The Barbecue Diary – part 2

Ricky Ginsburg (former head cook of The Boca Boys)

Friday morning 4am… I’m sitting at my desk checking e-mail when I remember at least eleven things I forgot to pack last night. One of these days I’m going to update my checklist.

Friday morning 5am… I thought I would go back to sleep for a couple of hours…

Friday morning 5:15am… I’m back at my desk checking e-mail again, and yes, there were 2 more things that I forgot to put in the truck.

Friday morning 7:30am… I’m on the road again (Willie Nelson?) Did I mention that we weren’t going to leave until 9am? My neighbor who will double as the other half of the Boca Boys cook team this weekend is slumped over in the passenger seat tying his sneakers and describing me in several quite interesting terms, most of them involving farm animals.

Have you spent much time on the Florida Turnpike? I’ve gotten pretty good at calculating our arrival time based on distance and my desperate attempt to make a fully packed Chevy S10 pickup truck travel at sub-light speeds. For example, you might think it takes 1 hour to go 60 miles. No, I can do 60 miles in under 40 minutes once we get north of Martin County or if we don’t stop for Cinn-a-buns. And since I always fill up with cheap gas in Broward County on Thursday night, I don’t have to stop for over-priced gas on an already over-priced highway. The real America lies several miles to either side of most major highways. Today’s journey will be no exception. FHP will let you cruise at exciting speeds on the Turnpike, but the local sheriff will take pride in giving you a souvenir of your visit to his county if you so desire. We’re only a few miles away from the contest site and the price of gas is even better here than Broward. Might as well fill up now so we’re ready for our return trip tomorrow night.

Friday afternoon… Great location for a barbecue contest. We’ve got a one hundred year old oak tree over our cook site for shade and the shortest walk to both the turn-in table and the rest rooms – real rest rooms, with air conditioning! I’ve got most of the cook site setup before I wake up my assistant who is still referring to me in some un-neighborly terms. He’s headed off to the rest rooms and then a cold beer before we prep meat. (That’s a funny term to me. All my life I would cook a meal. I never used the term “prep” other than when I worked in the hospital. Now I “prep” food, “prep” for a trip, “prep” to get out bed in the morning, and “prep” to have a scotch in the evening.)

With the meat prepped and the fire started for dinner, I can finally sit and relax. My assistant, who is onto his third cold beer of the afternoon, is setting up his tent and blowing up the air mattress at the same time; neither is going quite well. I grab my bottle of scotch and leave him to his tasks. Several sites down the row a cook team has setup chairs and is serving hot food. I’ve got my meal ticket in my hand.

… to be continued.