As we continue our barbecue sandwich trip around the USA, note the variations in cooking method (smoked or slow-cooked), cooking times and sauce ingredients.

Oklahomans favor beef brisket as do their neighbors in Texas. Theirs is typically a sweet but spicy sauce. In Oklahoma, barbecue most usually refers to meat that has been slowly cooked over wood smoke at a very low temperature, for a very long time. The wood used here includes Hickory, Oak and Pecan.

In Arkansas, the meat is slow smoked - sometimes up to 24 hours. Pork is the Arkansas favorite but beef does have its place on their barbecue menu. Their barbecued chicken, is "dry rubbed", then, smoked, and cut into pieces for the diner - after cooking. Barbecue sauce is served to the side for the diner to drizzle or spread. Most Arkansas barbecue sauce has a thinner tomato base with heavy vinegar accents and black pepper.

Mississippians seem to also prefer pork, usually shoulder, or alternately, the whole hog. Though most barbecue in Mississippi is pork shoulder slow-cooked in a smoker, you can still find the whole hog cooked in an open-pit barbecue from time-to-time. An open-pit barbecue must be started very early in the morning - a pit is dug about half a foot deep and several feet wide and filled with hickory wood. The wood is burned to coals then a grill is put over the coals. Next, the whole hog is lowered in and smoked over the embers. This method takes the entire day in order for the meat to be ready by dinnertime. A highly vinegar-based sauce with little or no tomato is a thing of great pride to Mississippians.

In Alabama, barbecue is also most often pork (ribs or shoulder), and is usually slow cooked over hickory smoke and served with a spicy, tomato-based sauce.

Floridians spice up both pork and seafood simply with butter and lemon or lime juice, then use the same as the base for their sauce.

Georgia barbecue follows the pork trend too. Here it is slow-cooked quite often over an open pit that is stoked with oak and/or hickory. Their sauce is based on ketchup, molasses and bourbon.

Time to take a breather on this trip! Next, we will visit the Upper Midwest, Kentucky, Virginia and the Carolinas. I hope you return and join me on the next leg of our barbecue travels.