The Mobile BBQ Cookoff is a charity event which benefits the United Cerebral Palsy Foundation and alongside the tidbits of food samples given to the judges, each team has to give away at least 40lbs of meat during the event. Most served up hundred of pound of mostly pork butt. Thousands of people showed up to support the event so you might imagine the teams were running hard from beginning to end. This didn’t leave a lot of time for us to get out and see the other teams and thier rigs or talk to other cooks.

I had ambitions of meeting up with Trigg and shooting the bull with him but the opportunity never presented itself. Mark and I managed to meet up with him on his way back to his RV from the awards ceremony where we were able to greet and shake hands. Amanda Yeager on the other hand, a co-worker and BBQ buddy, made the pilgrimage from the Back Yard division peanut gallery over to the pro area and harrassed the poor man into getting her photo taken with him! YES… I’m jealous! I’ve only been a smoking enthusiast for a few years and 2010 is my first year of competing against other teams. Johnny Trigg is who I want to be when I grow up!

Admittedly, I had never heard the name Johnny Trigg, Myron Mixon, Tuffy Stone, or Lee Ann Whippen (just to name a few) until TLC aired the “BBQ Pitmasters” series several months ago. Amanda’s impression of Johnny Trigg after talking to him for a while and as polite and outgoing as he was to Mark and myself proved that he was just as laid back and genuinely friendly as the show portrayed him to be. It was a pleasure meeting Johnny Trigg and I look forward to meeting up with him again on the circuit later this year, hopefully at Riverfest in Decatur, AL or the Big Pig Jig in Vienna, GA. It may be a while still before Double-M will be competing in the pro class but I really look forward to it!

For those of you not at least a little bit familiar with how a competition like this works, it’s pretty simple. You select a meat, take note of what time the judges want it turned in then back into your cook time based on that deadline.

Most BBQ competitions primarily judge the “Big 4” which is brisket, pulled pork, chicken, and ribs. Some events also have teams competing in sauce, deserts, and seafood.

Chicken, with its relatively short cook time, is by far the easiest of the “Big 4” to prepare. Teams competing in chicken only can show up to the contest with a grill 2 hours prior to deadline and get their product to the judging tent on time. Ribs are a little more complicated since most ribs experts will “low and slow” their slabs for no less than 3 hours. Pork butt and brisket are the most difficult due to their long-haul smoke of 10 to 12 hours in most cases.

The next thing you have to worry about is getting your rig up to and keeping it at temperature for the duration of your long or short-haul smokes for the different types of meat. Every back yarder, semi-pro, or pro has their own favorite cooking rig and every one of them is better than what the other guy is using. The secret to good BBQ is cooking your product at a consistent low temperature – very slowly. If that means a $100 gas-fired vertical from Wal-Mart, a $3,000 Stump’s rig, a $50,000 custom built rig, or anything in between, all that matters is that you know how to operate your own smoker and control that temperature. Once you learn that little trick, it’s all about the sauce.

Who knows if Double-M will compete again until next year’s Mobile BBQ Championship. I have my eye on one in Decatur, AL in September that looks very interesting —–

The gas rig is by far the easiest way to go. I’ve never used an electric rig but I can’t imagine it being very much different than a gas smoker except you wouldn’t have to deal with keeping a gas bottle charged up for use. One trick I’ve learned over the last few smokes with my gas burner is to use chunks instead of chips in the tinderbox of these non-wood-fired boxes. I’ve found Chunks to be the better way to go mainly because they will produce a better head of smoke than chips and won’t burn out nearly as fast in a gas or assumably electric environment. I’ve heard that your temperature is also somewhat easier to control with an electric rig – there’s very little variance between not hot enough and too hot with the gas box! Gas and electric rigs also are really nothing more than outdoor ovens with optional smoke. With wood-fired rigs you don’t have much of a choice about your product being bathed in smoke for its entire stay in your cooker.

One thing is for sure, neither of these two verticals will hold more than one turkey at a time or at most 6 slabs of ribs so I’m on a mission before the next holiday season – UPGRADE! I’m thinking for my next smoker, something with wheels and a trailer hitch. What I want can’t be bought in a store, I’ll have to build it myself. Everyone has seen those home-made rigs that are built out of an old gas container with a firebox on the end – I want to take it a step further and have a choice of either gas or wood and, a mounted burner for crawfish boils, fish frying and such. Basically a rolling outdoor kitchen. I have this crazy idea of taking a little 5×8 trailer I already own and building a wooden deck, complete with rails! I know – it sounds crazy but it would be unique!

The pork butt was outstanding – usual method from the other articles; wash the meat let it dry a bit then cover it with rub and slap it in the fridge for 12-24 hours. 10 hours in the box at 240 degrees yielded a perfectly cooked product with a deep flavor penetration I haven’t achieved prior to this smoke. Between my wife and I, a fresh pork butt barely has time to cool before we tear into it. With no additional BBQ sauce added, the flavor from the bark and sweet and salty taste deeper below.

After the initial post-smoke feeding frenzy, if any meat survives the slaughter my wife an I bestow upon it, the remainder of the pulled pork is neatly stuffed into zippy bags, given a generous helping of Pappy’s XXX White Lightenin’ Barbecue Sauce and plopped into the refrigerator to be enjoyed later.

Stay tuned for more updates on grub cooked with UD’s seasonings a new recipes!

I put the shoulder into the smoker at around 9:30am Sunday morning and ran the box a little hotter than I’ve done before – I tried to keep it at a level 250 degrees for the entire smoke. By noon I had 30 Atomic Buffalo Turds wrapped and tossed into the smoker for their redemption as well. The other significant change I made in this cook was not wrapping the butt in aluminum foil for the last couple of hours. The end result was a perfectly cooked chunk of meat with a great seasoning bark on all sides. My only complaint was it needing just a tad more of a bite – I’ll add a tad of chipotle powder to the rub the next time I try this. The ABTs were ready around 3:30pm, the shoulder was where it needed to be at about 5. I let the internal temperature of the shoulder get up to 210 degrees which worried be but it turned out better than ever regardless.

The pulled pork was great as soon as it was served – my wife and I were too hungry to let it sit and thing about what it did to get into this predicament so as soon it the thing cooled enough to touch, we mauled it. There was just enough left after we had our feel to share a little and get a lunch out of the deal. I pulled a few handfuls to carry to work the next day and decided as I was bagging it to pour some Pappy’s XXX White Lightenin’ sauce into the baggy to keep the pork company through the cold night in the fridge. What came out the next day was nothing short of fantastic! I have to admit the Pappy’s sauce when being used as a dipping sauce or just poured on something, is a tad spicy even for my tastes. Given the chance however to sit and think while being poured all over its intended recipient, the flavor turned out perfect. I recommend this to anyone!

Putting all of this together at the party a few weeks ago made me think of an omelette cooking method that had to have been the craziest thing I’ve ever heard – a BOILED omelette? It’s a cheeseless creation passed to me by a friend that requires only a pot of boiling water and some sandwich ziplock baggies. Boiled omelettes work the same way as the flat top or pan versions, the only difference is that you drop your favorite ingredients into the ziplock baggy, pour in two whisked eggs, zip-seal the baggy and drop it in the boiling water for two minutes. Fish your omelette out of the boiling water with tongs, or a net, maybe and let it cool enough to be handled then turn the baggy inside-out to serve. For those of you that can’t endure an omelette without cheese [meaning you're like me] just sprinkle some shreds on it and enjoy.

This method is a lot of fun for just a few people or a whole crowd and as a bonus, kids seem to love it as much as the grownups! It’s a perfect tailgating dish(just keep the little ones away from the boiling water!)