This past weekend I had the great fortune of heading south and spending a few days on Saint Simons Island. While the weather was a little too cold for my liking, it was a great excuse to let my dogs run on the beach for a few hours and sample some pretty good barbeque. Saturday I tried out Southern Soul Barbeque, located in the roundabout by the airport. From the outside it has the feel of a small local bbq joint with a large smoker grill and picnic table out front, small sitting area to the side, and counter for ordering and a few stools. Inside the place was packed for one o’clock and from the conversations it was mostly locals. That’s always a good sign in my book. We ordered the pulled pork sandwich, Brunswick stew, and beef brisket chili and had a seat on one of the bar stools. The staff was busy but great to us, maybe a little too townie for some crowd but my tea never went empty and they were playing Drive by Truckers so I was happy. Now on to the food.
The sandwich was nice and large, the meat was pulled in large chunks but not cubed, had a nice smoky flavor to it but was slightly dry if you ate it without any sauce. That’s okay because they didn’t overly sauce my sandwich before it came and I had the choice of a Carolina mustard, standard vinegar, hot vinegar, and a sweet thick vinegar. After trying all four I went with the hot vinegar which was slightly thick and not over the top hot, just a touch. All in all, the sandwich was above average. Their Brunswick stew was thin tomato base best described as a vegetable soup with bbq cooked in. I was a fan but my wife was not and I’d order it again. Now strangely the best thing we ordered was the beef brisket chili. It was a thick based chili with a spicy sweet taste and filled with a few beans and a lot of beef. These were chunks of tender brisket with just enough fat to give it a great taste. Not your run of the mill chili and I’d order this again anytime as long as it’s not blazing hot outside.
Long story short, if you’re down in SSI and looking for a good lunch, grab yourself some bbq and a cup of chili from Southern Soul.
Granite
The Grit Tree 
Any place that has “Q” and is playing the Truckers has to be good. We go down ever summer but have never tried out Southern Soul. I’ll be sure to make it our first stop this summer.
If you notice next time, when your in SSI, its not “Brunswick” stew, its SSI Stew. Atleast on Gnats Landing’s menus anyways…
Thanks! I think any southerner with a blog has the responsibility to give us a BBQ review at least once a week. Now, if there was only a way to keep the carpetbaggers from reading it…
We’ll see what we can do. Also open to suggestions. Never met a bbq joint I haven’t wanted to try.
And as for the carpetbaggers, we’ll keep up our ban on speaking of Ohio State so they will have no reason to stop by.