BBQ Freinds...

Wiley McCrary & Stumps Smokers

And one of the best things you'll ever put in your mouth... Brisket Sliders

Originally written in 2009:

Dear BBQ Friend:

Well... we took another Grand Championship at the Pigs & Peaches Festival in Kennesaw, GA a couple of weeks ago. We took first place in ribs again. I'm happy to see our rib scores doing well again. Ribs has always been our best category. We had a great time at the contest. I lived in that area for 15 years and I had a lot of friends visit and eat some great BBQ. And that's what BBQ is all about... cooking and eating great food with your friends and family.

Speaking of friends, I had the pleasure of attending a little BBQ cooking school put on by Wiley McCrary. Many of you may know Wiley & Janet - they are veterans of the competition BBQ circuit and have many awards under their belt. Even though I have had much success lately in BBQ contests, I thought I could learn a thing or two from this champion. And I'm glad I did. I had a great time. If you ever see him offering a BBQ cooking school for $75, jump on it. And if you are ever in Savannah, be sure to check out their restaurant... Wiley's Championship BBQ. What I like about Wiley's is he only knows one way to cook BBQ and it's the same way he cooks in contests. I swear, his BBQ is better than mine! His brisket sliders are fantastic! Their menu and all the details on how to get there are at their web site www.wileyschampionshipbbq.com

The Brisket Slider & Au Jus

I had my first brisket slider at Wiley's restaurant and it was to die for! Before I tell you how to make a brisket slider, let's talk about how to get that all important au jus. We start with injecting the brisket with a good au jus sauce - we have a good recipe in the book Competition BBQ Secrets , but any good au jus sauce will work. Cook the brisket as you normally do and place an aluminum pan under the brisket to catch the juices (if you have an upper and lower rack). If you are a "foiler", you can place the brisket fat side down in an aluminum pan about half way through your smoke and cover the top tightly with foil. If you don't like to foil, just place the brisket in an open foil pan fat side down. You can add a small amount of apple juice or au jus injection to the pan if you want. But what you are looking to capture is the juices that cook out of the meat. Strain them into a fat separator, let settle for a couple of minutes, and pour off your au jus being careful not to get any fat in your au jus. Keep it hot. We dredge each slice through this hot au jus before placing in the turn in box at BBQ competitions. If you are cooking at home, just pour it over your sliced brisket.

Brisket Sliders Recipe:

• Buy some good yeast rolls or dinner rolls and slice them open
  
• Quickly dip the cut open side of the top in your hot au jus sauce
  
• Put a slice of warm brisket on the roll and start eatin'
  

More friends... old Walter "Stump" McDowell was camped out across from us at the Kennesaw contest. He had the Que-N-View trailer with him that he help build. It's all decked out with Stumps smokers. Not only that - this rig has 3 wide screen TVs on the exterior of the trailer and a portable inflatable 20 foot projection TV screen! It's the coolest BBQ party trailer I have ever seen! If you live within 400 miles of Atlanta, you can rent this wonderful BBQ trailer for your next party. Visit www.que-n-view.com for more info.

Stump has been busy lately and has a really nice line of insulated gravity fed charcoal smokers. He can do anything from a Baby Stump to a Platinum 6 mounted on an open trailer to a fully customized catering trailer built from the ground up. Stump is top quality all the way. a lot of the best BBQ teams use stumps like Rub of Swamp Boys and Bubba of Bubba-Que. Speaking of Bubba, he has a new restaurant in Woodstock, GA in addition to his original restaurant in Jasper, GA. Check it out if you are in that neck of the woods. For more information on Stumps Smokers, visit www.stumpssmokers.com

Here's a video of the Kennesaw contest with some pictures of the Que-N-View, Stump, our BBQ turn in boxes, team sites, etc...

Recently, a Team out in California won all 1st place in all 4 categories and Grand Champion. The team is Slap Yo Daddy and here's a tip for everybody... they did it using only Weber Smokey Mountain bullet smokers!It's not what you cook on as much as how you do it. Weber Smokey Mountains are relatively cheap when compared to big offset smokers. I really like the newer 22.5" WSM smoker. You can fit a whole lot of meat on that thing! So if you are looking to buy a really good smoker for competition or back yard use, I would start looking at Weber products like the one's in our BBQ Store.

Sincerely,

Bill Anderson