Saturday, September 19, 2009

Blue Springs Wrap-up

I got into KC on Thursday night so we could get the ribs, chicken, and brisket trimmed and the trailer ready to go. Friday morning I had some last minute errands to run and left for the contest around 10, arriving at 10:45. To my surprise, I was the last team to check in. I had a hell of a time backing the trailer into our spot, but after about 5 attempts I finally got it. It only took me about an hour to get our site up and functional. Bayou Style BBQ was one of the teams right next to us and we hit it off right away. Sean and crew are a great bunch of guys and were really helpful with some seasoned pro tips. Most of Friday consisted of me loitering and drinking beer. Brad and Dad showed up around 4:30 and I think they were also taken aback at how big this thing was...80+ teams. The contest reps did a great job of having everything set and ready to go for the teams.
Friday night we walked around and sampled some of the other teams bbq via the Buck a Bone registration. Basically the teams can pay $50 and the general public can sample their food. My mom came out around 6:30 and hung out with us most of the evening. We got the smokers fired up around 9:30. We prepped the shoulders and the brisket and got them on the smoker around 10:15. We transferred one of the shoulders and one of the briskets to the egg around 1 a.m. Friday night/Saturday morning I spent with Bayou BBQ watching movies and preparing the garnishes for the turn-in boxes.
Saturday morning was a bit on the chilly side so Brad and I went to Starbucks and loaded up on coffee. We had our ribs on by 7 a.m, the chicken on at 9:30 and the sausage on by 10. Looking back we put the sausage on too early. By the time we cut it for turn-in, it was lukewarm/cold - rookie mistake. The preparation of the turn-in boxes went well for the chicken, ribs, and sausage but we realized that 15 minutes before turn-in time is not the time to be strategizing about how to do a pork and brisket box. Our pork shoulder box looked brutal. It was basically a lump of pulled pork in the middle of the garnish...oh well, we will get it next time. The brisket box actually looked decent with both burn ends and slices in the box.
Due to the number of teams and the seasoned veterans we were not expecting much come awards time. Chicken was the first category up and to our surprise we placed fourth in chicken! We were really proud of this because our chicken has not scored well in past non-sanctioned events and we have been working to improve it quite a bit. No calls for brisket, ribs, or shoulders. Ribs 32 of 80, Brisket 20 of 80, Shoulder 29 of 80. We took 10th place in sausage, which wasn't too bad considering we served it cold! We finished 13th out 80 teams, so for our first contest, we were really happy. All in all it was a great weekend hanging out with the family! We learned a ton and are anxiously awaiting our next contest! Unfortunately I left the camera at home! Sorry there are no pics to post from the contest. Here are pics of the ribbons.

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