When Don called and asked us if we’d cook at the first annual Cozy Fest in Mt. Airy, MD we did not hesitate to say yes. For several years we have raved about his ability to host a great eggfest. He has a knack for creating the perfect environment for eggheads to show off their recipes and allows them to interact with everyone that gets to taste the food. Cozy Fest was a hit for a first year eggfest and the venue has lots of room to grow for future events. As promised, we are posting all the recipes we used this weekend, enjoy!
Charring the salsa ingredients
Grilled Pineapple Salsa
1 head pineapple, cored
1 T finely diced red onion (or to taste)
1 bunch cilantro
2 fresh jalapeños
2 fresh poblano peppers
Dizzy Pig Jamaican Firewalk seasoning
Slice around pineapple core, then cut into slices or wedges. Liberally apply Dizzy Pig Jamaican Firewalk seasoning, and grill direct over high heat. Remove when grill marks form and pineapple softens a little. Add jalapeños and poblanos or any other pepper you prefer to the grate. Remove when charred all over. Let the peppers rest until they are cool enough to handle, then rub the charred, papery layer of skin until it is removed; finely dice. Dice the grilled pineapple into small cubes. Add diced pineapple, peppers, onion, and chopped cilantro in bowl, mixing until combined well. Add salt and pepper if needed, to taste.
Shown as a slider, also served as meatballs at Cozy Fest.
Curry-ish Meatballs
4 lbs hamburger meat (can substitute ground turkey or lamb)
4 T Dizzy Pig Curry-ish seasoning (to taste)
¼ C finely diced onion
¼ C crumbled feta cheese
1 small package frozen kale (thawed and liquid squeezed out)
Add all ingredients to large bowl and mix with hands until combined; be careful to not over-mix or the meat will become tough. Roll into 2” balls and add to hot grill. Cook direct over hot coals until internal temperature reaches 140 degrees, or approximately 7-10 minutes. Move each ball to ensure even cooking as needed. Top with tzatziki, sriracha mayo, or condiment of choice. We used store-bought tzatziki from Costco, but it is very simple to make at home as well.
Tips: When making a recipe like this, we usually make a very small patty that we cook first to taste and make sure our seasonings are where we want them. If they are not, we can add more to taste. This recipe can also be used to make patties for burgers or sliders.
Dump Cake
1 package cake mix of choice
2 cans pie filling or canned fruit in heavy syrup
1 stick melted butter
Add fruit of choice to bottom of cake pan or dutch oven. Sprinkle cake mix on top of fruit, then pour melted butter on top of cake mix. Cook on grill or oven at 350-375 degrees until the top browns a little and the edges are bubbly. This can take 30-60 minutes, just keep an eye on it after the first 30 minutes, checking every 15 minutes after that.
For this Eggfest, we used confetti cake mix with strawberry pie filling for one cake, and canned peaches with about a cup of thawed blueberries and butter cake mix for the other.
Thank you Dizzy Pig for helping us take home a 5th place overall at Harrisonburg.
“Maybe we should add Blue Ridge even though that would make it four weekends in a row.” That was the discussion we were having as we pulled out of the Sam’s club parking lot after a less than stellar performance. Experienced teams will tell you, although it seems like an unbearable amount of time and effort, it’s almost easier to just keep cooking every weekend because you get into a rhythm that makes everything run more smoothly. We have done three in a row more than once, but never four in a row. After some discussion, we decided to give it a shot. Although we were in a ‘rhythm’ of cooking, a variety of factors made this weekend anything but normal for us.
We signed up only days prior to the event, and I was out of town up until Thursday evening, so we were already out of our routine by having to pack late Thursday night not having trimmed any meat at all. We arrived early Friday to the fairgrounds and had our choice of spots to set up the battle wagon. We chose the nice grassy spot with easy access to electricity and water. The rain was still coming down but appeared to be letting up. We were happy to see our friends from Old Virginia Smoke setting up right next to us as the final rain shower kicked up, then got heavier, and heavier … and heavier. Next thing we knew, water was building around us and then we saw the dreaded flash flood forming. It was moving slowly, but steadily towards the battle wagon. The drainage ditch didn’t have a chance at handling that volume of water and I scrambled to ensure the eggs were off the deck in case it sank into the ground, and I managed to get our electrical cord a foot above ground just in time. 30 seconds later, our grassy spot had been consumed by water carrying all sorts of debris. Thankfully, the rain subsided and the water actually drained off completely within a couple of hours. We did have to wade through some water to help move the Old Virginia Smoke camp to high ground, I ‘m guessing Lucas will add water wings to his packing list after this. Hopefully this was not a sign of how the rest of the weekend would go.
Our nice grassy spot instantly became waterfront property. Taken from the porch of our trailer.
