Restaurant information:

Hours: Open 7 days a week for lunch, Friday and Saturday evenings from 5-9
Location: 801 Jerry Clower Boulevard, Yazoo City, MS 39194
Phone: 662.716.7100

For after-hours questions, reservations or orders please contact Leslie at 601.906.4844. The restaurant is available for private parties and functions.

 

 

 

History of Ubons

 

Ubon's BBQ sauce has been a Roark family tradition for at least five generations. Monnie and Lute Roark, in Southeast Missouri, first made the sauce. Lute was a farmer and at least once a year Lute would cook a side of beef or a hog and invite friends and family for the Roark Annual BBQ. Such a big occasion required a lot of BBQ sauce. Lute would mix the sauce up in a No. 3 wash tub and stir it up with a boat paddle. Chances are it was the same paddle he used to fish with the day before. Monnie condensed the recipe to use for family dinners. Most of the family fondly remembers the BBQ meatballs she served for Sunday dinner. The recipe was passed on to their son Ubon.

After moving to Yazoo City, MS, Ubon was best known for his outstanding BBQ chicken. Easter Sunday kicked off the BBQ season at the Roark house. All you had to do in Yazoo was mention BBQ to a few friends and family and the house would be full when the BBQ day came. Ubon's oldest son Garry was drawn very early in life to the art of BBQ. Before Ubon died in 1980, he passed on the sacred recipe to Garry. When Garry's friends and family found out he was making up what they called "Ubon's sauce", they would ask him to make them a quart or gallon. The last time Garry made the sauce at home in his kitchen, he made 28 gallons. His wife Elaine said, "enough is enough" and banned him from making such a mess in her kitchen. He had to find another place to produce his wonderful concoction.

Garry had often talked of mass producing the sauce. He didn't want to be sitting in the rocker on his front porch in his old age talking about how he wished he had just tried to make a go at marketing the sauce. Now was the time to step out and see if the Ubon's sauce was really as good as the Roark family thought. Thus was born Roark Packing Company and the production of Ubon's Dipping BBQ Sauce. The first labels were simple hand drawn paper labels that were glued to the bottle. Then a friend of Garry's helped design a label that Garry's girls called the "chicken label". A lot of time and research went into just getting the label ready to go. The production crew consisted of Garry, his wife and daughters Leslie and Jennifer. When Garry later discovered that Leslie had labeled her bottles upside down, they decided the best thing for the girls to do was to just sit and talk and keep Daddy company while he worked.

In 2004 Garry opened his restaurant “Ubon’s” in Yazoo City MS. He along with his daughter Leslie continue the Roark family barbeque tradition.

Ubon’s Restaurant has had visitors from all over the world. We have thousands of autographs from friends from California to New York, from Japan to Iceland, from Africa to London.