This week I recieved this email from Joe Boyd of Fatback Joe’s BBQ; Land O’ Lakes, Florida.  Thanks Joe for your support and love of our products.  We appreciate cooks like you that “wanna be a Plowboy, baby!”  

Todd,

I am sure you hear this all the time, but thanks for the great product you put out.

continue reading "A letter from Fatback Joe"

September 25!

Every so often, I’ll get an email from from someone I’ve never met from somewhere I’ve never been who’s used Plowboy’s Yardbird Rub and found success. David Rosol and his family are Toys 4 BBQ’n from Anthem, AZ. This past weekend, they competed at a KCBS contest in Taylor, AZ. David and I have swapped a couple of emails in the past about how we use the product in competition. Like us, David used it on his chicken, ribs, and pork. They placed 9th in chicken, 11th in ribs, and 1st in pork. This was the very first time the team has placed first at a KCBS contest. The smiles in the picture tell it all.

Pictured are David with his wife, Karyn, their sons Ryan (10) and Zach (7).

More and more teams are learning that Plowboys Yardbird Rub is an excellent choice for pork… just like the Rosol’s. Way to go, guys!!!! We may have to talk sponsorship in 2009!

Used labor day weekend as an opportunity to practice some chicken for the upcoming Blue springs Blaze Off contest.  Not top ten worthy, but kept the cobwebs off.

Overall - 6th (50 teams)

Chicken - 2nd
Brisket - 1st

The best BBQ contest is the one where you have a great time.  This was one of those.  Michael hasn’t been to a contest with me since middle of June.  He loves them.  He has his own friends there like Parker, Kaylin, and Loren.  This weekend he got to see Parker and they played on scooters, skateboards, bicycles and tricycles all weekend.  One of the teams had a cockatoo that apparently eats ribs.  It was a great weekend for Michael.  He even strapped on his apron and helped put rub on the pork and brisket.

The highlight for my weekend, other than time with Michael and watching him have fun, was the chicken.   Since Andy cooks the chicken when we compete together, all of the chicken calls this year have been Andy’s.  I haven’t had a chicken call since May 17, 2007.  Prior to that, I think it was August 2006 at the Missouri State Fair contest.  I’m the, self proclaimed, worst chicken cook.  With a few tips from Andy, and my own touch here and there, I finally got some redemption.  Chicken is the only category that I don’t have a first place ribbon.  It is one of the top items on my list for accomplishments in BBQ.  Maybe someday.

Thank you BBQr’s Delight for being a Pork Pullin Plowboys sponsor!

This summer I had the pleasure of meeting Candy Weaver of BBQr’s Delight at the contest in Shannon, IL. I found her to be a very down to earth gal who can also cook with the best of them. In Shannon, Candy won the Butt to Butt Champions competition. I had just started using Candy’s BBQr’s Delight pecan pellets the contest prior to Shannon and really liked how they performed. At the contest, I had run out of cherry and walked over to see if I could buy a small bag from Candy. She checks to make sure she has enough to finish her own competition food and gave me a bag. When I asked for the price, she replied, “No charge.” Needless to say, I was quite grateful and a friendship was born.

BBQr’s Delight have been my go to source for pellets this year. In nine years of competition BBQ, this is our best year ever. BBQr’s Delight is a big part of that equation and success. Over the years, I’ve used several different brands of pellets. Other than color from cherry, there was never a distinct difference in flavor from different species of wood pellets. BBQr’s Delight are the first pellets I’ve found that produce a true wood flavor. I’ve used the hickory, oak, pecan, cherry, and apple pellets.  My favorite for contests is a 50/50 blend of the pecan(for flavor) and cherry(for color).

If you are a pellet cook and aren’t using BBQr’s Delight, you should be.  All of my pellets come from Bobby at BBQ Bonanza found at www.KCK.com.  In addition to being an authorized BBQr’s Delight dealer, BBQ Bonanza sells Fast Eddy Cookshack, Kingfisher Kookers, Louisiana Grills, Tru Tel gauges, and more.  Though not an official Plowboys sponsor, BBQ Bonanza has always offered fair prices and excellent service.  All of our competition cookers have come through BBQ Bonanza, and will in the future.

