Windy City BBQ Classic - KCBS Sanctioning, flowers in a box, etc..

[rubbbq]

So like any good event, this past weekend had some drama to it...anyone who cooked it knows what I'm talking about - but for those who don't, here goes:

1) Our contest rules have always been slightly different than KCBS - no gas, no electric, no gurus, no pellets, no garnish restrictions, to name a few

2) This year we allowed gurus and pellets, but our rules surrounding garnish and sauce stayed the same:
http://www.windycitybbqclassic.com/uploads/1/6/2/9/16291380/wcbc_competition_rules_2014.pdf (see garnish rule - "Garnish is optional, judges are instructed to judge MEAT ONLY")

3) A team turned in 2 of their boxes with edible flowers & peppers (colorful), and someone posted pics during the contest on Facebook (which will be an automatic DQ next year - no box pics online until after contest)

So this was a stretch of what I think should be in a box for garnish, but since we didn't restrict garnish - it went through. FYI - comments on the cards in said box all viewed the flowers as "a distraction from meat" "Didn't look like an appropriate turn in box" and "Lose the flowers". So anyone who thinks this team benefitted from the colorful garnish - you're just simply wrong, if anything - they lost points.

What I will say this brought to a head was the need to be sanctioned. Y'all cook in KCBS contest all year, you're used to their rules, their scoring, you trust their judges, etc.

2014 was a great year - we raised $10,000 for Operation BBQ Relief, we had some great competitors, great restaurants, beer was flowing freely, live music, etc.

2015 will be KCBS Sanctioned, and I can let them run the scoring/judging while I do the 9,000,000 other things an event organizer does to make one of these go smoothly.

2015 will also have a different layout, with more electricity access and easier access to water

2015 will still include: Free beer! Free Moonshine! Free Tito's cocktails! Free food! Ribs & Chicken provided! Fantastic opening dinner! Live music and lots of money/trophies given out..

all in all, another great year - our 3rd....here's to another 30

thank you to all who came, and we look forward to next year

Jared Leonard
Windy City BBQ Classic

 

[Wampus]

I'd say if garnish was optional and completely unrestricted, then anything goes.
Not sure what the drama would be about. Everyone knew the rules going in right?


GREAT JOB raising $10K for OBR by the way. Outstanding! That, in and of itself, should be applauded!!

 

[3hmbbq]

Going to KCBS Sanctioning will be a great step in the right direction. It fixes many issues.
This is from your rules handout:
10)The four(4) categories will be turned in the following order:
CHICKEN: NOON
PORK RIBS: 1:00 pm
PORK Shoulder: 3:00 pm
BEEF BRISKET: 4:00 pm
The allowable turn-in time will be five
(5) minutes before to five(5) minutes
after the posted time with no tolerance.

However, Teams that brought their boxes to judging at 5 til were put into a line and were not accepted until the top of the hour hit. That meant many teams were holding their entries for 5-10 minutes in line, their meat getting colder with each passing tick.

*Also, not near enough judges or judging tables. After receiving my score cards, I see all my meat went to the same table. If that table was judging lower all day, I had no chance from the beginning.(I'm not saying that I was going to win at a different table, I'm not sure if I won with my own team)

As for the flower/veggie issue:
14) The container shall not be marked in any way so as to make the container unique or identifiable. Aluminum foil, toothpicks, skewers, foreign material, and/or stuffing are prohibited in the container.
11) Garnish is optional. If used, it is limited to chopped, sliced, shredded or whole leaves of fresh green lettuce, curly parsley, flat leaf parsley and/or cilantro.

That pretty much sums up that they shouldn't have been allowed at all. You had the rules in place, you just didn't follow through with them.

Event
Beautiful setting. Watching the sun rise and reflect off the skyline through tails of pit smoke was something to behold.

You already mentioned changing the layout, GREAT! and the electricity issue, GREAT! and the water issue, GREAT!

As a competitor we were told that we would be given a table to use. Why weren't they brought to our site? I wasn't going to lug those large wooden tables 200 yards to my spot. Point is every team preps and has their own tables. Save the rental fee and lower the entry fee.
We were all given 5 racks of ribs and 5 whole Amish Chickens. Thank you. But most competitors will always bring their own meat as they are not going to leave to chance they might not get the quality they are looking for. Thanks for the meat, but save the money and lower the entry fee.
You mentioned next year will still have all the free food and all the free drink. When? They only served from 11-3, right in the middle of our competition. I finished with my last box and walked to Tito's to find them closed. As for the spectators and festival goers, I can't believe they were happy spending $100 for a 3 hour event. Music til 6 but food and drink stops at 3?