With our new water front property drying up, I rolled the eggs back onto the deck and started prepping them for cooking. The first one I opened was our rib cooker and I found that our plate setter had broken into many small pieces. This is the key piece that allows us to cook indirectly vs. grilling right over the coals and isn’t something we that we keep as a spare part. We decided to wrap a cookie sheet in foil and hope that it was enough to keep direct heat off of our ribs. I finally started trimming meat around 3 pm and couldn’t help but to feel really behind. Between meat trimming and injecting and the cooking we did for Erin’s work function the following Monday, we were busy right up until 9 pm which is usually when we are trying to take a quick nap prior to cooking.
A broken XL Plate Setter … Time to improvise!
The actual cook went well. There were no surprises and our jerry-rigged rib cooker seemed to be working just fine. We did discover that our ribs came out a little darker than they normally do, which may or may not have been due to the slight change in our set up. They weren’t overdone, just dark. By the time we turned everything in, we felt fairly confident in all categories and knew that regardless, it was in the judges hands. We had made a prior agreement with Old Virginia Smoke to taste each others brisket after turn ins. We both complimented the other on what seemed like a really good brisket cook. Lucas told us he felt we would get second or third and we said they were right there with us.
Luckily everything dried up within hours and it turned into a beautiful weekend for cooking.
At awards they only called the top five in each category so we were not sure how we were doing because we didn’t hear our name for a while. Finally when they got to brisket they called Old Virginia Smoke for 5th place … Then we got our brisket call, 4th place! His forecast was slightly off, but we got a kick out of the fact that we felt our brisket tasted similar and then we placed side by side. We ended up getting three top ten places and 5th place out of 28 overall. 9th place chicken, 21st place ribs, 9th place pork and 4th place brisket. Not a bad finish for us in Virginia. We do our best to remain objective and unbiased about the judging because it is out of our control. We must bite our tongues after this competition because it would be very easy to say, based on the information on the score sheets, that there seemed to be some issues with one of the tables of judges and with ensuring some teams didn’t have their food landing on the same table more than once. But, like I said, it’s old news and out of our control. 5th place overall is one of our better finishes in the state of VA so we will take it! Congrats to the Fire Fighting BBQ Team for RGC and hats off to Hollywood N Swine for their first ever Grand Champion. We all know you have put in more than your share of blood sweat and tears over the years and it was good to see you holding the trophies!
Overall, we had a good weekend in the beautiful Virginia countryside with good friends. We certainly laughed a lot and we were blessed with the opportunity to try the “best cheese fries” which interestingly enough have been hiding from us at the Sheetz gas station. It was a memorable weekend to say the least.
With Tracy’s Landing cancelled this year, we will spend a rare weekend at home over the Labor Day holiday. Most likely we will be doing a practice cook or two in hopes of really dialing in our ribs and pork for the remainder of the season. Next stop, West Virginia!
Finally! We are back to getting some rib calls!
“I think I found our trailer” was all I heard as Erin rushed into the door over the 4th of July weekend. It’s no secret that we have been jealous of everyone with a dedicated competition trailer, and many people have heard us complain about not being able to store our RV at our house which has been a point of frustration for us for a very long time. We had a dream list of what we wanted in a custom trailer and we had not been able to find one that met all our needs to include being built on a compact 20 foot frame. This new find had nearly everything we wanted, it was used which meant it was about 1/2 the price of having one made. After many discussions, phone calls and Facebook messages, we were headed to pick up our new trailer ……… In Louisiana! It was well worth a three day round trip of doing nothing but driving. Now we have a trailer, it’s time to get back to the competitions!
All set up for our very first cook with the new battle wagon.
We have been told for years, “You have to compete in Louisa, it’s beautiful down there.” We finally made it there this year and it was beautiful, but man was it HOT! Note the photo of the thermometer, yep, that’s 118 degrees. We decided not to take the new trailer with us because we would have had only a few days to make the transition from the RV; so we were cooking in the sun as we have for the past few years. The ‘Virginia curse’ was still with us as we finished 19th overall out of 45 teams. We have yet to figure out why judges don’t like us in VA, but we will keep trying. Our category results were: Chicken – 22nd, Ribs – 23rd, Pork – 27th, Brisket – 7th. We were happy to get that brisket call otherwise it would have been another day of just watching everyone else get awards! Congrats to 3 Eyz for taking the grand and a special congrats to Pavone Brother’s BBQ on their first ever reserve grand champion placing!
Look closely, yep, that says 118 Degrees!
With our new ‘battle wagon’ prepped, the next weekend we headed down to southern Maryland to the beautiful St. Mary’s area. This was the first ever competition down there, but it won’t be the last. It wasn’t a full KCBS event, it was only a chicken and ribs competition, and that was the perfect time to break in the battle wagon. Mike did a fantastic job of organizing this and with plans for making it a full sanctioned KCBS competition in 2014, he’s certainly on the right track! We learned a lot about the battle wagon and were able to iron out the minor nuances of our cooking process while getting a couple calls and a 4th place overall out of a field of tough competitors.
Tending to the ribs at St Mary’s Chicken and Ribs cookoff.
