A barbecue adventure, the saga unfolds.

Sac Arrow said:
I cut a whole loin in to pork chops
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Easy, affordable, and when done right absolutely delicious. That’s three boxes checked for the positive ….”it’s a cut up loin?” And ignorance is the only negative check I can think of.. I’m 1000% for buying whole pork loins, cutting them into chops and grilling them (or cutting them into thirds and roasting or smoking them).
 
Flatiowa said:
Easy, affordable, and when done right absolutely delicious. That’s three boxes checked for the positive ….”it’s a cut up loin?” And ignorance is the only negative check I can think of.. I’m 1000% for buying whole pork loins, cutting them into chops and grilling them (or cutting them into thirds and roasting or smoking them).
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Oh I dunno. Sometimes it's fun to do this:
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My buddy is smoking a bunch of turkeys tomorrow for a charity event later in the week. I didn’t find out about it until tonight. I’ve been out of town all day and didn’t get a chance to get any meat. I’ll probably drive out to his place tomorrow anyway, about 45 minutes, and lend a hand.
 
Oh, and the American Royal contest is this weekend. The Invitational is Saturday, the Open is Sunday. I’m judging the Open. Likely around 600 teams competing.
 
Well, lookie there! I had a couple pork tenderloins in the freezer, waiting for a good time to go onto the smoker. I’ll head over to my buddy’s place this afternoon and get those cooked up and help him with the turkeys.
 
Man I wish I had taken pictures. Some types of cooking sometimes require all the stars to align. For me it’s been brisket. I had basically given up on brisket over 25 years of smoking meats. I would dabble in it when I had a certain aire of confidence or cockiness combined with a great price at the store, only to be disappointed in my creation. I think I cooked one great one in all that time. I hadn’t touched one in about 10 years! This time the I made the best I’ve ever had, including vs restaurant brisket. And that’s saying something - people usually love my BBQ while I am critical to a fault.

Bought a cryo 13.5 pounder about a month ago. Let it sit in the fridge for almost a month until this Sunday. Didn’t realize until trimming that the point was really small compared to the flat (like 20/80). This was gonna be hot & fast, so I did a severe trim.

Salt, coarse pepper, garlic powder, onion powder. Covered and left it on the counter.

Using WSM. Tried B&B oak lump for the first time. Loaded up to the brim with lump and 3 chunks of oak and 3 chunks of pecan. This mix is my favorite smoke profile on beef. Fired up a full chimney of Kingsford briquettes. I did this much charcoal out of habit (muscle memory) from overnight pork butts, not thinking that it was overkill. Didn’t hurt anything, just silly.

Shoehorned the meat on the 18” grate. Weber remote thermometer in the thick part of the meat. Fat cap down. All vents on the WSM open. Top dome temp 325-350. At the 2.5 hour mark we were at 170. Foiled it, nothing added to the foil, and I meant to put it in cap-up but didn’t. Shutdown the smoker and used oven at 375.

Checked the condition by probing starting at 195 and turned the oven down to 350. It wasn’t until 208 that it finally probed tender (like butter as they say). So that was 2 hours. Let it rest on the counter still wrapped for 30 minutes.

Best flavor, tenderness, and moisture ever.

I keep the liquid in the fridge for leftovers. Gently heat freshly sliced leftover in the microwave with a spoon of the hard fat and gelled juices. 15 seconds, turn slices to soak in the juice, 15 more seconds, flip, and 15 more seconds. Warmed but not blasted hot. So sublime.

I doubt I can do it again. Stars aligned. Thanks to the rancher, the animal, the trees, the hands that created the charcoal, the inventor of the WSM, the resources (online friends) here and elsewhere, my physical and mental health, and this great country to be able do this. And no, I’m not drunk.
 
Half Fast said:
I take it you were a little hungry?
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The turkeys are for a dinner party tomorrow. The pork chops were for my buddy. One of the tenderloins was last night’s dinner and a lunch sandwich. The other is still in the fridge awaiting disposition.
 
Sac Arrow said:
You smoked all that in the course of seven minutes?
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Welp. Lots of hands-on dirty work and clean up to keep busy.

Plus, I found out why my buddy’s dog was so fascinated with me when I realized I’d been snacking on her treats all afternoon.

I pretty much just had time to sit back and relax with a couple Modelos before it was time to work again.

Years ago I was at a bbq contest and these two young guys were talking about their Yeti stainless steel beer holders. They thought I had one, too. I mentioned I had an Rtic brand.

“Well, OURs keeps beer cold for 4 hours!”

“Yeah? Mine cost half as much and keeps beer cold for 8 minutes.”

“BUT, BUT, … oh.”
 
455 Bravo Uniform said:
What temp and how long was the smoke?
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Seasoned w/ Montreal Steak overnight and all day. 225* until the meat probe hit 120* internal. That took maybe 40mins max? Then seared on the Blackstone with a burger press.

I’d do it again, maybe with some fresh rosemary. It didn’t need a sauce, but something berry/red wine-ish would have matched nicely.

Mixed veggies and a glass of Bending Branch Cowboy Cuvee.
 
