When you go to a restaurant, which of these two should you order?

Barbecue is a noun that either can refer to suspending meat over burning coals on a wooden frame, (In any small Texas town, you probably can find a restaurant with a barbecue out back. ) or a get-together in which food is prepared this way (The Johnsons invited us to a barbecue on Friday night.).

It also can be a verb showing this way of cooking (John plans to barbecue pork.). It also can be used as an adjective describing the way a food was prepared (Max always ordered barbecue ribs when he went out to eat.).

Barbeque means the exact same things and can be used in the exact same ways. It’s merely a variant in spelling – of which there are several, including bar-b-cue, bar-b-que, and BBQ.

Barbecue is the most common spelling of the various versions, however. The variants typically are seem in advertisements and restaurant names.