Hickory & Spice BBQ
Fans of tender, fall-off-the-bone meats will find sweet happiness at this Orange barbecue house
One benefit of being raised outside the South is our absence of barbecue partisanship: We have no home-grown bias as to whether BBQ from Texas, Kansas City, Memphis or one of the Carolinas reigns supreme. Moreover, we’ve attended enough barbecue festivals over the years to have tried meats from too many award-winning cooks to count – there are lots of these festivals, lots of competing teams, and lots of awards; the food ultimately speaks for itself. So when we learned about the 2022 opening of Hickory & Spice BBQ, helmed by an award-winning pitmaster, we weren’t as interested in the backstory or trophies as the quality of the food.
When we say that Hickory & Spice’s ribs, brisket, and smoked turkey are more notable for being soft, moist and sweet than either smoky or spicy – fall-off-bone pork ribs arrived pre-sauced, with a smoke ring on inspection, but in no way brown or burnt – you can apply your own judgment to whether that sounds great to you, or violates your preferred/favorite local BBQ rules. We’re good with it, just as we’re good with many other styles.
Experientially, Hickory & Spice offers a sharp difference with locally famous Heritage Barbecue, where you’re all but certain to wait in a sun-heated line for an extended period of time and pay steep prices for more peppered meats with jerky-like bark. Like The SmoKING Ribs, Hickory & Spice actually has indoor tables and air conditioning; unlike SmoKING, the owner will likely come over and personally check on whether you’re enjoying your food. Again, this is still BBQ, but a substantially different experience.
One bummer for us was that many of the non-meat dishes – tater tots, onion rings, and sweet potato casserole – were at least dusted with sugar (“fairy dust,” the menu says about the tots and rings). It’s an interesting trick that makes the pecan-laden sweet potato casserole sing like dessert, but struck us as unnecessary on the otherwise impressively giant rings and basic tots.
If you’re looking for a tenderness-focused, quality BBQ experience that’s steps better than chains such as Lucille’s and way more focused on customer service than Heritage, Hickory & Spice is worth a visit. We enjoyed our experience and would come back again.
Stats
Price: $$$
Service: Counter
Open Since: 2022
Addresses
2143 N. Tustin St. Suite 6
Orange, CA 92865
714.202.5458
Instagram: @hickoryandspice