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pieces of beef, fowl, fish, or the like, roasted over an open hearth, especially when basted in a barbecue sauce.
a framework, as a grill or a spit, or a fireplace for cooking meat or vegetables over an open fire.
a dressed steer, lamb, or other animal, roasted whole.
a meal, usually in the open air and often as a political or social gathering, at which meats are roasted over an open hearth or pit.
to broil or roast whole or in large pieces over an open fire, on a spit or grill, often seasoning with vinegar, spices, salt, and pepper.
to cook (sliced or diced meat or fish) in a highly seasoned sauce.
to cook by barbecuing or to entertain at a barbecue:
If the weather’s nice, we’ll barbecue in the backyard.
Contemporary Examples

You know the Korean-style barbecue that you wrap in lettuce leaves to eat?
Chang-rae Lee: How I Write Noah Charney January 21, 2014

For better or worse, I chose men over meat, and suffered, for 15 years, whenever I smelled bacon or barbecue.
Women Who Eat Meat Laura Fraser April 1, 2009

To say the least: each year Deeley hosts a Fourth of July barbecue at her home for current and former Dance contestants.
Why Is It So Hard to Be a Reality-TV Host? Kevin Fallon April 24, 2013

The sifter dumped flotsam—bricks, wiring, barbecue grills, bicycle wheels—in piles to be shipped to landfills upstate.
Superstorm Who? Sandy’s Hard-Hit Beach Towns Reopen for Business Eliza Shapiro, Josh Dzieza May 24, 2013

“He fell twice on a barbecue fork,” von Bulow told me some time ago.
The Getty Family Implosion Anthony Haden-Guest February 9, 2011

Historical Examples

Occasionally, very occasionally, where a wedding throng ran well into the hundreds, there was barbecue in addition to other meat.
Dishes & Beverages of the Old South Martha McCulloch Williams

I think it was the fellow that shot so well with the rifle at the barbecue––what was his name?
Whispering Smith Frank H. Spearman

He dug a pit just like a barbecue pit, and he would burn coals just like you was goin’ to barbecue.
Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves Work Projects Administration

He had instructed his black people to have a barbecue at their quarters.
The Kentucky Ranger Edward T. Curnick

By the time the next afternoon arrived, however, Joyce was far too much interested in something else to think of a barbecue.
The Gate of the Giant Scissors Annie Fellows Johnston

noun
a meal cooked out of doors over an open fire
an outdoor party or picnic at which barbecued food is served
a grill or fireplace used in barbecuing
the food so cooked
verb (transitive) -cues, -cuing, -cued
to cook (meat, fish, etc) on a grill, usually over charcoal and often with a highly seasoned sauce
to cook (meat, fish, etc) in a highly seasoned sauce
n.

1650s, “framework for grilling meat, fish, etc.,” from American Spanish barbacoa, from Arawakan (Haiti) barbakoa “framework of sticks,” the raised wooden structure the Indians used to either sleep on or cure meat. Sense of “outdoor meal of roasted meat or fish as a social entertainment” is from 1733; modern popular noun sense of “grill for cooking over an open fire” is from 1931.
v.

1660s, from barbecue (n.). Related: Barbecued; barbecuing.