This little piggy......

I don’t like pork. I say pork…… what I mean is roast pork or pork chops, that sort of pork. I love bacon. And ham. And sausages, particularly cold sausages which are quite a different beast to the hot sausage and best eaten from the fridge, while wondering what to eat…..

I don’t like BBQs either. I hate BBQ sauce. Even though I lived for a time in Los Angeles where everything is cooked, al fresco, on the BBQ, surrounded by blokes with long folks poking it and drinking beers, I still tend to remember the dodgy outdoor dining of my childhood: chicken legs systematically burnt and blistered on the outside, appetisingly raw on the inside. It's a wonder any of us have made it to middle age.

So, you might wonder why it was I could be found queuing…… yes me queuing ……… outside, on a chilly evening, to get into a BBQ joint specialising in pork. Quite simply I was so seduced by the pictures of pork being served up at Pitt Cue Co. I could think of little else for a week. This Southern-style American BBQ project started life, I believe, in a mobile catering truck under the Hungerford Bridge, where the queuing began, and is now London’s brand new, must-go-to, Soho eatery, situated on a corner near Carnaby Street.

Once inside we then had to wait some more, but we were in and we now had a pair of Whiskey Sours to warm us up. The bar is teeny-tiny, and serves a whole lot of different bourbons, amongst other things. We were seated eventually at the bar by the window: half curtained, looking out onto the street. I felt like I was back in

New York's west village. The high ceiling is strewn with low hanging, low light, clear light-bulbs; the only way to light a restaurant in London at the moment. Downstairs there is more seating for about 20 or so but it's a tad tight.

The menu is small, beautifully formed and vegetarians are welcome but not catered for. They do pork and beef a couple of different ways and a choice of sides, but here I feel it's all about the pig. And they do take away.

My mate Dave knows all about pork, and BBQ, and expertly ordered us ribs and slow-cooked, pulled-pork with sides of slaw, mash & burnt bits, and a jar of pickled stuff. The food comes lip-sticky and unctuous and smokey, the pickles and slaw crunchy and sharp, a perfect accompaniment to the sweet BBQ sauce we sucked from our fingers. Dave pronounced it all excellent. For me the pulled pork was the winner. I appreciated the smokey ribs and sticky-sauce but it’s never going to be my first choice. But I could happily have eaten the whole jar of ceamy mash topped off with the ‘burnt’ bits of chewy pork from the pan, again and again.

The buzz is big about this place. It seats only 30 so they don’t take bookings, to make it fair they say. It also makes queues down the street which is never a bad look. Whoever’s doing the PA is definitely doing their job, a clutch of Canadians desperate to order and newly arrived in town had it on their itinerary .……. the place only opened last week. The guy on the door sounds like a Rupert or a Charlie and much of the clientele seamed to be on first name terms with the staff who probably all went to school with each other, no doubt helping to keep the place hot and heaving during it’s opening weeks. I'd happily go back..... when the queues go down......

Top tip: try something you know you don't like...... you may suprise yourself.....