Triple D Bar-b-cue

Non-Quest BBQ No 40 – Triple D Bar-b-cue

Rome, Georgia

During my occasional travels, I try to sample BBQ at those near and far away places outside the Quest area. I just really, really like that stuff ... 

I love planes. And I love to watch planes flying around. Straight or in circles, in loopings or in Cuban-8s, in formation or solo, slow, fast, low, high, it doesn’t matter. And what better place to be then, than at an Air show? And if this Air show also has a BBQ competition attached, I am in heaven.

So I went to Rome, Georgia, to the annual Wings over North Georgia Air Show and their Kansas City Barbeque Society sanctioned Smoke’n’Thunder BBQ Classic competition.

The weather was perfect, the flying was exciting, and there were at least half a dozen big BBQ stands that sold their stuff to the Air show spectators. I picked one to have lunch from based on three criteria: it had a pink trailer, they were smoking in a small rig just beside the trailer, and the line in front of the cashier was the longest. Just must be good, don’t you think?

Well, I had the pork sandwich with a sweat tea and a bag of chips for ten bucks. The sandwich came wrapped in aluminum foil and without any fixins’. There were a couple of jars with onions and marinated peppers, but I took a pass on that. They had three different sauces standing around, from which I picked the one that had “Spicy” written on it.

Suffice to say, it was either mislabeled, or my taste buds were already numb from the smell of aviation gas that lay over the flight line. It was not spicy at all, and not really flavorful either. It is really hard to describe, because of the total absence of any aroma. But it lubricated the fairly dry pork real well, so it was tolerable. The meat actually had some smoke aroma, and it was tender and lean. It was also a sizeable portion, coming on one of those big buns, so I think, given the circumstances, I got my money’s worth.

I have no idea where the Triple D guys ranked in the BBQ competition. But based on my lunch experience, it can’t be too high. Or maybe they have a different standard in Kansas City. I rather stick to the North Alabama version of it. If only we had an Air show here once in a while.

Stokin' the Fire BBQ Festival

Non-Quest BBQ No 5 – Stokin’ the Fire BBQ Festival
Birmingham, AL, Sloss Furnace

During my occasional travels, I try to sample BBQ at those near and far away places outside the Quest area. I just really, really like that stuff ... 

Competition BBqing is a world of its own. The teams have colorful names that nobody in their right mind would dare to slap on the street sign for a regular BBQ joint – “Two Fat Boys and a Grill”, "Motley Qüe", "Smell my Butts", "Chainsmokers", "Smart Ash Smokers", to name just a few of those that were at the Stokin’ the Fire BBQ Festival at the historical Sloss Furnace in Birmingham today.

Some teams wear rather outlandish costumes, some at least matching T-Shirts and some don’t care at all about fashion.

The BBQ rigs you see there range from the ubiquitous black drum to machines that require a Ph.D. to operate. All recipes are of course of the cosmic secret variety and espionage is punishable by banishment to New York, where they think that BBQ is just some meat you put on a grill.

For the seventh year now, the good folks at the Sloss Furnace have put together this Festival, and last year the grand prize winner actually came from Madison. Not that this is the least bit surprising – this here is, after all, the BBQ Nirvarna.

But some other folks, not from North Alabama, can cook real good BBQ, too. And at this festival, you can sample a lot of different styles.

The smell alone is worth the seventeen bucks they want from you at the entrance – after a few hours wandering around, sampling, chatting, and listening to the live music, your clothes will be soaked with the fragrance of smoked pork and burnt hickory.

As I write this, sitting here and still having the smell in my nose, although I showered and discarded my clothes hours ago, the results of the competition are not yet online. But I am sure that the winner is totally worthy of that honor – and it would be no surprise if they came from this neck of the woods, again.