Lastly, the Friday night dinner is a nice thought. Bring people together in the name of BBQ. I understand you had a power issue and there were no lights at that time, but if there would have been a proper tent with tables and lighting we could have found power. The organization was nil from the hog to the potluck. Nobody put anyone in lines and you couldn't see what foods were in front of you. 2 of my group did not eat due to food allergies and they could not see what they were putting in their basket. 4 tables and 25 chairs? really? Everyone had to grab some food and go back to their site to sit and see what they gathered. We were happy to bring a dish and enjoyed all of the wonderful options that other brought. We would have really enjoyed sitting with everyone to eat and celebrate the weekend. (And I want my serving utensils back that were taken)

 

[Fat Freddy]

I have no dawg in this fight and am speaking only as an outsider looking in. What I read in the rules said about garnish that judges are to judge meat only. And that is how it should be but an almost daily look here on Brethren or other areas like BBQ Critic and Facebook shows that is not the case. And while there were not any real rules regarding garnish I would bet over 99% of competitors WOULD have an issue with colorful flowers being included. Also I understand your comments about posting pics of turn in boxes, but in my opinion that is way over regulating. I personally dont have time to post pics before turn ins but i have seen it done by many others at many different contests. And honestly who is going to watch for this you yourself already said you have over 9,000,000 things to do but now you are going to spend the time between each turn in watching every aspect of social media and for every team? Now if some of this was brought up at cooks meeting and everyone was on level playing field the I just need to hush, but I am honestly trying just to point out things.

There were two originally very well thought of non sanctioned contests not to far from where I live. One originally was getting 65 teams. And one who got 20-25 but was on same days as 2 big KCBS contests withing 3 hours. Anyways they allowed rules to be "bent" or taken advantage of and the one for the last 3 years the first one struggles to get 30 and the other one got 10 teams and probably wont happen this year....my point being something happened not good and it hurt both of these non sanctioned contests. To me it sounds like you are trying to be proactive as to what changes you would like to make, and I can agree with you. And you are willing to use this as a learning experience. But honestly I think the flower thing would have irritated the chit out of me. And to stop what damage may be happening if any you might want to send a non generic email or letter to the teams involved this year explaining your position. I think the majority would accept, still might not be happy, but accept..and then next year make sure it is repeated numerous times in cooks meeting and judges meeting.

 

[Scottie]

The rules we received stated that garnish was limited to lettuce, parsley, cilantro, etc. Same as KCBS. Nothing I received had different rules. There were enough KCBS cooks that were at the contest to also question. The team thst turned in also cooks KCBS events.There also wasn't a cooks meeting, they lost power to main stage. Although, I have been to many cooks meeting with more than 40 teams and the people talking didn't have mics.

I did have a good time. Free Lagunitas and Moonshine on Friday night was awesome!

 

[rev0jace]

Too bad I missed this year but was wife's bday weekend. Looking forward to next year.

 

[Fat Freddy]

The rules we received stated that garnish was limited to lettuce, parsley, cilantro, etc. Same as KCBS. Nothing I received had different rules. There were enough KCBS cooks that were at the contest to also question. The team thst turned in also cooks KCBS events.There also wasn't a cooks meeting, they lost power to main stage. Although, I have been to many cooks meeting with more than 40 teams and the people talking didn't have mics.

I did have a good time. Free Lagunitas and Moonshine on Friday night was awesome!

No cooks meeting and there were rules regarding garnish....WOW...:shocked:.....I sure hope the team with flowers was a new team that would have benefited from meeting and/or couldnt read rules.

 

[Ron_L]

So like any good event, this past weekend had some drama to it...anyone who cooked it knows what I'm talking about - but for those who don't, here goes:

1) Our contest rules have always been slightly different than KCBS - no gas, no electric, no gurus, no pellets, no garnish restrictions, to name a few

2) This year we allowed gurus and pellets, but our rules surrounding garnish and sauce stayed the same:
http://www.windycitybbqclassic.com/uploads/1/6/2/9/16291380/wcbc_competition_rules_2014.pdf (see garnish rule - "Garnish is optional, judges are instructed to judge MEAT ONLY")

3) A team turned in 2 of their boxes with edible flowers & peppers (colorful), and someone posted pics during the contest on Facebook (which will be an automatic DQ next year - no box pics online until after contest)

So this was a stretch of what I think should be in a box for garnish, but since we didn't restrict garnish - it went through. FYI - comments on the cards in said box all viewed the flowers as "a distraction from meat" "Didn't look like an appropriate turn in box" and "Lose the flowers". So anyone who thinks this team benefitted from the colorful garnish - you're just simply wrong, if anything - they lost points.