Our first full KCBS competition with the battle wagon was in Bel Air, MD. We have never competed in Bel Air although it has existed for 12 years now. We signed up soon after we acquired the new trailer knowing that Bel Air was infamous for cramming teams into small spaces. The new trailer allowed us to pull in and occupy a minimal amount of space and we were excited to see how we handled cooking all four categories with our new set up. They placed us next to our sponsor, Dizzy Pig, and 3 Eyz so we knew we were amongst some seriously competitive teams. Things went well for us and we were thrilled to get a call in both chicken and brisket and to end up 3rd out of 60 teams! Congrats to 4:20 for their GC and to Firefighting BBQ Team for their RGC.
Showing the hardware after finishing 3rd out of 60 at Bel Air.
We went into week three of consecutive weekends of cooking by competing in the Sam’s Club National BBQ tour in Laurel, MD. Sam’s Club has a limit of 30 teams for the local events, then the top six from the local events move onto a regional event, then the Finale. Because of this bracket style set up and the high dollar pay out, it’s a popular event attracting the best of the best to compete with many left hanging on the wait list hoping for a chance to show their skills. We were able to get in as one of the 30 teams and the battle wagon proved again that it has really increased our efficiency. The cook went off without any real headaches, and after turn ins, we were packed and ready to drive away by awards time. Although we got two top ten calls in both chicken and ribs, that was not enough to get us into that top six that moved on to the regional competition. We still felt good about our scores and knew that we were cooking well, which left us eager for another competition. Congrats to the BBQ Guru for their GC and to Aporkalypse Now on their RGC. Hopefully we can put the battle wagon to good use as we move into the fall season and wrap up 2013 with some nice trophies and top finishes.
We held our own at Middletown and managed to walk away with a top ten overall finish; however, our performance wasn’t really one to brag about.
We always enjoy competing at Middletown. Mose does a great job coordinating the event. We commented when we pulled in on Thursday evening that this was one of the few events where we have zero questions when we arrive. We knew where to set up, where everything was located, how to reach key people, etc. Great job Mose.
Always a beautiful skyline from our Delaware cook site.
On to the cooking! Our routine has not changed all year and this weekend was no different. We were right on schedule with every category. When it came time for boxing and turn in, Erin was just about to place the last piece of chicken into the container when she noticed the bottom was charred, ok, burnt. Evidently a grate got too hot while our sauce was setting and it burned on the bottom. Luckily we always turn in at the beginning of our ten minute turn in window and this is exactly why. We decided to empty and rebuild the box. The couple of pieces that were charred were removed, the box was rebuilt, and easily turned in on time. Had Erin not caught this, our chicken scores certainly would have suffered, instead we came in 8th place. Our ribs were a little flat, nothing too exciting and our scores showed it with a disappointing 22nd place. Based on our recent rib failures, we may look at a small change in this category. Pork has done well for us so far this year and the look on Erin’s face prior to boxing it told me that the streak was about to come to an end. We discussed our pork as we tasted various parts and the parts that usually go into the box were not up to our standard. The box did come together although it didn’t have quit as much meat in it as normal. Erin’s boxing skill helped us pull off a 3rd place and considering the fact that it was a near disaster, we were pleased. Brisket did not go well for us, and the judges were being kind by giving us 34th place. Along with ribs, brisket has been a consistent problem area this season. We’ve already made a change for Swinetastic in June, so we’ll see if we can get our brisket scores up to where they were last year.
Cosmo is always showing support and being a team player.
Although we were top ten, we feel like it was a middle of the pack cook for us because our lows were really low. We have already brainstormed what needs to change before we head to Frederick, MD in mid June. This competition is full of 65 powerful teams, so we will have to work hard and have a near perfect cook if we want to hear peppermonkeybbq get called during awards.
Reserve Grand Champions at the 2012 Keystone Classic
We ended the 2013 season on a high note by placing 2nd out of 58 teams at this year’s Keystone Classic. Keystone is probably one of our favorite competitions that we regularly attend. The staff and organizers are wonderful and very responsive to anything anyone needs. There is always plenty of room for every team and the competition keeps growing and growing. We would not be surprised to see 70 teams at this one in 2014.
The weekend started out a little shaky for us. On our way up to Harrisburg, PA, we almost had an incident just outside of Baltimore. Traffic came to an instant stop as we were cruising along and I had to get on the breaks so hard our trailer tires actually locked up and started squealing. I didn’t even look at the cars in front of us, I was watching our Green Eggs in the rear view mirror praying they wouldn’t come hurtling out of their straps, and flying into the truck. Luckily they held on and we have managed to avoid an incident with our fragile eggs over three years of competing.
The amazing meatballs that never made it to the judging table.
