Texas, Memphis, Kansas City, and North Carolina have long dominated the American barbecue scene, each serving a distinct style — Texas is famous for its brisket and dry rub, North Carolina for its whole hogs and vinegary sauces. Nashville is home to plenty of barbecue joints, but for years, its defining calling card has been hot chicken.
One Nashville restaurant wants to change that by giving the city its own barbecue identity.
Edley’s Bar-B-Que opened in 2011 and now has multiple locations in Nashville and others in the Tennessee cities of Chattanooga, Franklin, and Gallatin. The restaurant recently announced its new “Nashville-Style BBQ,” which they’re calling a new genre that combines low-and-slow smoked meats with a signature dry rub and sauce.
The dry rub features 15-20 ingredients, including cayenne pepper, which is a staple in Nashville hot chicken. The sauce blends Edley’s traditional barbecue sauce with a fermented habanero mash for a result that’s smoky, spicy, and sweet.
Edley’s menu calls out the Nashville-style barbecue in a special section, which explains the rub-and-sauce combination. The style is available across a variety of items, including brisket platters and sandwiches, pork platters and sandwiches, ribs, and wings.
“Creating a new style, especially in the world of barbecue where traditions run deep, isn’t something that happens overnight,” said Ryan Carter, the chief marketing officer of Edley’s Restaurant Group. He sees this new barbecue style as a reflection of the city’s evolving food culture, which he calls bold, lively, and unafraid of a little heat.
The restaurant is combining slow-smoked meats with cayenne-based dry rub and fermented habanero barbecue sauce. | Edley’s Bar-B-Que
“Like any new culinary movement, adoption takes time,” Carter said. “When you look at the rise of other iconic regional styles [like] Texas, Carolina, or Kansas City, they each started with passionate local cooks, a distinct point of view, and a deep connection to community taste and demand.”
Edley’s is pioneering this charge, but they’re hoping other restaurants join them.
“The beauty of regional food traditions is that they evolve through collective creativity,” Carter said. “We would love to see other pitmasters interpret Nashville-style barbecue, add their own twist, and share it with the world.”
This initiative was driven by consumer demand. Edley’s guests told the company they wanted that signature Nashville heat combined with authentic, slow-smoked barbecue. So Edley’s listened. Then they began experimenting with recipes, eventually landing on a style they felt represented the city.
“Ultimately, our goal isn’t to own this style. It’s to help put Nashville on the barbecue map in a new way,” Carter said. “If one day people talk about Nashville barbecue the way they talk about Memphis or Texas, and it’s because of many voices and many different expressions of this heat-forward barbecue, then we’ll know we’ve done our job. This is a new chapter, and we’re honored to help write it, together with anyone who wants to join in.”
