LINE OF SUCCESSION

“We’re going to prove that we’ve got championship barbecue right here at the King’s place.“ Thus sayeth Memphis wrestling legend Jerry “The King” Lawler last week as he opened his barbecue restaurant at 465 N. Germantown Parkway. Along with the new shop is a line of barbecue rubs and plans to franchise the business.









Lawler told the The Commercial Appeal that “barbecue and wrestling” are two things that are “synonymous” with the Bluff City, and that “I’ve already done the wrestling. We just wanted to jump in and challenge all of these other barbecue restaurants in Memphis.”

Well, he does have a ton of name recognition going in, but “all of these other barbecue restaurants” aren’t a bunch of Andy Kaufmans. The menu covers most of the barbecue bases, but the The CA’s story didn’t offer any info about how the new shop cooks – wood/charcoal or gas. I would hope for wood. Schweinehaus in Overton Square, which recently made the move to barbecue while keeping some of its German favorites, opted for a wood-burning Tucker Cooker made in Downtown Memphis (122 W. Carolina).









Wood vs. gas cooking is probably a topic for another time, and to be honest, I probably can’t tell the difference. But the human element involved in cooking with wood – looking at and feeling the fire and knowing when it is right – appeals to me. It seems like another skill that is being lost to technology.

One reverse move Lawler is employing is this









In every Memphis ‘cue shop I’ve been in, it’s understood that slaw comes on the sandwich unless otherwise requested. You opt out of slaw, not into it. I’ll bet the vast majority of Lawler’s customers will be slaw on, so it would seem easier to add 29 cents to the sandwich prices. It isn’t a fairness thing, either. The hamburger costs the same whether you want it plain or with everything on it. (There is a restaurant in Chattanooga that charges you for pretty much anything you add to an entrée or side. It’s one of my favorite places.)

Lawler isn’t the first to embrace the “barbecue king” motif here. Circa 1960 we had











which is now home to the bar Canvas. A couple of decades later came another aspirer to the crown.









It’s a ghost pit, the subject of a previous post (so is the Canvas site). Also in the early 1980s was





and the Memphis-based Colemans chain asserted royal dominion in this 1968 ad.









We’ve also had a couple others in the line of royal succession, from the 1940s and 1950s.









OK, Earl’s is a stretch. I missed the opportunity to eat there before it closed and was demolished. At that time, the biscuits would have been the attraction.