Tim and I are now certified judges for the FL BBQ Association! Anne also attended the training but we had our 12 year old with us so she ran herd on him today rather than let him loose in a carnival for 4 hours. I'm hoping she can be certified in January!
Met some folks, learned some things -- still don't have the "winning solution" but at least we have some idea of what the rest of the association is cooking. Naturally, we were at different tables so we got to look at a total of 11 boxes between us. We were all encouraged to talk amongst ourselves AFTER each category -- learned a lot. Our table captain, of course, took a look at all the score sheets as we turned in and would ask why someone was high or low just so we could all sanity check ourselves.
Overall scoring was pretty tight but there was outstanding to "you gotta be kidding me" food in all categories.
Nothing jumped up and told me we couldn't produce winning que -- so we'll be regrouping and on running the FBA cirucit in 2005 - getting to as many events as we can.
We also got some ideas about rigs, rig configuration, trucks, concession setups, etc. I'm negotiating with a builder for a cooker and concession setup - hopefully I'll get the first estimate next week. Tim and I are really looking hard at concession/vending at these events - if we have the help (read that as the spouses) to help us do the sales we should be able to easily make up meat and registration costs -- and probably line the coffers at bigger events.
We're working through menu options and let's just say we won't be selling $2.00 ribs in a hot dog tray!
Overall, a pretty good weekend!