This year's check in was much more organized than last year. Clearly they learned some lessons last year and everything ran much more smoothly. About a quarter til they came through, scanned tickets, attached wristbands, checked IDs for alcohol sales, and did security checks on bags. When the magic hour of 1 pm arrived, we went straight to the food with no waiting. That was a nice change from last year where all the check ins happened during the VIP magic hour, not before.
We were first in line at Schmidt Family BBQ and got the first slices off a fresh brisket. After that we wandered around to the BBQ booths gathering a couple of samples at a time then checking them out at the well placed tables near the booth. We never had a problem finding a spot to chow down.
There were only 10 BBQ joints in attendance but the food was uniformly good. Standouts to my taste were Black's brisket and garlic sausage, Schmidt Family's brisket, and Louie Mueller's always excellent jalapeno sausage. Heim brought along some candied pork belly, which was an interesting diversion. Not a single rib appeared, which seemed a little strange, but understandable when you can trim tiny samples of brisket, but a rib is a rib and a little tougher to divide. Looking back at last year's event, only Hutchins had ribs.
In addition to the BBQ joints, there were a number of chefs with items that were neither smoked or BBQ. Most I skipped, I got my fill with the excellent BBQ being served, but I did have to try a couple of items. The fried quail did nothing for me but I did like the big shrimp and grits. The shrimp seemed to be grilled, not smoked, but whatever it was, I do like shrimp. The dessert from Haute Sweets was good enough I had to go back for seconds before they let in the general admission folks.
All in all it was a delicious day in a beautiful park with lots of places to sit in the shade and chow down some tasty Q.
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