Smoke on the Hill

Saturday October 1st found me waking up at about 1 am. I asked my wife why it is we seem to do most of our camping in a Parking lot. The only answer I got was, "Is the fire going?"   Cook offs are a lot of fun, and a lot of work.

Its a lot easier to cook and feed 200, than it is the 6 judges that I have to wow in one or two bites.  Why 2 bites you say? Ever eat 6 ribs, 6 chicken thighs, pulled pork and brisket from 6 competitors, and not die of a heart attack?  Me either.   Prep starts on Wednesday with chicken. That only takes 2 hours to trim and prep 12 uniform chicken thighs.  Thursday is Brisket day, thats quick trim it down and remove the fat. Friday is the fun day. All I have to do is trim ribs and pork butt, make 4 sauces, 3 rubs and get all the stuff like tables, wood and the rest of a 2 page list loaded up in the truck, oh yeah and serve customers.  

That brings me back to Saturday at 1 am and lighting the fire. The easy part is cooking the meat. Keep the fire just so and spray, and wrap and do everything under the moon (it is 1 am ) to get as much flavor in to every bite of meat!   

 The camping

 2nd place Ribs

 3rd place Pork

In the end it all came out fun, and the ribs came out better than ever, pork was good too. Now i just have to figure out what they want out of brisket and chicken.  Who knows maybe I'm just to southern to cook beef well.