I think Man Vs. Food or some similar Travel Channel show found an amazing pulled pork place in Raleigh. Worth checking their website.
Correct. The name of the joint is "The Pit." I've never been there, but I will say this: I visited one of the places featured on Man v. Food's Tampa episode, a place called Skippers Smokehouse. Adam Richman raved about the smoked gator ribs. We did not especially enjoy the visit. The fried gator tail appetizer was very good, but the gator ribs were very tough and chewy to the point where Ms1995hoo gave up on hers and got more of the gator tail instead. The place also was not air-conditioned. Struck me as a good place to go for live music, but not so much a good place to go for summertime lunch! That experience kind of made me a bit wary of going to places featured on Man v. Food UNLESS I first go online and seek out reviews of the restaurants.
I spent a lot more time in Durham and Chapel Hill than I did in Raleigh during my three years living in that area. Recognizing it's been 15 years this year since I graduated from Duke, my favorite places in Durham were (a) a dump of a seafood place called Fishmongers located on Main Street near Brightleaf Square east of Duke's East Campus; (b) an Irish pub called the James Joyce located in the same general area; and (c) a local pub named Devine's located midway between the other two places (the burgers at Devine's were really good). All three were still there as of two years ago.
In Raleigh my favorite place was actually a fast-food joint, a small chain called Char-Grill. The place is a bit of a local institution. There's one near NC State. The one I frequented is on Atlantic Avenue north of the city (I worked around the corner from there the summer of 1996).