Nestled into a roadside just north of UMASS in Sunderland, MA is an eatery you might not expect to exist, or, at the least, you might not expect to be this good.

The first clue that Bub’s BBQ is good eating is the unassuming exterior.  Much of the outside seems thrown together, ramshackle, even, with a big red and white tent out front for al fresco dining and some diversions for those needing entertainment, including a basketball hoop and what looked like a few holes of home-crafted mini golf.  What’s best, the entire places is covered in a cloud of woodsy-odored smoke, but we’ll get to that later.

Charm even extends to what is on your table before you get your chow.

That’s two rolls of paper towels to serve as napkins, S+P shakers, ketchup, hot sauce, and a box of well-worn Trivial Pursuit cards in case you want to know if your dining partners can convert feet to fathoms.

But enough with the ambiance.  We showed up at Bub’s in the middle of the afternoon and had eaten little all day.  We were starving, but Bub’s takes care of that immediately right after you step in and order your main dish.

You see, after ordering your BBQ goodness you grab a plate, turn around, and start hoarding side dishes from the included Hot and Cold Bar.  There’s a lot of options, some good, some bad, a couple straight up awesome.

To get an idea of just a few, baked beans were good and slightly smoky, dirty rice was passable but a bit plain for my taste, the sweet potatoes were creamy with a nice hint of orange, and the beets were beets.  However, for my money the highlights are three of the cold salads.  The coleslaw is a bit over-dressed and on the gloppy side but it’s made with what tastes like real, hand-cut cabbage and big chunks of what I think were dill pickles.  The pasta salad also tasted very fresh and homemade, with big fat chunks of fresh basil.  However, it’s all topped by this -

That’s pasta on the left, tater salad on the right, and in the middle, corn.  Corn salad-y stuff.  It’s always the first thing I go for at Bub’s and often the last thing I go for, too.  Mixed in with the sweet corn are black eyed peas, celery, red peppers, and onions, lightly dressed, and then hit with a good amount of cilantro.  It tastes light and crunchy and verdant from the dark green cilantro, and makes for a good contrast for the main event which is anything but light and crunchy and verdant.

The brisket (shown here, blurry, and without the bun it usually comes on) was fine, but probably not Bub’s strongest dish.  The beef was tender but most of the flavor came from the tangy sauce it was smothered in.  More beefiness, more fattiness, and more smokiness would make this more satisfying but there’s so much else to chose from on the menu, the just OK beef brisket isn’t too much of a disappointment.

The pulled pork was better where the brisket left us wanting.  The smoky flavors were more intense, the pork was overall moist and unctuous, and the whole thing wasn’t inundated with the sauce.  However, the pulled pork at Bub’s is not where the pig reaches its most glorious potential.

That would be the ribs.

This is where pork fat, salt, smoke, tang, and gristle come together at Bub’s, and they were remarkable by any standards, not just Yankee standards.  The meat was perfect, not over-cooked and falling off the bone but just firm, and released with just enough pull from the bone.  Each bite was different, some full of pork fat and juiciness, others with a mixture of char and meat, and then others that were chewy and crunchy from the last-minute grilling the ribs get before going to plate.

Bub’s also has a fun selection of desserts, including an excellent deep fried Twinkie but we had already stuffed ourselves silly by the time the rack of ribs was gone, and we already had other plans for dessert further up the road.  Our last course of the day comes up in our next post, stay tuned!