Ole Hickory Pits and Class

We have ordered a Ole Hickory Ace BP from Big Poppa Smokers. I have a business meeting in St Louis this weekend. When checking the Ole Hickory Pits site I saw that "The Legend" Mike Mills was doing a cooking class at Ole Hickory Pits the same weekend I was to be in town for the meeting. Changed the plane reservations so I could attend the class on Saturday and arrange with others in the company to shoot some Skeet on Sunday. Will be driving from St Louis to Cape Girardeau for the class and plan a side trip to Mike's 17th Street BBQ restaurant. My wife and I met Mike Mills at King of the Smokers competition (Nice Man). I can't remember looking forward to a business meeting this much.(Business Meeting Monday, Red eye home).

Photos from Class

Here are some photos from class. No photos are allowed where they build the smoker. We did get the tour and the build quality is impressive.
First a whole hog on a CTO DW. Two can fit in this cooker


Slicing up some meat for lunch



Loading some chicken in a CTO style cooker



Getting ready to load some ribs up in the start of class. we ate them at the end.

This class is geared for folks that have Ole Hickory Pits as it covers how to cook the different meats on the cookers. Meat prep and presentation and tips for those in food service. Glad I went. If I didn't already have a Ole Hickory Pits Ace BP on order from Big Poppa Smokers. I would have placed a order.

Ole Hickory Pits Ace BP

Our Ole Hickory Pits Ace BP arrived Friday. The cargo weight is 860 pounds.I was able to but the wheels one at a time and roll it to the backyard without assistance.




cooked some deboned chicken thighs first. Traditional Butter in pan etc.



They came out real good very juicy.

Next cook was 6 racks of lion back ribs. You can easy get 5 lion back on each pull out rack. In these photos there are three to a rack as the ribs were done two ways one with foil and one without. The one with foil had Zero to Hero rub and Big Poppa Smokers Money and finished with IPO Barbecue sauce. The non foiled ribs had 17th Street Barbecue Magic Dust for a rub and their regular BBQ sauce.



After foiling the 3 racks I added a cut up chicken quarters with Simply Marvelous Spicy Apple Rub.



Here we are saucing the ribs. I sauce them and let them sit out for 15-20 minutes. The sauce the meat side one more time and back on the pit. A lot neater this way.





I was on a time crunch so cut up photos I don't have this time. The cooked chicken I put in the refrigerator. I wish I had the time to taste the chicken as the skin did not feel like rubber closer to crisp.

Two days in still figuring out the proper amount or Kingsford to load and how much to light.Once it gets to temp it just seems to stay there and the fan that can stoke the fire doesn't seem to run much once it has the Ace BP at temp. We cooked at 225. The Ribs were great. Foil or not foiled didn't seem to matter much. The non foiled ones were spritzed with water three times while the others were wrapped up.Learned the non foiled recipe in the Ole Hickory Pits Class.Which I just outlined, it is that easy.Not spicy enough for a comp rib. Entertaining at parties it is a good all around flavor, which explains why Mike Mills uses it in his restaurants.

This is a scary cooker. I don't know how or why it works so good, some sort of applied science. If we were going to compete in competition. I would find a way to get this beast on a trailer. I am guessing you will see more teams using these as time goes on. I am glad we got ours when we did, it will be great for our summer parties and BP had some in the pipeline which meant the wait wasn't as long. Next weekend Brisket. Am I nuts for buying a cooker like this for the backyard? Until today I might have agreed. Now I am happy we did. It is fitting that it sits next to our MAK Grill as the workmanship of these two units are very similar.

First and foremost Big Poppa is a friend of ours and a friend of Barbecue.
The MAK and Ole Hickory Pits Ace BP we did buy from Bog Poppa Smokers the others were from forum posts here on the Brethren. I think Bigmista is using a Ole Hickory Pits in their new restaurant. Rib fest at the Bigmista Q will be good! On the rib color on the ribs I did the ones on the right with the 17th Street BBQ sauce. That sauce is a burnt orange color as you can see on the far right rib. Wouldn't win any appearance scores on the Left Coast..

Just want to add the next two weeks there is a $500 price reduction if anyone is thinking about one it just got a little easier.