The Keystone Classic has many ancillary categories in addition to the main four KCBS categories. Overall we did eight different turn ins this weekend. It’s common for teams to not partake in the extra categories as it can be a distraction from the main event, but we enjoy cooking so much that we always like to try our hands at something new and see what the judges think of our experiments. Friday night was ground beef and bologna. Erin created a killer meatball recipe which was served with a wonderful pasta. Unfortunately, for the first time ever, we missed our turn in window. There is always a ten minute window when everything has to arrive at the judges tent, and if you are one second late, they won’t accept it and you have to take the walk of shame back to your camp holding your completed dish. We were very frustrated because we have never missed a turn in. In this case we pushed it to the limit, and that ended up being about ten seconds too late. The neighbors enjoyed it, and we all of the sudden had plenty to eat for dinner, but we learned a lesson and luckily it wasn’t one of the important KCBS turn ins. We don’t know anything about cooking bologna; our bologna turn in was basically a cuban sandwich and we replaced the ham with smoked bologna. We liked it, the judges seemed to think there were better turn-ins than ours! On Saturday we turned in the people’s choice chicken legs and also a dessert. We didn’t win the coveted “Leg lamp” that the best legs teams receives, but we did get second place with our pumpkin spiced creme brulee. We were given three eggs and told the only rules were to use the three eggs in a dessert. My favorite dessert is creme brulee so this was a no brainer. Luckily the judges liked it too.
2nd place dessert!
This was our second reserve grand champion finish, we have yet to catch the elusive grand champion, but we got within three points of it this weekend. We heard our name on the first call of the day for the official KCBS categories, 10th place in chicken. This was a surprise to us as we nearly avoided a chicken disaster this weekend. That was followed by a 3rd place call in ribs; we were hoping they’d be top ten because they cooked well. We were surprised by an 8th place call in pork. We knew our brisket was good, and were hoping for a top ten place there as well. That would mean a call in all four categories which is pretty rare for us, the only other time being our other RGC in Tracey’s Landing. Our brisket ended up being 4th place. With four top ten calls we knew we had basically hit four home runs. Unfortunately for us, Black Cat BBQ hit two grand slams by getting 1st place in both chicken and ribs. They edged us out by three points for the well deserved grand champion trophy. Congrats to Jen and Jack for an impressive victory!
We used our new Green Egg to cook our chicken this weekend. We had practiced at home and our regular cooking technique seemed to work just fine so that’s what we went with. 45 minutes into the cook we took the temperature of the chicken and knew we were slightly behind schedule. No worries, we cranked up the heat a little and let them cook. The second time we checked, we were still behind, no worries, crank up the heat some more. The third check was getting close to the time where they had to come out, and they were safe to eat … barely, and far from the desired temp we wanted to achieve. Now there were worries, and we really cranked up the heat! We pulled them off the smoker at the very last minute and the last time I checked I was cooking them at 370 degrees, about a 100 degrees more than we normally would! We were surprised when we tried a piece and actually really liked the texture. Unfortunately by cranking up the heat, we ended up with a little more smoke coming out of the egg than we would like, and chicken is like a smoke sponge. It was more smoky than we prefer, so we were actually very happy to get a 10th place call after such a non-standard cook. I guess chicken on the new Egg will require a little more practice.
The other three categories were fairly uneventful. Everything went as scheduled and we were able to take a few deep breaths and relax after our near disaster with the chicken. We had plenty of good ribs to fill the box, our pork was very juicy and flavorful, and our brisket was on point as it has been most of the season. We felt pretty good after we were done turning everything in, but had no idea if we had done well enough to get 2nd place.
We had a great time as always seeing old friends and competing in our last KCBS competition of the year. We are already looking forward to next year and will be practicing much more this winter than we did last winter. We are so close to getting first place, we need to focus on perfecting every detail in order to push us over the edge. Hopefully our neighbors and co-workers won’t be too sick of eating BBQ by next spring!
Cooking at dawn inside the Shenandoah Speedway
We did a better job this year at planning our competitions ahead of time than we have in the past, but there is always room to be impulsed! After learning that Smoketoberfest had to be cancelled, we were kind of bummed that we only had one competition remaining this season. We started shopping around for one more competition in September and before we knew it, we were pulling our gear through the Shenandoah Valley to compete in Smokin on the Track. This was a first time event and Carey and his crew did a pretty impressive job overall. There were a low number of teams competing, but there was still plenty of good competition! Congrats to Kit of Deguello BBQ and Mike of Aporkalypse Now for their first and second place finishes respectively.
We were the first team to pull into the middle of the raceway Thursday afternoon and got our choice of spots. Carey already had everything laid out. Spots were marked off, electrical drops were in place and load tested, and water was available for each site. After we got set up we enjoyed the cool evening as we sat around a fire and reviewed our notes for the weekend. We have gotten to the point where little review is needed because we are cooking the same every weekend. Because this was a small comp and there wasn’t a whole lot at stake for us, we decided to break the unwritten rule of competition BBQ and do many different experiments, some untested, all at once. We used a different rub on our pork, we used a different rub on our ribs, we modified our injection for the pork, and we cooked a brisket from a new source which we had never used. The good news is it all came out pretty darn good!
