Red, White, & BBQ review....Milk Cow prep

We are back and mostly recovered from our competition in Westmont this past weekend.  It was a great event.  We arrived Friday afternoon, a day early.  The spots were a little tight and they ended up having to move people around to get us in.  It all turned out perfect as we ended up under a very nice shade tree and only about 10 feet from the water supply.  We got the canopy setup and secured and then headed for the hotel for the night to get a decent night's sleep.

We woke up pretty early Saturday and went down to get a good breakfast.  Very happy we chose the Clubhouse Inn and it's full free breakfast.  We checked out and searched out a grocery store.  We had a few things that we needed to get for the upcoming cook as well as items to munch on throughout the next 30 hours.  

We got back to our site around noon to find everything as we had left it.  Which find out is lucky because it was awfully breezy and some teams lost their canopies.  We finished setting up the site and started injecting the meat after we had it inspected.  The weather was very comfortable.  The temp was mid to upper 70's with a nice breeze.  After the meat prep we had nothing to do until the cooks meeting.  We took this opportunity to walk around and visit with some of the other teams and catch a few winks while we could.  

The cooks meeting was the standard welcome to the event.  Nothing new.  It did go on a bit longer due to the extra money sponsors put in for the special awards.  After that, we headed back and relaxed for the rest of the evening.  It's the most relaxed our camp has been.  

I lit the smoker around 9:30, mostly because I started getting antsy.  At 11 I pulled the brisket from the cooler to let it warm up a bit and apply the rub.  It hit the smoker at midnight and the pork went on at 2.  It was a comfortable night.  It got a little chilly and we were forced to close up the canopy and get the heater going.  The smoker ran perfectly through the night.

With the morning hours, came the humidity.  The air began to get thick and then hot.  Everything was still progressing well.  Ribs went on at 6am and the chicken was on at 10am.  We had the usual spectators curious about what we were doing.  Our location was proven to be more beneficial.  We were tucked back in a corner and not really visible from the main isle way.  We probably would have had a lot more visitors otherwise.

We got all 4 categories boxed up and sent in on time.  No DQs!  Below are the pics....


Chicken

Ribs

Pork

Brisket

Overall, we finished 29th out of 66 very good teams.  42nd in Chicken, 16th in Ribs, 8th in Pork, 36th in Brisket.  We met our goals of being in the top half and getting 1 call.  Now it's time to start prepping for the Milk Cow Music Festival that is taking place this Friday and Saturday!

Almost ready...

I managed to make it to Sobie Meats last night to pick up our cuts for the Red, White, & BBQ event in Westmont Illinois.  Spent a good portion of the evening trimming meat and making rubs.  Woke up early this morning to get going on the dreaded chicken thigh prep.  At this point of the day, we are looking pretty good.  Have a couple doctors appointments and then it's all BBQ focus until 5 pm Sunday.  Stay tuned for more updates!

Gearing up for the Red, White, & BBQ in Westmont, IL

It's Tuesday and the Westmont event is right around the corner.  During a normal week we would be picking up meats from Sobie Meats and begin prepping tonight.  But, the day job has taken over today and looks like I won't be picking up meat until tomorrow.  Since Westmont is a Saturday/Sunday event we aren't really getting behind, which is nice, but we aren't really getting ahead either.  This comp has presented numerous challenges already and we haven't even arrived on site yet.  This leads me to believe we will have one of two outcomes...we will continue the highly stressful and flawed week with a terrible showing or, we will have our best contest to date.  Only time will tell...