And 2012 is in the books: thoughts on the week and plans for next year

Although I think our ribs were a hell of a lot better than the 71st place that we were awarded (seriously, if there were 70 ribs out there better than mine, I slam my junk in a car door), we did have our best finish in the team's history and improved on last year by 23 spots. As for everything not related to the rankings, it was a huge success in my mind. We got to use the smoker free of charge, we ate some damn good BBQ and crawfish, and our party made mardi gras look like a baptist church sunday social. Damn right, we threw down hard as hell. I'd like to just toss out a few ideas here and hopefully I'll remember to look at them next year when we start planning out our menus and such.

-I'm all for going with the spare ribs for next year's family night. They were meaty, plentiful, and cheap compared to the baby backs. The one thing I'll say is that 2 cases is probably plenty. I don't think we touched the 3rd case until friday when we reheated them, and I gave the fourth case to Billy today since I have no room in my freezer.

-The 2 giant shoulders from easy way were plenty for thursday, but I really liked having the smaller 2 that we served as leftovers on friday. Cooking them, then chopping and basically just stirring them with their own juices and a little rub after coming off the smoker was phenomenal.

-The burgers were great, but I guess we need to be better on guessing numbers of burgers to buns and who the hell knows what happened with the hotdogs.

-10-12 bags of charcoal was a great amount and the big boxes of wood chunks worked great. We had just the right amount for what we were cooking.

-If we use the same smoker next year, and we have the same wood logs, we need to by an axe. that one that billy had on the trailer was loose and frankly I was scared to swing it for fear of losing the head and killing one of our neighbors. Of course, If we'd have gotten the Pork stars, perhaps we could've finished a little higher.

-We still need to work out a better rack system for the cooler. Maybe we can buy some cheap plastic shelves from Lowes next year.

-2 jugs of Wickers/Hog Wild is sufficient for the week. basically one jug per rib day

-One giant bottle of BBQ sauce is enough for the week assuming that the one from Friday night's dinner makes it back into the cooler before saturday (it did not). I guess what I'm saying is that we need one large(ish) jug for competition and one for serving with food.  And cattleman's was pretty damn good on the competition ribs. It was bland and tomatoey (sp?) enough to fade into the background of the flavor that at least two of our onsite judges really liked. Pam was the most complimentary on site judge that I've ever had, and Sal came back and told me our ribs were the best he'd had all week, so there's that.

I'm exhausted so I'm out. if any of y'all think of anything that worked or was a complete flop this week, PLEASE post it in the comments or as a new blog entry. I want to make this as easy on us next year as possible seeing as how we aren't going to have the luxury of a pro when it comes time to handle all this shit next year.

Thanks
All Pig, Swig, Swine