We arrived at the New Palestine Wine, Brew & BBQ Too competition with a simple mission: cook our #@%&s off. Smoke Freaks rose to the occasion and snagged our first RGC, or Reserve Grand Championship!
It was a fierce battle facing 38 teams on Day 1 of the double-header, including 5 of the top 25 teams in the nation. We cooked this double-header weekend as a 2-man team, for only the second time. Much of our success that day should be attributed to our level of organization and planning, both of which we needed to lean on heavily.
When it was all said and done, I got my second-ever chicken call (9th place) and we also snagged 4th in Ribs. We couldn’t believe our ears when they called Smoke Freaks again for 4th in Pork. And we lost our minds when we were named Reserve Grand Champions!
For us, it was a victory of epic proportions and validation of this crazy thing that we love to do.
And the best part was that my college roommate and her husband drove down to see us in action. They’re our lucky charms. We love you, Beth and Bruce.
And just like that, they wiped our names off that great big check and wrote in our friends Thunder Hog BBQ as RGC for Day 2. We, on the other hand, got totally shut out. We cooked exactly as we had the day prior, but it just wasn’t our day. Those judges scored some killer BBQ, that’s for sure.
We’re headed to the Effingham Jam BBQ Cookoff this weekend to go back at it. You know what that means? It's time for Effingham to get Freaky! So if you're in Effingham this weekend, stop by to Taste the Freakage!