Fugawetribe | Where in the……? | Page 28

Jackie Hite’s BBQ, Leesville, SC

March 24, 2014 Author: jbh
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There’s something called 100-mile barbecue, as in “I’d drive a hundred miles to get some.” Jackie Hite’s is right up there in the top of the pack.

We tried to beat the after-church crowd on Sunday and just barely made it. Cars and pickups were already parked almost a block down the road alongside the tracks; the takeout door had a line out the door and the sit-down line was almost to the door. Fortunately it’s a buffet, so we got ourselves huge loads and sat down.

Mac n Cheese, Greens, Green Beans and Potatoes, Pork, Fried Chicken, Fried Okra and bread!

We had two kinds of pork, regular pulled pork and mustard-sauced finely-chopped pork. The pulled pork was good but really isn’t Hite’s forte; the addition of some mustard sauce made it better. The chopped pork sauced with a somewhat different mustard sauce was absolutely wonderful and is what Midlands barbecue is known for.

The fried chicken was great, moist, drippy and juicy but not greasy and far better than the Kentucky fried colonel. And this is at a barbecue restaurant. Mom even ate the skin.

A Midlands specialty is BBQ hash. It’s sort of hard to describe other than to say it’s a thick soup/stew made up of all sorts of piggy parts with some mustard sauce and served over white rice. There are hash cookers who work for restaurants and there are others cooking in a shed out back; what they have in common is that hash is a BBQ art of it’s own.

Part of the Buffet!

Jackie Hite’s has hash nailed, hitting all the right notes without going too far in any direction. Great!

I reckon it’s time to mention sides. We both got the same things except Mom got some greens and mac’n’cheese that I didn’t have room on the plate for. The fried okra was amazingly crispy, the flat beans and taters were tasty and Mom said the greens and somewhat Velveeta-style mac’n’cheese were good.

Then we hauled ourselves off to the dessert bar and zeroed in on one thing, Nanner Puddin. Light fluffy whipped cream, banana cream, lots of bananas and crispy ‘Nillas. That was amazing; crispy ‘Nillas means that it was made like right now or a little while earlier, not yesterday. Superb!

All the while, at least an hour or more, the line for the buffet snaked around the room.

Jackie Hite’s BBQ
(803) 532-3354

460 East Railroad Avenue
Leesville, SC 29070
Charleston, S.C.

March 23, 2014 Author: jbh
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Here’s a few snaps of our wandering around Charleston. Warning, large photos.

The old Charleston Market.

Anson Street

A really unknown grave.

Pineapple gates.

Jestine’s Kitchen, one of Charleston’s premier southern-cooking restaurants.
No pretentiousness, great food and relatively low prices.

The Joseph Manigault house has a spiffy little rotunda gate.

A reproduction of the CSS Hunley in front of the Charleston museum.

Slouching?

A huge old live oak tree.

This odd little conch-shell-studded structure sits on the property of Ashley Hall.

We went for a ride on the short bus. Shuttles run around the historic area and they’re free.

Charlestonians love their Confederate heroes.

A cruise ship in port with the Ravenel bridge in the background. Citizens were less than thrilled with cruise ships coming to town.

The old custom house.

Some of these graves were present long before the oak was an acorn.
Santee SP, S.C.

March 21, 2014 Author: jbh
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We arrived at Santee SP on Lake Marion east of Elloree yesterday and found it to be…interesting.

You know how usually you pull into a park and find a check-in kiosk? We found a signpost. And went miles and miles down what appeared to be an ancient state road to turn left as the sign indicated to an office. It was a bait shop; the office was the next building over.

After a tidbit of heated discussion we got checked and sent to the campground…a few miles away. So we went back out to the signpost and turned left. We bounced and jounced along past the Sinkhole Trail, past another big sinkhole along the road, only to end up on a dirt road that had a bit of hard dirt between the potholes.

It was where we wanted to be.

We had to drive all the way around the CG just for the idiot to miss the turn and go around again. Seems that Mom didn’t sign up to go off-roading.

We found our spot and the idiot executed a 50-point turn between the trees and stuck that sucker right in there. Thank you for your applause.

It took a bit of manuevering to get past the trees.

Today we’re futzing around. A couple who had been here a while informed us that no showerhouses on this end of the park have hot water. I informed Mom that our outdoor shower works fine; if they can’t provide us hot water we’ll make ’em suffer.

Mountain-girl Mom does the hunter-gatherer thing.

Since it’s Friday the park’s filling up. A local couple showed up next site with a poontang boat. You know, a poontang boat, one that has floats on each side and you anchor out in the lake and get some. A poontang boat. Anyway, they’re nice folks.

I really like this park. Campsites aren’t very close; they’re hollerin’ close but not too close. The entire thing here is a place to camp while you go fishing.

Lake Marion is huge and offers some good fishing.

However, the campsites are hemmed in by trees. Although our campsite is 50+ feet, it was impossible to get in without running over the neighbor’s fire pit and I don’t know how we’ll get out. That’s a topic for another day.

We’ll be back.

251 State Park RD | Santee, SC 29142 | Phone: 803-854-2408 | Fax: 803-854-4834 | santeesp@scprt.com