Man, that flambéd with a drizzle of elderberry brandy, horseradish, and a side of boiled grated Jerusalem artichokes and fall beets would be amazing. (Be warned if your body isn’t use to Jerusalem artichokes they have “side effects” until your gut biology adapts to them).
 
TCABM said:
Seasoned w/ Montreal Steak overnight and all day. 225* until the meat probe hit 120* internal. That took maybe 40mins max? Then seared on the Blackstone with a burger press.

I’d do it again, maybe with some fresh rosemary. It didn’t need a sauce, but something berry/red wine-ish would have matched nicely.

Mixed veggies and a glass of Bending Branch Cowboy Cuvee.
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A red wine reduction and sauteed mushrooms? That sounds good all on its own.
 
Got checked in at the Royal at the Kansas Speedway this morning. Air temp is 30, wind chill is 13. Judges are inside one of the garages. They finally turned on the heat, I don’t feel it yet and that concrete floor will never get warm.

The Royal is like the OSH of bbq contests. Biggest in the world, about 600 teams. It’s also a fun place to meet people. At my table of 7 we have someone from Arlington, VA, Casper, WY, MN, SD, and a few of us locals.

Edit: wind chill is down to 10, now.
 
Survived the Royal bbq. I got home and fixed up a steaming mug of hot chocolate. My feet are still cold.

When judging was over I had to go back out into the cold and wind so I could catch the shuttle back to the parking lot. After waiting in line about 5 minutes, a pickup pulled up towing a back to back open air tram with aluminum seats. That was a cold ride.

Good competition today. I didn’t get anything that really popped. Even the rib I gave a perfect score wasn’t that great. We don’t do partial scores, whole numbers only and we round up. 9 is “excellent”, there’s no such thing as perfect. My highest scoring rib was more like 8.1, but rounded up to 9.

That’s it for me this season. Competition starts back up here in March.

Life is good.


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Pictures are not allowed in the judging area, “What happens in the judging tent stays in the judging tent.”

But a few teams are starting to post pix of their entries. JDQ is named after the team leader. He has his own line of rubs and is a super nice guy. He used to, maybe still does, teach competition bbq cooking. He used to manage the bbq store about a mile from my house and we had a lot of good conversations when I would stop in for supplies.

He and his team cooked in the Royal Open contest Sunday, the same one I judged. The Royal Invitional was Saturday. JD didn’t compete in that one, and I didn’t get selected as a judge.

He got 13th place overall, out of a little over 400 teams in the Open.

That contest started with turkey and ended with sausage. Those are the ancillary categories and can win money and bragging rights but don’t count towards national championship points. I didn’t see pix of sausage so I don’t think they entered that category. The fun part of ancillary categories is the rules allow for quite a bit of imagination in how and what you turn in.

In between was the 4-meats, chicken, ribs, pork butt, and brisket.

Here are JD’s entry pix.

Turkey, chicken, ribs, pork, and brisket.

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Sac Arrow said:
Wow. I am humbled.
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Simply from looking at the pix:

Garnish isn’t judged. It needs to be legal (parsley, kale, green lettuce, …) but it’s just to keep the meat from sliding around.

Smoked turkey breast, sliced, on pretzel buns, cranberry sauce, and some kind of spread I can’t make out. The turkey slider I judged had a layer of stuffing. The other turkey entries I got were slices of white meat.

Chicken thighs: thighs are typically turned in and almost always look just like this. I’ve seen a steady pattern of drumsticks the last few years, but it’s probably 5:1 thighs. Yesterday I got a box of thighs and wings. But they are always shined up like this. After cooking they get dunked in sauce and put back on the smoker another 5-10 minutes.

Ribs: St Louis cut spares.

Pork: that would be a money muscle and “tubes”. Many teams cook a pork collar, a specifically trimmed pork butt that pretty much just includes those two muscle groups. This is where I disagree with the current KCBS rules, I prefer the old rules that required a whole butt.

Brisket: Josh (JD), and the other top teams believe in “go big or go home” and will spend around $200 for a Wagyu brisket flat that’s the perfect size to fit that box. The slices are soaked in the juice before boxing.

A lot of teams are cooking in drum smokers, hot and fast. It’s efficient, consistent, and makes for an easier cook. The side effect is the brisket gets that dark roasted look.

Another thing I’ve been seeing recently is burned sauce. Teams new to the drum forget how hot they cook will put the chicken and ribs back on in order to set the sauce and then burn it on the bottom. They may not even notice. But the judges get a bite of that bitter, burned sugar and mark down the taste score.
 
I’m glad I didn’t hang around for the awards after the Sunday contest. It didn’t get any warmer as the day went on.

913 BBQ is a husband and wife team that’s won a lot of championships over the years. And they are good people. They took 7th in chicken Sunday and you can get a feel how cold it was.

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Now that teams have made it back home from the Royal, more and more are posting pix of their entries.

Old Virginia Smoke from Bristow, VA got 103 in dessert.

I didn’t judge dessert, that was part of the Saturday contest, I judged Sunday.

Desserts are always fun because teams will go to extremes on their turn-ins.

Here’s what 103rd place looks like:

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