29-May-2004
Beachfront BBQ State Cook-Off
Imperial Beach California
    
   Comments below were extracted from the CBBQA Yahoogroups email string
(pictures at bottom thanks to Bentley Meredith)

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Del King wrote:

It was a great event. We had 11 teams, below is their winning positions:
     

All the teams were having a good time. If you ever get a chance to set up next to those Bad Boys do it they will help you stay awake all night. Great people. I gave them a sample of the BBQ'n Fools new super Hot BBQ sauce with out telling them it was kind of hot. Man what a show it was worth the price of gas just to watch that. All and all those that missed it you lost out on some great fellowship with other Q'ers.  Congrats to Carl for such a great job taking Grand Champion. Gene did a great Job there were a lot of people walking around the event both days many expressed interest in the CBBQA. He even got the local press down to cover the event.
 
del
        

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Kristin Meredith, wrote:

First, congratulations to Holy Smoke for taking Grand Champions!!
They are great competitors and truly supportive of our California  events. I hope Bentley can get his photos online because he has a  nice picture of Carl and Verna by their winning site.
 
Second, thanks to Gene for setting up the event. It was a beautiful  day, great location and a nice turnout. I know there was a constant  line of folks buying BBQ from Gene's charity organization and I hope  that he was able to raise a lot of funds for the Boys and Girls  Club. It is nice to think that we, as a group, provided a little bit  of a background for that charitable activity to take place.
 
Third (and I know since I was judging yesterday that this statement  is somewhat self-serving), I think that all the judges should be  thanked. There were 11 teams and 13 certified judges, so this meant  that we had table captains who were CBJ's. Judges came from some  distance -- I know that at my table, we had a person who had traveled  from Thousand Oaks. That is a 300 mile round trip just to judge. I  think that more people who are certified are feeling that they should  come judge if they can't compete and we, as a group, should applaud  and support those efforts since it will strengthen our competitions and raise our credibility.
 
Kristin
 

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Kaun Carl,  wrote:
 
Thanks to Gene for the fine event (and the tri-tip dinner), John and  Lynn Ross for the excellent and beyond-the-call competition, John  Hopkins for repping the event, and to everyone who has been so generous with their congratulations.
 
Tom Chilton asked if I would give some hints about my success. I'm unsure whether to share dumping a brisket into the water pan, or  steaming some ribs. At least my pit didn't catch fire, not to name  names :-). Maybe I'll share what I think John Ross's chicken secret
is  - he grills them. But I guess there might be more to it than that.  The  more I think about it, why should I be the one giving hints? I didn't  take first in a single category. The category winners should be giving the tips.
   
Actually, I didn't do anything especially different, except with  chicken. I did frenched buffalo legs for chicken. My tasters  compared  them with some more traditional thighs, and unanimously voted the legs for turn-in. They were pretty zesty, so there's maybe something to be learned there.
   
I did cook as good a brisket as I know how to, and it only took a 4th.
<sigh> What do I do now?
  
It was nice to see everyone there - Kim and Brent, Del, Scott Williams, Grant, Ken and Shara, Alvin and Carol, Kristin, Bentley, and all.
 
Also mista neil and beautiful significant other. I'd love to see you at the next one.
 
Cheers, all!
    

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Randy Gille, wrote:
  
The only thing comforting about being last is not having to look back to see  whether anyone is coming up from behind! We'll be back but we'd  like to  offer our anchor position to someone else!   Thanks to all for making us feel mighty welcome! Despite Del saying we kept him up all night, he is a fun guy to have right across the street.
He entertained us from dusk to dawn with his stories and jokes. We  discovered he  takes it as well as he gives it.
   
Randy Gille
Burbank Bad Boys BBQ
   

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Gene Goycochea, wrote:
 
Hello everyone, just wanted to say that I enjoyed having everyone who attended this year's Beachfront BBQ event.
 
The teams, the judges, our contest rep (john Hopkins who always does a great job for us.....
 
This years event was judges by 100% KCBS certified judges and table captains.... (good to see)
 
I want  to congratulate Carl Kaun (Holy Smoke) a San Diego team who was the Grand Champion of this years event and John Ross (Smoke & Mirrors) a Kansas City team for Reserve Champion..... I hear that all of the food was pretty good from the judges that I talked too........
 
I for one had a nice time seeing all of the teams and being around the nice smell of smoke for the couple of days.....
 
Just wanted to say Thank You,
 
Gene
     

In CBBQA@yahoogroups.com, Grant Ford, wrote:
 
Hello all,
 
It was tough getting there late in the evening, first time doing that,  ouch. Somehow the brisket flat got push through and took 3rd. It did  taste good and was tender, so that helped. It was the second time  that BBQ'n Fools has been with the new scoring system it will likely  take awhile to understand what the Judges are thinking. The next  event I believe Tom will be doing on his own, one we have a couple of  these scores we can get a better feel as to what is happening on the  Judges tables. I will likely be judging myself at Follows Camp if  they need some extra Judges.
 
It was great to see all of my BBQ Friend's and share barbecue  thoughts with some of the new first time teams. We also were able to  talk to interested people in CBBQA and give out some fliers. I wish I  could have dedicated more time to the CBBQA booth, but with some help  we did make some contacts. I keep working on new places to get the  info out about CBBQA.
 
As for the one hand tied behind my back, will I would just like to  say to those cooking chicken at this event, Great Job! Looks like we  may have some new chicken champion rising in the ranks of BBQ, love  to see it, and taste it too!
 
Wishing you all the best in BBQ.
 
Grant Ford, VP CBBQA.
BBQ'n Fools Cooking Team
   

(pictures thanks to Bentley Meredith)