Shaver Wood Products Annual Barbecue

Mr. Shaver has his annual barbecue at his farm behind his sawmill business.


This year the barbecue was pork and chicken plus the fixings and even corn dogs.


Here is one of several huge tents where everyone could get together and talk and pig out on que.



Mom and some of her buddies have finished eating and are thinking about the homemade ice cream - vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, and banana.


Mr. Shaver sure knows how to throw a barbecue party. I guess he's had some practice, since he does this every year. It's kind of a company party, but he invites the whole community. I barely remember when some of the big companies around here would do nice things like that for the community. That was a long time back. Mr. Shaver is a small business owner. He has a saw mill operation, but he remembers everyone at this time of the year.

After I got off work, I picked up my son at the high school and then dropped by my mom's house to get her. Then we drove a couple of miles down the road to Shaver's for the annual barbecue.

Mr. Shaver always has pork barbecue which is a local favorite. Here in North Carolina, that's chopped pork. It's slow pit cooked to get that smoke flavor. The sacue is a thin vinegar based mixture with some hot pepper to give it a kick. Most folks eat the Carolina barbecue on a bun, but some just go at it with a fork.

There was also barbecue chicken and fried chicken - both favorites in this area. This isn't a huge chicken farm area, but some local farmers do keep chickens. From what I hear, that's a lot of work.

The sides were barbecue baked beans, red cole slaw (generally put on the bun with the chopped pork barbecue), French fries, and hush puppies. There were corn dogs as well though I don't guess you'd call those sides. The kids really liked those.

Sweet tea was the beverage, and that's just as Southern as it gets. They did have some unsweetened tea which is what I actually prefer. Shhh. Don't tell. That's very un-Southern of me. I got used to tea without sugar when I lived overseas and just never really went back to the sweet stuff. I have loads of vices, so that was a good thing.

For dessert, there was home churned ice cream. I got my favorite which is strawberry. Boxed strawberry ice cream - no thanks. That stuff is not very good. Homemade strawberry is fabulous. Everyone at the table was talking about how good the banana ice cream was, so I hate to confess, but I had to go back and get a serving of that too. Shame on me! Oh well, I didn't drink the sweet tea, so maybe it balanced out. The banana ice cream was fabulous, and I enjoyed every bite. I do, however, feel like I ate a bowling ball. Two servings of ice cream isn't a great idea - but it was at the time.

If you're looking for a great home churned ice cream recipe, I have our old family recipe up at Yes You Can Grill. It won't feed the multitudes like at Shaver's party, but it does make a big container. We've used that recipe for about 40 yrs. It's hard to beat.

I don't think I'll need to eat for a week after that party, but I'll probably be up and thinking about something good to throw on the grill tomorrow. Then again, the weather man is saying Hurricane Hannah may be giving us some rain love tomorrow. In fact, we got some rain at the party, but no one minded. It was a good time as always! Thanks Mr. Shaver!