OMG! We became 'Best Belgian'!

 

 

The title above seems like pure clickbait, but a lot happened before we got to that conclusion

 

The Eastern BBQ Contest 2022, excellently organized by the BBQ team Wettels on fire, is a double competition (2 in a row, a back to back, double trouble) and a direct attack on your lack of sleep, your mental state of mind, but it takes you so hard out of reality and into this traveling BBQ circus that you also have to detox afterwards (and catch up on sleep)

 

It was again my first double competition, in which the preparation took the necessary time again. At the load in of the first competition of Lommel the wheel of my smoker broke off, so it first spent a week at the welder to repair this. Immediately also had some small changes/improvements made, and they have greatly improved the user-friendliness, so thank you WP Construct from Kruibeke, for arranging this so quickly.

 

Match Day 1.

Woke up at 3am and noticed it was really cold that night.

I light the fire and heat up the smoker. We warm ourselves by the fire.

Few words are said. The sleep in our eyes.

 

The cook is intense and we try to do everything as well as possible.

We had to change something especially at the ribs, so that got special attention.

Overall very pleased with what we had submitted and then the long wait began until the awards ceremony.

I noticed some nervousness in myself, because I couldn't estimate what it would be like.

Will we score again, or will we completely fail?

We hope each time that we are as consistent as possible, because 1 bad category result has a huge impact on your final result.

 

First category: Chicken

We are not mentioned in the top 10. Can happen, no problem. Didn't feel like our strongest turn in either. No drama. Maybe we were ^11th ?

 

Category Ribs

The moment of truth. Would our choices and changes have been successful?

“4th place: Barbecoa”, says the jury.

Yes! It worked!

Great relief and joy!

 

Category Pork

Here too we were actually very pleased, but that is no guarantee of a good result. We become ^8th , and are quite pleased with that.

 

Category Brisket.

We were very pleased with what we had delivered, nice dark bark, nice smoke ring, good taste, tender… yes that one had not gone wrong

But no mention. Still a bit surprised.

 

Finally the overall ranking is announced, and with a ^4th and ^8th place I expected a top 10 place. But it remained quiet.

We fell outside the top 10.

And then the mindfuck begins… 'huh?'

 

When looking at the points we notice that they ended up particularly low for Chicken and Brisket and that is why we did not end up in the top 10. For Chicken we were even second to last.

It is now 9:30 pm and everything needs to sink in.

Dimi and I take some time to think and decide to do a few things differently for day 2.

 

I light the smoker again and crawl into my sleeping bag and try to let everything sink in my head for a moment.

 

 

 

Match Day 2

 

4:20. And I crawl out of my sleeping place half broken.

It is still very quiet, and you can hear the hum of some pellet smokers.

A light snore here and there.

BBQ land is still sleeping.

 

I feel relaxed. Nothing to lose.

A very big difference from the day before, but much more pleasant.

The cooking went surprisingly smoothly and even the Easter Bunny stopped by.

We paid special attention to what needed improvement and submitted everything on time again.

Conclusion: yes, that reality check on day 1 was necessary, because this was better.

Chicken was much tastier than day 1 and brisket looked nicer too.

But that doesn't mean anything. If the jury doesn't like it, the only thing you can do is mentally pull yourself together.

 

In addition, on this second day of competition, 5 additional teams participated, so the competition became more difficult.

 

Category Chicken:

They start with the top 10 to shout:

Place no 10: Barbecoa

“aaaaah” phew! Relief and joy. We pushed it back in the right direction.

 

Category Ribs

With that 4th ^place on day 1 we hoped that we would score well again but we didn’t hear our name… until suddenly we were called: again 4th ^place ! Awesome!

Category Pork

We thought we had handed in a slightly nicer box than the day before.

No mention. Doubt strikes again.

I notice a slight disappointment in myself, but that's okay.

 

 

Category Brisket.

What if we score badly again? But we didn't get much time to think about that, because the score was going fast.

6th ^place : Barbecoa!

Yes, again good, but most importantly we knew what we changed and why.

And know that we can and will do even better.

 

 

Wow! 3 entries in the top 10, with a very strong field of participants

Teams from the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Sweden and Denmark alongside established and motivated teams from our country… Not bad for this starting team J

 

 

The best was yet to come…

 

But wait a minute: if our pork didn't fall far from that top 10, we might actually have a high final ranking...

 

Overall: 7th

Not bad, even very good if you know that there were some champions from other countries present. Some with almost 100 matches on their counter.

 

We ^7th … and we kept hearing teams from our neighboring countries calling…

 

Would it?

Yes! We are Best Belgian on day 2!

 

Because we only do the Belgian competitions, this is an extra point of attention for us.

 

And then that extra: Invitation for the Jack

As the best Belgian team you will receive an invitation for the draw for the Jack.

The Jack is a BBQ competition at Jack Daniels in America.

And is invitational only. So you can't sign up for it and it is a very nice experience if you can eventually end up on the Jack.

 

At the end of this season a draw will determine which of the Belgian teams will go and now we have our chance!

 

This whole BBQ adventure is a gift that keeps on giving.

I learn so much, meet so many wonderful passionate people, and every time you achieve something I thought was impossible, a door opens and even more possibilities arise….

 

 

Of course I have to thank the sponsors:

Carmans / Atelier Francois for delivering such beautiful pieces of meat that help us achieve such great results.

Big Green Egg to provide us with a tent (which almost blew away this weekend)

Red Bull for the wings

 

And of course, my teammate Dimi who takes this whole adventure to a higher level.

Be sure to check out his Braai take away, because he also delivers to your home!

 

 

Next Stop May 14, in Aaltert