We were already busy cooking friday. We offered to assist the Air Force Sergeant’s Association by cooking up about 30 lbs of pulled pork and 20 lbs of pulled chicken for an event they were having at Andrews Air Force Base. We did the pork ahead of time and froze it and decided to do the chicken Friday night and put it in the RV freezer. We also threw on some chops and baked potatoes for dinner, then retired early in preparation for the competition.
Cooking up some yard bird for the Air Force Sergeants Association
Our experimental brisket was smaller than those that we normally cook. We did our best guess at the timing adjustment and were happy when it finished on time, or so we thought. There was something mysterious about our overall cook this weekend. We did four butts and one brisket and everything seemed like it needed to cook to a higher temperature than normal to give us the texture we were looking for. Our brisket and butts reached our initial target temperature on time. Normally we pull them within one or two degrees of this temp depending on the feel of the meat. Our brisket had to go almost ten degrees higher than normal before we were happy with how it felt, and the butts had to do the same. This was the first time this had happened all year, but we knew it was more important to go by feel than by some pre-conceived number on a thermometer, so that’s what we did. Our brisket ended up getting us third and our pork came in fourth, so clearly we did the right thing by ignoring the fact that our thermometer said the meat was done!
Our chicken came in 8th but our ribs were not so good. No call on ribs as we came in 12th in this category. The ribs also were not quite as tender as we like them when we normally would take them off, so we continued cooking them until it time to slice them … we needed 15 more minutes! We used the best rack we had, but knew they were going to hurt our overall score. We ended up with a 4th place overall, which wasn’t too bad considering the strange cooking time/temps we encountered as well as all of the experiments we were trying. We had a great time and the weather held out all weekend which was a nice change compared to the last few competitions we’ve done. We cooked next to a new team, Life is Good but BBQ is Better. They heard their named called right away at the awards ceremony and that was exciting. Good work for your first comp! We also got to know the crew of Late Empire BBQ at little more. These guys pulled off a 9th place overall with probably the least amount of equipment of any team at the competition … Well done! We’ve determined that if this team sticks with it, we are going to be watching them cross the stage a lot more in 2013.
The people’s choice for this competition is worth mentioning here. We can honestly say, although it was truly an experience, this was the first competition where we have decided that if they don’t make some changes, we will not be doing people’s choice next year! We went through the health inspection and had the proper forms on file with no problems. We planned on having three extra pork butts to pull and serve for people’s choice; usually that is more than enough. Unfortunately the schedule had people’s choice starting at 1:30, which is exactly the middle of the brisket turn in window. Trust us, the public does not understand when you tell them you are busy and they have to wait for three more minutes. After turning in our brisket, we scrambled to make our camp presentable and within 5 minutes, we had a line of people waiting for samples that was so long, we couldn’t even see where it ended. We handed out 1 oz cups stuffed with pork at record pace and went through about 25 lbs of pork in less than half an hour. We had four racks of ribs in the warmer, so we started handing out ribs … gone within minutes … chicken thighs …. gone within minutes. We gave out every ounce of meat we had cooked all day in less than an hour and the line was still long when we had to close up shop … sorry Shenandoah, but we had no idea there would be so many people lining up for samples! All that work and we only got 4th place in people’s choice! We couldn’t help but notice that the top teams in the competition got the least people’s choice votes; and the lower scoring teams in the competition rocked people’s choice … interesting.
The people’s choice line started like this … and never went away!
Erin happened to check Craig’s List postings for used Big Green Eggs while we were traveling home and discovered a used Egg living less than an hour from our house. Our normal conversation on the way home from a competition revolves around our desire to have a little more cooking space, so we were excited about the idea of having another Egg. After contacting the owner, we decided to take advantage of the good deal. We unloaded the truck and headed out to pick up our ‘new’ Egg. It turned out that there were mistakes in the ad and the Egg was not quit what was advertised. After some negotiating, we still came home with our 5th Big Green Egg and after a few evenings of TLC and many new parts, it has now worthy of being our new chicken cooker for our next and final competition!
The newest member of our family!
We only have one more competition left this year. On Oct 4th we will be on our way up to Harrisburg, PA, for the Keystone Classic. We really like this competition and this year they have already maxed out their alloted number of teams (over 50) with a waiting list of others hoping to still get in. We’re hoping to end the season on a high note, so we’re hoping to hear our name in Harrisburg!
The beautiful sky after the storms cleared out.
Pickin in the Panhandle 2012 brought 43 skilled competition teams into Hedgesville, WV, all hoping for a shot at the Jack Daniel’s invitational. The invite automatically comes with the grand champion trophy at this competition because it is the only KCBS sanctioned competition in WV. We knew, like always, that because of the chance to get to ‘The Jack” that there would be a good mix of skilled teams competing. Looking to the left of our camp we saw three teams: Pellet Envy, Cool Smoke, and Hambones by the Fire; maybe “skilled teams” was an understatement.
The BBQ was smelling so good Cosmo couldn't stop drooling.
