Kendall’s BBQ

Honestly, I don’t love Kendall’s BBQ. But I do love where it is, just yards from exit 114 off I-65. If one is traveling fast with no time to wander far from the interstate, it’ll do just fine. The barbecue is hacked-up pork that is tender and flavorful and just slightly smoky. On a sandwich or plate with side dishes, it comes bathed in bright red sauce that looks a lot like ketchup and, in fact, doesn’t really taste all that different from ketchup. Among side dishes to go with a plateful are fried okra, Tater Tots, corn nuggets, cole slaw, etc. and, for 50 cents extra, a nice, big baked potato. One of the easy-eat meals here is one of those baked potatoes stuffed with BBQ.

Beyond chopped-up pork, Kendall’s offers a surprisingly broad menu of chicken and ribs, pork chops, fried shrimp and flounder, even a rib-eye steak. There are all kinds of sandwiches, too, including hamburgers. However, my bacon cheeseburger, which was dressed handsomely with crisp lettuce, tomato, etc., suffered from a shocking lack of beef flavor. It was a protein patty, for sure, but beyond that, not much.

The extensive repertoire of eats is especially noteworthy considering that Kendall’s is hardly bigger than a walk-in closet. How they prepare everything in this tiny space is beyond me. It is located in the corner of a gas station parking lot and has no indoor seating at all — just a walk-up order window and a few picnic tables on a patio to the side.

By the way, when I said I loved the location of Kendall’s BBQ, I didn’t only mean its proximity to the highway. It is in the town of Georgiana, which was Hank Williams’ boyhood home. The house he lived in from the age of 7, now an adorable homespun museum, is just minutes away.