Day 310: Poor Richard's

For the past four years, my husband has been competing in barbecue competitions around the state and Wyoming.  The number he attends depends on the busyness of the summer.  This year he traveled to Miles City, Absorkee, Worland, Wyoming, and Bozeman.  Our middle child helped with Miles City.  The daughter helped with Absorkee.  The two of them melded as a well oiled machine.  This weekend the team did amazing.

At the Bozeman competition, the night before the teams have the opportunity to sell whatever they want.  Jerry decided brisket sliders with coleslaw.  Madelle wanted smoked smores bites.  They asked me to tag along to help with the selling if needed.  Madelle was getting over a cold and wasn't sure how she would do with the social aspect of working with customers. 

Madelle was brilliant!!!  She took orders, prepared the sliders, chatted with customers, took the coins, and stayed calm during the long lines.  I was so very proud of the kid.  And her wanting the smoked smores bites was outstanding.  The two pans Jerry made with a little help from me sold out.  I made a third pan.  All sold out all in the first two hours.  Jerry made two briskets and two batches of coleslaw which sold out at the same time.  There was still an hour left.  We had to close up shop.  Rest assured, next year will be three briskets and five to six pans of smores and maybe another item or two.

The event was surreal to me.  I have never wanted to work in the food industry.  Maybe baking, but not fulltime.  I like to bake when I feel inspired, not on demand.  With that said, I do watch all the food shows that Jerry likes.  The one we watched a lot was the Next Food Network Star.  I felt like I was in the middle of that show Friday evening.  We were rushing to get everything ready in the cambros.  Then when the food started to run out, I rushed around getting the third pan made of the smores while Jerry rushed around to get more coleslaw.  Unfortunately, we had no more brisket or chocolate.  And all the things that go wrong during the show?  Yep, we had that happen.  The outside temperature was too warm for the chocolate chips.  They melted when I was chopping them up in the food processor.  The machine gummed up something fierce.  I almost dumped melted butter all over.  In fact, I almost dumped coleslaw all over as well.  Crazy.  I would prefer to never do that again.

With that last statement said, I am already volunteering to take over the smores project for next year.  In fact, I am thinking of using my dad's propane smoker to practice different ideas that we all have for selling.  Yes, I am a glutton for punishment because by the end of the evening, I could barely move I hurt so bad.  That is some major work.  My RA hated it!

The best part, Madelle and Jerry took second place in the rib division on Saturday.  I am so proud of them.  They took eleventh overall.  I believe there were twenty-nine teams all together.  They are doing so great as a team.  This is the first win.  And what is super cool as well is that they competed under the banner of their newly created catering business Poor Richard's Barbecue.  I only see great things in store for them in the next five years that will only get bigger and better after that.  Good job!!!