2009 Pickled Pig Olathe BBQ Contest Pics

[Bob in Fla.]

I heard a rumor that a "Pickled Pig" won some contest in Olathe this weekend.

Congratulations, Big Pig!

http://http://www.kcbs.us/events.php?id=1770


BOB

[smokin mike]

Oh yeah!

I got to see it in person, it was great!

Congrats guys !!!!

[The Big Pig]

Thanks guys. It was amazing and fun. I'll try and get some pics and a report up later.

[Thom Emery]

Very Cool

[The Big Pig]

Lee (Lwest99) and I competed in a first year event in Olathe, KS this weekend. The rest of our team (Dawn (wheatcountry) and Jon (jon)) were off vacationing in WI and could not make it to this contest. Lee is our resident chicken and pork cook and it was good to have him back from his own vacationing over the last couple of months. But the loss of Dawn meant I had to make the putting greens and that is never a good thing. And the loss of Jon meant I had to cook ribs, another task usually ending in failure.

This was quite possibly the best run first year event we've been to and I'm not just saying that because of the results. The contest was held at a large church in a very large level, grass field. The organizers and army of volunteers were extremely attentive and helpful. The contest layout was rectangular with a tent in the center of the team rows for meetings and judging. It worked well as no team had far to go for turn-ins. There were 48 teams but the church has aspirations of making this a much larger contest in the future and every team I talked with had a very positive contest experience.

It was hot with temps in the upper 90's but there was a constant and sometimes fierce wind that took the edge off the heat. Of course, the down side of wind is that it makes everything we do a lot harder. While assembling our pork box for turn-in, the wind whipped up and blew the box off the table, destroying our putting green in the process. We grabbed the last box (for brisket) and used it for the pork thereby buying some time to fix the overturned box. Lee managed to salvage enough parsley to cover the outside edges while leaving the center of the box naked, chopped lettuce. It worked, once the brisket was in the box you really couldn't tell how badly damaged it was.

Our presentation scores suffered a bit in this contest because I made the putting greens too tall and chicken, ribs, and pork all hit the top of the box. That's what happens when I'm left in charge of something so important.

In the end, we did okay and won our 2nd GC. We had calls in chicken (1st) and brisket (1st). We had thought ribs were our strongest entry but the judges thought otherwise and gave us 24th in that category while our pork came in 15th.

We were a little surprised at the overall results because KC Can Crew, who won the RGC, had 2nd place calls in chicken, ribs, and brisket. But KCBS scoring is cumulative and Jeff had some issues with his pork which allowed us to squeak by him.

Winning was a blast and 6 hours later I still can't get the grin off my face. But it was a lot of fun to spend time with and hang around so many friends and even meet some new ones. And it was good to get Lee back up on the contest horse.

A Chinook helicopter did a demo landing and takeoff on the church grounds during the contest. That is one large aircraft.

[Thom Emery]

Nice boxes Brother

[discosuperfly]

Congrats! That's some good lookin' cue.

[Sledneck]

Congrats!!!!

[MooCow]

Great job Paul, I saw that copter take off from from the reserve center in Gardner while I was working on the roof at a plant next to the base. Little did I know it was heading your way for a victory flyover!!

[bbqstudent]

Okay, so now you've got a money muscle entry for the chicken. This bar just continues to get higher. :) Did you take de-boned thighs and cut them to make it look like it does or what?