The weekend started off very hot and humid. We were very happy to have our air-conditioned (and waterproof) RV. We arrived with our meat already trimmed, but we had two ancillary categories (anything meat and dessert) that we had not even practiced, so we spent Friday doing food prep and finalizing the recipes for the extra categories. Erin was prepared with some good ideas that were quickly revised into plans B and C. Saturday rolled around and everything was right on schedule. We knew that there was rain on the horizon and possibly even severe storms. As turn in time approached the rain closed in. We were able to walk chicken while it was still dry, but once the ribs came off, Erin checked the radar one more time and all I remember hearing was, “There is a red cell coming!” We looked at six beautiful racks of ribs that had just come off the smoker and knew outside was not the place to be. Within minutes we moved our operation inside. The rain started just after noon and I stepped outside to make sure everything was waterproof. I barely made it out the door and everything started shaking from the wind. I saw our 10’x10′ canopy raising off the ground and was able to grab hold of it, but the 50 mph force was enough to pull me off the ground with it. By the time I landed, two of the legs had folded and I wasn’t far from becoming a human kite. Erin came out to assist and during the downpour we were able to pull the walls down and lay the 10’x10′ on the ground. Ribs had to be cut in four minutes, so we headed back inside soaked to the bone. High winds and rain seem to be a common scenario that has played itself out at almost every competition this year, except this time we lost some equipment AND it happened right in the middle of turn in time.
The aftermath. If you look close there are broken canopy legs, a torn tarp, and everything is soaked.
Back inside we were able to towel off and focus on the ribs with only a few minutes until turn-in. Our ribs looked and tasted really good this week. I told Erin on Thursday, after I trimmed the ribs, that it was going to be a good rib week. After we built the turn in box, my feelings had not changed. Pork and brisket were both decent, but we weren’t sure if there was enough wow factor to win over a table of judges. After turning in our brisket we weren’t done yet. We still had to turn in our ancillary categories. Finally at 2:30 we were done with turn ins. Still soaking wet, we sat down in our wet chairs and had a beer. It had been a long day and dealing with cleaning up from the aftermath of the storm was not a motivating thought.
Our chili cups came in 3rd, but that didn't even earn us a ribbon!
After all that work we only heard our name once at the awards ceremony, it was for the ribs which we knew were top ten ribs. We ended up with 16th in chicken, 8th in ribs, 23rd in pork, and 22nd in brisket for a 15th place overall. We had mentioned to a newer team just the day before that with the level of competition that comes to Pickin in the Panhandle, anything in the top 15 is a good accomplishment. I think deep down we were hoping for a little better, mostly because we had such a strong finish the week prior at Tracy’s Landing. We certainly won’t hang our heads for finishing 15th overall; however, we will be putting pressure on ourselves to do better at our last two competitions this year. Congrats to Tuffy of Cool Smoke for a very strong Grand Champion finish. Tuffy is having the type of year that we all dream of in the competition world.
We learned this week that Smoketoberfest had been cancelled due to circumstances beyond the organizer’s control. We decided we would still like to compete a couple more times this season, so we have added Smokin’ on the Track in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley to our schedule. This is the first year for this competition, so we are excited to see how things will be set up at the speedway. After that we will finish the season at the Keystone Classic in Harrisburg, PA. Hard to believe the 2012 season is almost behind us.
Our first ever reserve grand champion – and an awesome hand carved trophy to show for it!
This was a week of redemption for us. Just three weeks ago we were driving back from Pittsburgh trying to figure out what went wrong after completing our worst competition of the year. It is hard to look at your scores for your dead ass last pork and not want to make drastic changes, but we knew deep down we had to stick with the logical advice we’ve received from other successful teams all season long (Thank you Deguello, Dizzy Pig and 3Eyz). We knew our pork at Pittsburgh was not consistent with what we had cooked all year, and our very minor changes to our chicken seemed to have brough our chicken closer to the top than it had been in the last few competitions. So what did we do different at Tracy’s Landing? Answer: Nothing. We pushed our last competition out of our minds and focused on the task at hand. We had the added pressure of making sure we didn’t embarrass ourselves in our home town and in front of family because Erin’s dad and stepmother (Tom and Renee) flew into town from Florida just to see us compete. This was our first time cooking in front of family.
The Mullins’ and crew did a great job of organizing the event and getting everyone in position as early as Thursday night. They hosted a competition that really went smoothly from our perspective. Kudos to everyone that volunteered to support this Elks Lodge sponsored competition, we think it’ll be even bigger and better in 2013. We ended up setting up camp next to Big Bully BBQ, a team we had never met, but hope to cross paths with again. A great group of guys (and gals) who shared a few tastes of some delicious home made sauce in exchange for a few box building tips. Friday night the weather was warm and clear and after the eggs were set up we cooked a great salmon dinner for Tom and Renee and welcomed them to the neighborhood.
Erin saucing our chicken as her dad looks on hoping for a sample.
