As your roving reporter in Birmingham, I found myself at Sloss Furnaces on Saturday morning to cover the Stokin' the Fire BBQ and Music Festival. Alas, the BBQ tasting wasn't until 4:00 that afternoon, but I wandered around the whole place and checked out the team tents and the various grills/smokers. I'm a fair barbeque smoker myself, and I have to tell you that there were some mighty fine rigs out there. I don't know who the winners were, but I can tell you that everyone was having a fine time at 11:00 and I can only imagine how much fun they were having by nightfall when the music really cranked up. Oh and just for the record, my two favorite team names were: "Bad to the Bone" and "Bubba Q"!
Just one of the Mega-Grills!!
My southern readers won't need an explanation here but for the rest of you, this is a smoked Boston butt. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Boston or anything Yankee. Butts (excuse my French), ribs and I think chicken were the categories for judging.