Another year in the books – and what a year it was!
We cooked…A LOT. We ate…A LOT. We had incredible parties Thursday and Friday. We met up with old friends, made some new friends, and even chatted with a legend.
I also was able to spend some time with one of my favorite teams, Too Sauced to Pork, and my friend, Neil Gallagher, who wrote a guest post for us a few weeks ago. Neil introduced me to Robyn Medlin who has an awesome BBQ Blog – Grill Grrrl. Check it out!
I am very proud of the results our team, SLABS a’ Smokin, achieved this year. In the main cooking contest, we entered Ribs again as always, and placed 28th out of 123 teams.
That puts us in the top 25% of all contestants – and ahead of some former world champions. Tim gave a truly extraordinary presentation to each and every judge.
We were also one of 16 teams asked to participate in the Kingsford Tour of Champions – a new contest within MIM started this year. All participants are former champions and we did ourselves VERY proud.
Cattlemen’s also asked us to be one of a select group to participate in their “Hog Crawl” on Friday. We served ribs to dozens of executives interested in learning more about competitive BBQ, and I think we gave them exactly what they asked for.
Lastly, we entered nearly all ancillary categories for the first time this year and the results did not disappoint. We placed in the top 30% in nearly every category. We placed #10 out of over 100 teams in the exotic category, thanks to my cousin Danny and his talented Venezuelan bride, Lusnail.
But the highlight of the week was placing #7 out of over 120 participants in the Tomato Sauce category! This was a HUGE achievement for our team. Now, not only have our finished products been recognized, but the components of them as well! We’re thrilled.
All in all an incredible Memphis in May experience for 2012. It’s easily the best week of BBQ in the entire year.