Saturday was the prep day because Tracy’s Landing is unique in having the actual competition on a Sunday (If you are taking votes Dave, we’d still like to see it happen on a Saturday)! We were happy with all our meats so prep was a non event. With all the dirty work done, we again cooked for the family and then settled in for a relaxing evening of storm watching and chatting over a few drinks with Dan from Drilling and Grilling. We always enjoy our conversations with Dan and appreciate his laid back attitude. Just before we called it a night we checked the weather radar just in time to throw on a t-shirt and get outside to hold down our 10 x 10 and our awning as a powerful storm cell passed directly over us. We, along with everything else, were completely soaked; luckily the rain doesn’t really affect the eggs, so all was well.
The big day arrived and it was business as usual. Chicken went as planned right down to the minute and within one degree of where we like to see it. Ribs came off on time and we had more than enough to choose from. Pork made us nervous only because we had dead ass last in the back of our minds, but it wasn’t talked about and we did the best we could. Brisket gave me a short moment of panic. As I started slicing, the flat turned out to be about 1/2″ thick from top to bottom. No worries at first, but after the fifth slice I still was staring at 1/2″ thick slices due to a rather large fat pocket in the middle of the flat. I stopped, we brain stormed an alternate plan just in case the slices never improved, then I started hacking away hoping I’d find a few good slices. It turned out that we were able to get just enough ‘normal’ slices out of the end of the flat. The mysterious fat pocket vanished and all looked good. In the end our box looked identical to every brisket box we’ve turned in all year.
Erin and her Dad walking the first box to turn in … Erin is hard on herself when it comes to boxing, so seeing a smile is a good sign!
The work wasn’t done after brisket turn in because it was time for peoples choice pork which was served up right at our cook site. Tom and Renee went out to pimp PepperMonkeyBBQ to the locals, and our friends Peter and Jane even stopped by to offer extra hands and serve up pork to the crowd. Our allotted cups sold out very quickly and we were feeling good about the samples we gave out. We truly could not have pulled that off without everyone’s help. It really turned out to be a group effort and we no know we could not have done that with just two of us. Thanks everyone!
Thanks to Tom and Renee as well as Peter and Jane for stepping in and helping us serve our pulled pork to the crowd.
So on to the results … We fell a few votes short of the peoples choice award, but we certainly gave them a run for their money. Congrats to Baby got Butt for winning over the crowd with their pork! Out of 47 very good teams, we managed to get 9th place in chicken, 8th place ribs, and 3rd place pork. We have never had 4 top ten calls in a competition so a brisket call didn’t seem likely; however, we walked for the fourth category in a row to pick up our 5th place brisket trophy. We now knew this was our best competition so far and when we didn’t hear our name called in the top ten rundown, I knew we either got 11th, or 2nd … thankfully we were called for the reserve grand champion, beat out by none other than the best team in the country, 3Eyz BBQ. Congrats 3Eyz, you have pulled off the impossible and then some, keep it going! Congrats to every other team who got to walk as well.
We were grateful for the opportunity to get this call. The organizers had two large, hand carved trophies for the RGC and GC and the GC got the choice of which one they wanted. Dan Hixon didn’t hesitate to offer us the first choice of trophies even though his team earned it. We have always considered 3Eyz a class act since we met them three years ago and they have been cheering us on at every competition. It’s likely that this was Dan’s way of congratulating us for finally getting close to the top. The truth is, which trophy we carried away was the least of our concerns, so hopefully 3Eyz is happy with the one we left for them!
Thanks to everyone who has encouraged us all year. Our hard work finally paid off and now we will see just how consistent we can remain. There are three competitions left and we will be putting pressure on ourselves to be successful. Our next challenge is fast approaching as we are packing up to compete in West Virginia this coming weekend.
After a call in pork and ribs, 3rd place brisket was our third call of the day. I'm sure the cheerleaders were sad that we didn't get called up for one final trophy!
This year in Frederick, Maryland, 69 teams showed up to compete for cash and trophies; making it our biggest competition of the year. We knew that with the quality of the teams competing, anything finishing in the top 15 was a good accomplishment. We had three categories in the top ten, and our chicken bombed for a third time straight since our 1st place finish in Annapolis. Damn you chicken … Damn you!
First things first, usually the end of our post is a congrats to the Grand Champion of an event, but it’s fitting to put that first this week. A very big contgrats for a well deserved victory to Deguello BBQ. Kit puts in countless hours of research and practice to improve his competition BBQ and it was obvious this week just how hard he has worked. A great rebound from what he deemed a “middle of the pack” performance in Delaware just a few weeks ago. Great job Deguello BBQ … we were cheering for you! We would also like to congratulate Tasty Licks BBQ for coming in a close second for the reserve Grand Champion position.
Our cook went as expected. We made very minor adjustments to our chicken, which we now know should have been MAJOR adjustments. Three consecutive finishes where we placed below 20th … we are going to revisit a few things before our next competition. Ribs, pork and brisket all gave us top ten calls with our brisket coming in 3rd making it three competitions in a row where our brisket made top 5. Yeah brisket! Booooo Chicken! We will work on bringing our chicken back up over the next few weeks.
