Helen Turner is the most renowned female pitmaster in Tennessee and is one of the most decorated pitmasters in the nation. Turner has owned and operated Helen’s Bar-B-Q in Brownsville for over twenty-nine years and has mastered the art of smoking pork. Born and raised in Brownsville, a small town thirty miles west of Jackson, Turner is the daughter of a farmer and a homemaker and the oldest of ten children. Turner got her start working for Curly and Linda Spelling’s restaurant in the 1980s. After fifteen years she departed, and the business was sold. The new owner pleaded with Turner to return to make her special barbecue sauce recipe. Within a year, she took ownership of the restaurant and changed the name to Helen’s Bar-B-Q. The rest is history.
Her work routine was legendarily rigorous. After her husband lit the fire each morning before dawn, Turner stood working over strong flames in a shed behind the dining room, shoveling hickory and oak coals into the pit while cooking pork shoulders, ribs, and bologna. Her famous pork shoulders smoked for over 12 hours. In addition to tending the meat, Turner prepared the sandwiches and cooked the sides from scratch. She pulled and chopped the meat to order, making sure her regulars were taken care of. “No contemporary food figure better represents the state of Tennessee,” writes John T. Edge, of the Southern Foodways Alliance. “The smoke often billowed from her pit room, perfuming the air and clouding her eyes, but Helen Turner never flinched. She stood tall in that smoke. She recognized that customers worked as hard as she did. And she was determined to serve them the best barbecue sandwich she could, at a price they could afford.” Daily, Turner also made her secret barbecue sauce recipe. To this day, Turner has never shared the ingredients in her famous sauce.
It didn’t take long for word to get out that some of the best barbecue in the country was coming out of a small eatery in Brownsville, Tennessee. Helen’s quickly became a required stop on any barbecue pilgrimage. Accolades began pouring in from local and national publications. Helen’s Bar-B-Q was featured on ESPN, USA Today, Southern Living, A&E TV, Saveur, Eater Magazine, and countless newspapers. In 2012, the Southern Foodways Alliance (SFA) honored Turner with the Ruth Fertel Keeper of the Flame award which honors a foodways tradition bearer who has made significant contributions to Southern culinary arts. One year later, SFA crowned her the first-ever Queen of Barbecue. Turner has had two documentary films made about her, including TURNER: The Legenda, directed by Zaire Love, and “Helen Turner, Pitmaster” by Joe York. In 2022, Turner received SFA’s Lifetime Achievement Award, recognizing the indelible mark she has left on Southern culture and cuisine. Turner is one of five barbecue industry legends to be inducted into the 2025 Barbecue Hall of Fame.
Not only has Turner kept the near extinct tradition of pit barbecue alive in Tennessee, but she has also forged a path as a pitmaster that few women have traveled. In a business historically dominated by men, Turner owned and operated Helen’s Bar-B-Q for decades. “I had people come in, men pretty much, and say can’t no woman do this job,” she told USA Today in 2021. “But I done proved everybody wrong.” In 2023, Helen Turner closed Helen’s Bar-B-Q after almost thirty years of sweat, time, and dedication to her craft and customers. For those fortunate enough to have experienced Turner’s delicious fare and for those who wish they had, she remains a living legend and the reigning Queen of Barbecue.
