When Adam Platt Talks About Barbecue

(with apologies to Tony Hoagland)

The brisket writhes in the smoker.
The pulled pork dreams of returning to Memphis.

But when Adam Platt talks about barbecue, his voice is strangely calm.
Yet it seems that meat is rarely mentioned.

He says, The boxy whitewashed space looks more like a boutique beauty salon than a rib joint.
He says, The elf-like tables are set with chopsticks.
He says, You’ll find they can be quite palatable when soaked in yuzu.
He says, The well-trained, unfailingly cheerful staff are dressed in snappy charcoal-colored T-shirts and come at you in never-ending waves.

He belches as if recalling his childhood in Texas.
He shakes his head at a rub.

Flavored, tragically, with raspberries, he says and quotes his daughter. (“The ones at school are better, Dad.”)

He calls a desert a towering Buyanesque creation. This, he says, could tip even the most hard-bitten man into a food coma.

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