Sal missed his chance for the best Smokin' Gnome mascot yet!
We’ve been taking our mutts with us the past few competitions and they are adjusting rather nicely to living in our trailer from time to time. Our Shih tzu, Cosmo, is alway curious and ended up under the trailer where our cookers are and got some grease drippings on his head. Our remedy was to make an impromptu foil hat for him … which ended up looking suspiciously like a real life yard gnome. This had us worried because Sal from Smokin’ Gnome BBQ was cooking just across the way from us. We decided that before we caught Sal stealing our real life gnome, we’d offer to trade him straight up for his inflatable gnome posted outside of his camp. Unfortunately for all of us, he wouldn’t take the bait so we still have our Shih tzu and Sal still has his gnome … our loss.
Happy Father's Day! Always celebrated with SPAM and eggs!
The Swinetastic BBQ competition happens to fall on fathers day weekend, and the proceeds for the event go to the American Cancer Society … So it’s only fitting in memory of my father, a former consultant for Hormel, that we always stay until Sunday and cook a family tradition of Spam and scrambled eggs for breakfast. You may think you don’t like Spam … or would never try Spam barring some natural disaster … but Spam and eggs is GOOD! Anyone staying Saturday night in 2013 can come over for breakfast Sunday morning!
Although we wanted to burn our chicken recipe, we promise it wasn't us who started the dumpster on fire!
We had fun as always at Swinetastic, but are looking forward to a few weeks off. We may revisit our chicken recipe, but Chris, we promise we didn’t burn our old recipe in your dumpster!!! Our weekends in July will undoubtedly be filled with practice cooks and the freezer will soon be packed with experimental chicken thighs … but that’s what makes ‘time off’ so much fun!
Even the scrap ribs were rather tasty!
With only 29 teams registered for the Showdown, the level of competition was surprisingly high. We did not have the best cook this week and we knew it even before the meat was off the smoker… but we did everything we could to give the judges the best we had available by turn in time. The results were 3rd place ribs and 3rd place brisket which helped carry our low scores from 19th place chicken and 20th place pork to an overall 7th place finish.
We tried to be organized this year and sat down with a calendar before the season started. We planned out each competition knowing we were going to have our busiest season yet. After a strong finish in Delaware a couple weeks ago, Jeremy from Seadog BBQ unintentionally talked us into adding one more and we ended up competing in the Beltway BBQ Showdown in Fort Washington, Maryland. Our original plan was to take the few weeks after Delaware to ensure we were 100% ready for the Swinetastic BBQ Festival in Frederick, MD on June 16th. After Jeremy mentioned there was still room at the Beltway, we changed our mind and decided maybe it was best to just keep in the rhythm of competing.
We pulled in early Friday morning to a very well laid out competitor area. Sites were clearly marked, water was easily accessible and each team had a power drop right in front of their site. Weather was going to be a factor Friday night, so we prepared accordingly … At least as much as you can for a tornado. As the weather warnings went off, all we could do is watch as the clouds began to spin and drop to the ground a mile away from us. Although they claimed there was a tornado in the same county, we never saw a full funnel cloud hit the ground … but it was close enough for us!
PLEASE don't become a tornado … PLEASE! … Or is it already?
Saturdays cook was uneventful. Our chicken ended up a little ahead of schedule and our test bites were on the dry side. we were not too surprised that we were not leading the pack with the yard bird. It’s frustrating to go from 1st in Annapolis to 26th and 20th the competitions after that. We had a discussion about it and may have identified the slightest, inadvertent change in technique that may have been impacting the final product. We are going to make the adjustment for Frederick, but keep the same flavor profile that got us 1st in Annapolis. In Delaware, we had almost nothing worth turning in for ribs. This week we cooked better racks of ribs and had plenty to choose from … I guess we chose the 3rd place ribs instead of the 1st place ones! In the pork category, our pork was a little dry. The butts cooked on schedule and the temps were right … but they still came out a little over done in our opinion. This was reflected in our scoring. On to brisket … guess what … dry. Not overly dry, and the flavor was right on, but a large section of the flat was more dry than normal. I sliced the entire thing until we found some slices with moisture. Although we turned in fewer slices than normal, we still managed to fill the box with good flavored meat and managed to get that 3rd place call.
A huge congrats to 3Eyz BBQ for taking Grand Champion! With so many reserves, we knew their time was coming and it was well earned. We keep telling Dan and Chris that someday there will be a competition that we are going to nudge them out of the top seats, but that seems to be quite a lofty goal. Great job guys!
We have a weekend of fun and relaxation coming up at the “Dizzyfest” at Chris Capell’s BBQ store in Manassas, VA this weekend. Then it’s game time in Frederick. That’s a big one this year and the team list looks like the who’s who of Mid Atlanta Barbecue! Looking forward to a weekend of serious competition!
