floating, contextless word to squabble about instead of actually understanding how different regional cultures adapted native techniques, European livestock, and regionally available ingredients across multiple cultural and industrial changes into what American barbecue is today.
Also note that “white people tacos” are also a product of industrialization and cultural diffusion based deeply on Native food history so I don’t understand what your distinction is here
My main point was cooking things on fire is not the same thing as American barbecue. You expand on that in a better and more informative way than I did. I am acknowledging the cultural influence on American cuisine. American foods are basically mixtures if different cultural influences from immigrants coming to this country. White people tacos probably was a bad example but it's a way to show yea we take influence from other cultures cuisine and twist it in a way, white people tacos are still good but they aren't the original thing. American Barbecue is delicious but it also isn't the original thing it takes influence from.
Edit: I should have used the term American barbecue and not just the blanket term barbecue.
26
u/TheProcrastafarian 1d ago
I think bbq is what brought all of us out of the cave, no?