Back to the Future Part 2: BBQ competitions & Myron Mixon
By Jeff Finger
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Photo submitted by Jeff Finger
A younger Myron Mixon on his way to BBQ fame. |
This is the second of 3 articles concerning one Georgia boy’s take on the history, current state, and future of the BBQ tradition.
Last month I wrote of growing up in Oconee County, Georgia, and relishing the Union Christian Church’s annual BBQ. I spoke of playing in the creek at Harris Shoals Park while some local politician pulled pork from the cinder block pits, and the fact that in almost every single public park, a cinder block pit was available for community use.
Church functions, school functions, political functions, civic and community group functions, as well as family reunions, they all involved BBQ off the pit.
As such, within each community, the pitmasters who worked the cheap, tough meat into such a wonderous delight often gained a local reputation of epic proportions. Local BBQ becomes tradition, and each individual area that you visit has the absolute best. If you don’t believe me, just ask the folks who live there.
The competition circuit evolved from this “social and political force” – the quest to determine who and what really is the best.
Was it Mr. Poss, whose “sammich” was part of every Bulldog football Saturday? Was it Zeb Dean’s chopped delight? Or, was it Mr. Huff’s sliced wonder with a side of hash?
In the mid-90s, I returned from Washington, DC, to work in the district office of my hometown’s Congressman. As part of my welcome home, my Dad took me to this emerging phenomenon known as the BBQ cookoff.
He had been taken to his first one by Carl Gooch, a close family friend who in his youth had helped his uncle cook whole hogs on the pit for the local fire department. We all became “Certified Judges” and were off to enjoy some Q.
I believe it was at the Jonesboro Beaux Arts Cookoff where my Dad first introduced me to a recent addition to these competitions, Myron Mixon. He had signed up to compete as a way of trying to help sell a little more of his Dad’s BBQ Sauce – Jack’s Old South.
Still to this day, his entries were some of the best, if not the best, BBQ I’ve ever put in my mouth, especially when, as the rules allowed, I had the choice of combining it with his Dad’s vinegar sauce.
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Photo submitted by Jeff Finger
Still using my Dad’s old smoker. He was a pistol & I’m a son of a gun. |
Myron had grown up in the Georgia BBQ culture; his Dad sold pit cooked BBQ from his general store in Vienna, where, as was often the case in those days, you had to get there early “‘cause when it’s gone, it’s gone.”
With his heritage of BBQ knowledge, especially of the whole hog, Myron, well you know the story, would capture three world championships and become “the winningest man in barbecue.” Myron became the local Georgia boy done good and was all over the TV talking about “gettin’ paid.”
Next thing you know, everyone is on the bandwagon. Heck, I even started my own team, Sho’ My Butt BBQ Team. Mama always said: “Boy, you been sho’n’ yo butt since you entered this world!”
While I’ve never received a podium call, I have had some good days, even have a very rare score sheet showing me beating Jack’s Old South one time in ribs.
But I’ve watched the circuit move from an event which often featured regional flair and was a competition of great BBQ styles to a contest that is a competition of just one style. Vinegar is out; mustard is out; ribs that don’t meet the taught “bite” criteria are out.
I don’t know how to solve the problem. And I don’t know which came first – the chicken: a huge influx of judges looking for a perceived standard instead of the best eatin’ BBQ, or the egg: teams who strive for the sweetest sugar shock and call it “good.”
I do know, however, that the shocking statement award would go to a winning Pitmaster – not from these parts – who stated on TV: “In the south, they like a lot of sugar, almost candy sweet BBQ.”
What???? After I got off the floor, I wondered to which part of the south he was referring – the vinegar regions of North Carolina and Georgia? The mustard regions of South Carolina and west Georgia? Alabama’s mayo sauce? Was he taught that? By whom?
For in my neck of the southern woods, if we want candy, we’ll take a King Leo Peppermint Stick, not that Pitmaster’s “rib” sugar stick. ‘Round these parts, we want a vinegary peppery kick, like Mr. Zeb’s, with our Q!
If you insist on using all that sugar, put it in the tea. I’ve never had Sweet Tea (that’s redundant around here) that’s too sweet!
All this saddens me, and I just continue to advise those in the competition business, “Better be careful, if your ‘Grand Champion’ product is one that’s so far removed from what the local folks would actually eat, you’re going to lose credibility.”
I’ve experimented with this theory a little myself here recently, offering some local folks my non-injected pork with a selection of sauces, sweet and vinegar. Well, you wouldn’t believe it, but they seemed to overwhelmingly pick the one rejected by the trained judges.
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Photo submitted by Jeff Finger
Jeff & Family: From Zeb’s to Memphis, a journey in BBQ. |
I’ve also watched quite a few BBQ restaurant chains pop up around these parts attempting to take advantage of an opportunity. They surge into town, ride the current popularity wave, only to fade away, while those that seem to survive the test of time are often family joints that have been catering to local tastes for years. They’ve become institutions.
Someone once told me, “When your name is on the door, you’re the one standing by the smoker, and you’re feeding the people who live next door to you, you can bet you’ll put forth your best to uphold your reputation.”
For the few folks who have actually read my collection of National Barbecue News columns (thanks Mom!), you know that for me, BBQ is about values, most importantly, tradition.
It’s a craftsman virtue that I’m afraid of losing to today’s mass media and homogeneous production, all in the name of efficiency. Next month we’ll conclude with hope for the future. |