Overall - 6th of 71 teams

Chicken - 1st
Ribs - 10th
Pork - 6th

Normally, I don’t like posting without pictures.  Pictures are worth a thousand words, so they say, and I’m not one to sit and type a long recap.  I also think the pictures are much more interesting anyway.

Well, without any pictures, I have to brag on my buddy Andy.  We teamed up again for Excelsior Springs.  Of 71 teams, Andy got his only first place chicken call of the year.  Firsts are hard to come by in any category.  Andy’s had many, many chicken calls this year and a few seconds.  He’s made a few changes to his chicken starting at Burlington, KS where he placed 2nd in chicken and we finished as Grand Champions of that contest.

Through the middle of the season, I was struggling with my ribs.  Once I got the second FEC-100 on the trailer, I haven’t been able to bring my Traeger grill with me.  This has been my rib cooker for over a year.  I was getting some great ribs off of it and had two top five finishes in ribs prior to leaving it in the garage.  It has taken me a while to figure out how to get the baby back ribs how I want them off of the FEC-100, but a first in Burlington, KS and a 10th out of 71 at Excelsior Springs has me encouraged that I have the right process for that cooker, finally.

We started the year very strong in pork, and then it trailed off a bit, not getting any pork calls over three contests.  It was good to see pork finishing strong again.   We’ll see what the next stop on the BBQ trail has in store.  Andy and I won’t be back together until River City Roundup in Omaha, NE the last weekend of September.  Randy and I get to team up again at Blue Springs in a couple of weeks.  Very much looking forward to that.  We haven’t cooked a contest together since Des Moines in early June.

Overall - 5th (76 teams)

Brisket - 1st

The Hillbilly BBQ Competition in Laurie, MO, held every first full weekend of August, isn’t Hell itself, but you can see it from there.  Saturday saw upper 90’s for temperature and 102-106 heat index.  Whoa, that’s hot!!!

At Kansas City BBQ Society (KCBS) sanctioned contests, the order of entries and awards are always the same… chicken, ribs, pork, and brisket.  The category last award to be given is first place brisket.  I’ve seen it happen, but never experienced the wait through all of the awards to get a lone “call” as first in brisket.  I was literally ready to get up and start walking to the truck for the long three hour drive home.  To my great surprise, I got the call to the stage for brisket.  After receiving the scores, I learned that my entry was one tenderness point away from a perfect score.  To my knowledge, there are only three perfect scores throughout the whole of KCBS contests this year.  They are very, very rare.  I’m ready to cook another brisket!

BBQ is like golf.  You can struggle for a while and then you hit that one good shot, which is just enough to keep you going for a while longer.  That’s the best I can describe the feeling.

The local Coffey County newspaper ran this picture and an article on the front page of Monday’s news paper.  This was after Andy and I won Grand Champion at the 4th Annual Wild Blue BBQ contest.

I get asked a lot if we use Yardbird on other categories besides chicken. The answer is, “Everything but brisket.” IMHO, Yardbird is by far best on Pork Butt/Shoulder. We admit that the product was named too early. It was our initial chicken rub. It wasn’t until we started selling it that we tried it on anything else. DUH!!!

Here’s a picture of our first place ribs this weekend with Yardird Rub and Blues Hog sauce.  Ignoring the black spot, I’d kill for ribs that look this good each week.

My ribs are rubbed the night before I plan to cook them for a contest. They usually get rubbed down before I go to bed. Mostly around 11p-12a. My ribs go on at 8a. They NEVER turn out “hammy” or taste cured with that length of time. However, I got my ribs prepped at 10am at a contest once. Two of the three ribs definitely tasted cured. Learned my lesson not to depart from my process. The cause of “hammy” or cured tasting ribs is the presence of salt in the rub. Don’t be afraid of salt in rubs. It can be your best friend just as sugar can be. I’m convinced that judges taste salt as “flavor”. But if you don’t respect the salt and either watch your amounts or rub times, it can be your enemy. For ribs, our rub seems to be fine overnight, but I wouldn’t push it past 10-12 hours.

Hope this helps those of you using our product and trying to find your own signature flavor profile.  Don’t be afraid to mix rubs or sauces as well.  Another rub can change your color and definitely change your flavor. The same is true with sauces.