Jammin’ Joe Van Dykes

Was in search of gluten free food after a day in Shenandoah and heading back to MD. We saw the smoker out front on the way and let it guide us here on the way back. The place was empty on Monday at dinner time and the tunes were turned way up. We placed the order and chatted with the owner who let us know his life story. This is something that happens to me a bunch, but to my partner, I’m sure it was annoying. The owner was also overly complementary to me which could be read in many ways. He showed us what the place looked like before and slammed the previous owner (who also owned a BBQ restaurant) in how they cared for the place.
We took the food to go. We both got pulled pork, potato pancakes for me. They forgot to add my pumpkin/​molasses cookies, but when I asked, the owner heaped a whole lot more on me (they were fantastic, BTW). I got the hotter version of the standard BBQ sauce, and neither of us really loved it. The pulled pork was advertised to be done by hand to maximize the tenderness, it was somewhat chewy. The potato pancake reminded my of a Chopped Challenge, only I had to guess the ingredients. I think they pan fried mashed potatoes with crunchy peppers and onion and either cheese or maybe cream. It actually tasted good, but it was mush. If they shredded the potatoes and then added cooked veggies with cheese, I feel the outcome would’ve been better.
The awesome thing was, my partner’s gluten allergy wasn’t triggered in the slightest. No issues with the BBQ sauce at all. If we need food in a pinch, we’d go back, but there’s no reason to go out of our way.