Jack Easley

Marion Pit Bar-B-Que in Marion, Kentucky

Nearly 40 years ago, Jack Easley was paying too much rent on his sit-down restaurant, so he went looking for a more affordable avocation. There aren't any tables or chairs in the vinyl-sided hut known as Marion Pit Bar-B-Q, but out back there's a hickory-fired pit in which Jack smokes pork for 17 unhurried hours. When the shoulders are quivering on the cusp of fracture, he pulls them apart and soaks the meat with an exceptional tomato-based sauce, orange as a robin's breast. "The main thing for me is the sauce," says Jack, who refuses to disclose ingredients. "It's a little bit ketchup, a little bit everything else. So far everybody pretty well likes it." 270/965-3318