Note: This is my original review of Byrd's Bar-B-Q which changed ownership in the year 2005    . . . click here to read my new, updated review of Byrd's (they're stil rated 4-Pigs!), and thank you!

Review of Byrd's Bar-B-Que Grill Durham, NC by H. Kent Craig ©2004

I don’t remember exactly when or why I originally wandered into Byrd’s Bar-B-Que (2816 Cheek Road, Durham, NC, phone: 919-682-8809) those some many years ago, but it was truly love at first bite after that first mouthful of absolutely perfectly cooked fine-chopped ‘cue sweetly caressed my tongue.

Their barbecue is so evenly and absolutely cooked through without any drying out of the meat whatsoever that it’s the most greaseless barbeque bar none that I have ever eaten, period. For those of you who love The Pork Divine but have to watch your cholesterol, you can’t beat Byrd’s, because their meat is equal to the very best-tasting in North Carolina and is as without grease as can possibly be cooked without being dry.

Take a forkful of any other barbecue restaurant’s, put it on a napkin, wait three or four minutes, and remove the meat; you’ll usually find a grease stain not just almost puddled but soaked completely through. Do the same with a forkful of Byrd’s and only the slightest trace of grease will be visible, which is amazing to me, how the pork can retain all of its rich, full taste with basically 95% of the grease cooked off.

Their hushpuppies are in the very good to excellent range, but the one weakness if they have one is their sidedishes, most of which come from cans and are doctored-up a little to give them more of a homemade taste and presentation. When I order their Bar-B-Que Plate ($5.50 for a full half a pound of barbecue, plus your choice of two side dishes), I normally order the "new potatoes" (small, plain boiled potatoes) and the pinto beans, both of which are excellent if they do start out from wholesaler’s cans.

Their iced tea is full and dark and rich without being syrupy, both sweetened and unsweeted, being able to retain its full flavor as the ice in your glass melts and dissolves into it, and they also have lemonade for those of you who don’t drink tea.

One thing to take note of, which they don’t ever tell you but which they will acknowledge if asked, is that they are the supplier of barbecue to several unnamed for obvious reasons restaurants in the Durham/RTP area. In fact, their barbecue is so good and is featured anonymously by so many other local places that most of their actual business come from wholesale, not retail, sales though they definitely welcome and want walk-in customers. In fact, at lunchtime it’s often hard to find an open one of the dozen or so parking spaces in the lot out front. If the parking lot is full, is okay to park across the road on the shoulder, you won’t get a ticket.

Because their primary business is wholesale and not retail, this actually helps assure you that every morsel on your plate or in your sandwich is as fresh as possible, since their daily volume predicates continual cooking and complete freshness.

Byrd’s serves breakfast and lunch, from 6:30AM to 2:30PM, and yes you can order barbeque for breakfast if you wish since they’ve been cooking and preparing it all night long before, but are not open after two-thirty, not having dinner/supper hours, sad to say.

Durham is so blessed to have two true four-pig-rated Temples Of The Holy Grub, Bullock’s and Byrd’s, that when I’m in Durham it’s a matter of which side of town I happen to be on and which one I am geographically closer to that influences my choice of where to eat lunch at, Byrd’s being in the northern part of town and Bullock’s being closer to downtown and west. Bullock’s is more famous and gets the notices in other barbecue guidelines, but Byrd’s porcine fare is every bit as equal to Bullock’s if more anonymous because they’re a little harder to find but are definitely worth the extra four or five miles drive to get to, their sign very visible on Cheek Road just past the railroad tracks where Junction Road runs into Cheek.

One last interesting side note: to me, their barbecue is such a classically perfect example of the very best of Eastern-NC-Style Barbecue, that a photo of one of the many barbecue plates I’ve eaten there is the trademark icon for this humble little North Carolina barbeque site of mine.


Map of Byrd's Bar-B-Que
2816 Cheek Rd
Durham NC


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