What I will say this brought to a head was the need to be sanctioned. Y'all cook in KCBS contest all year, you're used to their rules, their scoring, you trust their judges, etc.

2014 was a great year - we raised $10,000 for Operation BBQ Relief, we had some great competitors, great restaurants, beer was flowing freely, live music, etc.

2015 will be KCBS Sanctioned, and I can let them run the scoring/judging while I do the 9,000,000 other things an event organizer does to make one of these go smoothly.

2015 will also have a different layout, with more electricity access and easier access to water

2015 will still include: Free beer! Free Moonshine! Free Tito's cocktails! Free food! Ribs & Chicken provided! Fantastic opening dinner! Live music and lots of money/trophies given out..

all in all, another great year - our 3rd....here's to another 30

thank you to all who came, and we look forward to next year

Jared Leonard
Windy City BBQ Classic

Thanks, Jared...

I think moving to a sanctioned competition will help a lot, although there are threads on here every week about judging issues at sanctioned competitions as well.

The layout changes will be a huge improvement.

As far as the garnish, the document that you posted above conflicts with the rules document that was sent to the teams via e-mail (attached)...

11) Garnish is optional. If used, it is limited to chopped, sliced, shredded or whole leaves of fresh green lettuce, curly parsley, flat leaf parsley and/or cilantro.

This is where having a cooks meeting to review the rules would have helped. I know that you ran into electrical issues, but doing it at the start of the dinner wasn't the right time because there was three or four times the number of people there and no one could hear the couple of announcements that were made because of the crowd.

But, we still had a great weekend and Amy and I appreciate that you are listening to us and are willing to make changes to make the competition better going forward.

 

[Jorge]

Also I understand your comments about posting pics of turn in boxes, but in my opinion that is way over regulating. I personally dont have time to post pics before turn ins but i have seen it done by many others at many different contests. And honestly who is going to watch for this you yourself already said you have over 9,000,000 things to do but now you are going to spend the time between each turn in watching every aspect of social media and for every team?

I never gave it any thought, until now. I don't expect an organizer to monitor social media, or the internet in general. But, posting pics prior to judging being complete defeats the blind judging system in theory. Most sites where pics are posted have pretty accurate time stamps as well.

 

[Vindii]

2) This year we allowed gurus and pellets, but our rules surrounding garnish and sauce stayed the same:
http://www.windycitybbqclassic.com/uploads/1/6/2/9/16291380/wcbc_competition_rules_2014.pdf (see garnish rule - "Garnish is optional, judges are instructed to judge MEAT ONLY")

3) A team turned in 2 of their boxes with edible flowers & peppers (colorful), and someone posted pics during the contest on Facebook (which will be an automatic DQ next year - no box pics online until after contest)

If your the organizer why have 2 sets of rules? And why do you link to the one that makes it look like no rules were broken?

As a cook if there's any slight thought that maybe something wasn't fair. We wont ever come back. At least I wouldn't.

 

[ModelMaker]

Too bad I missed this year but was wife's bday weekend. Looking forward to next year.

So you found a way to change your wifes' bday? Or are you changing wives?
Ed

 

[Crash]

So wait, did the flower box team GC?

 

[Ron_L]

Nope

 

[Gowan]

I never gave it any thought, until now. I don't expect an organizer to monitor social media, or the internet in general. But, posting pics prior to judging being complete defeats the blind judging system in theory. Most sites where pics are posted have pretty accurate time stamps as well.

Assuming a KCBS sanctioned event...

Since judges are not allowed to use smartphones during judging I doubt that there would be a problem. Theoretically if a team posted a box picture well before the turn-in time AND a judge happened to be looking at Facebook during a break between categories there could be a problem, but the time window and probability of such would be pretty thin.

Interesting concept though!

 

[MikeJ65]

Assuming a KCBS sanctioned event...

Since judges are not allowed to use smartphones during judging I doubt that there would be a problem. Theoretically if a team posted a box picture well before the turn-in time AND a judge happened to be looking at Facebook during a break between categories there could be a problem, but the time window and probability of such would be pretty thin.

Interesting concept though!

Or you could just tell your buddy a week ahead of time to look for the flowers.