Our first full KCBS event this year left us thirsty for more competition by teasing us with a 3rd place finish. With two more back to back competitions coming up in the next two weeks, we’ll get to see if we simply had a lucky opening day or if we are still cooking as consistently as we were at the end of 2012.
Although we left last season with a Reserve Grand Champion finish, we made some pretty significant changes this year to most of our recipes. Primarily, we were not happy with the rub we had been using. Granted, the rub is only part of the equation, but it is still an important part to us. Thanks to our Dizzy Pig sponsorship, we are now very happy with our flavors and getting far better color on our meats than we were last year. Thanks Dizzy Pig!
We also made the decision in the off season to expand our cooking space. We invested in our 7th … yes 7th, big green egg, and most recently added a BBQ Guru Onyx Oven to the collection. Having another egg allows us to cook each meat separately which some would say is too much work, but with green eggs managing four or five fires is not that difficult (if you are doing the math we can now leave two smaller eggs at home)! The Onyx is too new for us to really know the best way for us to use it, but we will be slowly working it more and more into our cooking schedule.
So the results … First place chicken! We had a good chicken cook and tweaked our presentation which the judges seem to really enjoy. Our ribs came in 6th. It was a pleasant surprise that they made top ten, so we were happy to hear our name twice in a row at awards. Then came a second place pork call! It will be exciting to see if our pork can keep scoring well. We broke the unwritten rule about making more than one change at a time to any category in order to keep track of how the change affects your scores. This year we changed it all because we were bored with our pork. We came to Naptown with new rub, new injection, new cooking technique, even a new box design, and at least this time it payed off. Brisket was the category that sank us, we ended up 24th and were not all too surprised. Of course we tried something new here too, but rest assured, we are going back to our mildly successful 2012 recipe for the next few competitions.
We cannot complain about our 3rd place overall finish. Jacked Up BBQ took Grand Champion and 3 Eyz BBQ took reserve. These guys are some of the best, so hats off to both teams for another great day of cooking. We are already packing to head to the BBQ Jamboree in Fredericksburg, VA next weekend, and then the Middletown BBQ Cookoff in Delaware the weekend after. Hoping we see some consistency throughout these competitions.
Superb showing!!
Sorry I had to drop out of judging at Fredericksburg. I was really looking forward to that event and also reaquainting with y’all.
I will see you at Swinetastic in June.
Congrats again on your great finish!!
Hi Scott. Always good to hear from you, sorry the circumstances are what they are but I’m sure we’ll cross paths again soon. We are always looking forward to Frederick.
Not that you need my approval, but I am really proud of you guys. Talk about making a plan and executing it! And I know I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again: that door is about to be busted down bigtime. Just keep doing exactly what you’re doing now and I guarantee you 100% we will be celebrating “you know what” real soon. And when you do I have a special gift to share. You’ll find out when the day arrives. And sorry, it’s not the secret of great competititon pork. That’s kind of what I am hoping to receive myself someday……
And finally, I want to thank you for admitting you have seven BGEs and an Onyx. It makes my future capital equipment acquisitions easier to sell to Sharon. All I have to say is “but, but, Joel and Erin have EIGHT cookers!!”
Your approval is always good to have Kit!!! If nothing else, we should get credit for a relentless effort! Maybe we can set a record for consecutive years without a grand! Always appreciate your kind words, sorry we didn’t get to chat much last weekend, we were kind if in a vacuum in our camp plus we had visitors. We’ll certainly have a cold one at the Jamboree this weekend. Let me know if I need to get another cooker so you can tell Sharon that we have Nine!!
You guys rocked it, see in Fredericksburg!