Canadian BBQ Championships:

This year I was fortunate enough to be invited along with three of my closest friends to be a judge at the Canadian BBQ Championships in Whistler BC. I have been waiting with almost agonizing anticipation for this event over the last 5 months or so, and not only did it live up to the hype it actually exceeded my expectations in all aspects. What I tasted, learned, experienced, and the overall fun I had was way beyond what I could have hoped for.

We rolled outta the lower mainland early on the Friday so we would have plenty of time to settle in, check out the sights and get to our BBQ judges class we had to attend that day. The hostel we stayed at had a really great diner attached to it called the Southside Diner. They served up some great breakfast and classic diner fare, I highly recommend grabbin a bite there if you are in town or swingin by.

We rocked over to Dusty's Bar And BBQ where the whole event was taking place in Whistler Creekside, cracked a couple beers on the patio and then took the BBQ class, which was easy and pretty informative, but really really really long. Nevertheless we were all certified PNWBA (Pacific Northwest BBQ Association) BBQ Judges.

So needless to say after a 4 hour class we were more than ready to party it up a bit that night. The bar had a really killer Led Zeppelin tribute that night called "Whole Lotta Led", who tore the house down. They played all the hits and a few really obscure tracks. The lead singer was a big bearded viking lookin dude, who we said was like a hydroxycut Byron Stroud from Fear Factory, and he sang exactly like Robert Plant. Rest of this night is a bit of a blur, that involved many pitchers and pints, ridiculous air guitars and actual pro wrestling moves.

Thankfully after some proper precautionary measures and a good nights sleep non of us were feelin the previous evenings festivities too hard in the morning, so it was up and at em for the first series of events to be judged. First up we judged the Burger competition. There were many good burgers and a few disasters. The winning burger was judged at my table, and was done by Bad Ass BBQ headed up by Dave Mackay. He made a beautifully crafted and well thought out burger that was smoked, stuffed with 3 kinds of cheese, mushrooms and spinach, served on a ciabatta style bun with mayo, crispy prosciutto and frizzy onions. It was perfectly cooked and the best burger I have ever eaten in my entire life. As the winning burger it is going on the menu at Dusty's and I feel really sorry for the cooks that have to prepare that one as the words "labour intensive" don't even begin to do it justice. An example of a disastrous burger was one that my friend got which used an apple fritter as the bun. Bizarre to say the least!

(At this point I have to mention that I don't have any pictures of the judging or the winning products because photography wasn't allowed during the judging.)

Next up we judged the King Of The Grill competition. This was an open event where competitors created a BBQ platter for six. Any ingredient was allowed and there were no rules or restrictions. There were some real hilights in this category for me. One was Ron Shewchuck's cedar planked white salmon that had a bourbon maple glaze. This fish was perfectly cooked, and I would have been happy to pay $30 for a piece of that fish in any restaurant. I was amazed that it didn't win. The second place finish was a "Smoked Alaska". Yep, that's right a smoked version of a baked alaska cake, which had maple and smoked bacon ice cream inside of it. Don't ask me how they did it, but they did. The winner of this event was hometown buy BBQ Bob who did a beef tenderloin with lobster and some form of hollandaise. I didn't get to try this one so I can't really comment on it.

After the judging was over we were free to check out what was going on around the event. One thing we made sure we got a piece of was a whole suckling pig that had been smoked and cooked for over 24 hours. The meat was just unbelievable and the crispy skin was like an explosion of smoky flavour in your mouth. Something I want to try to cook for sure one day soon.

That night we had a few more beers (hey it's a BBQ competition, why wouldn't ya?) and turned in early because we had to be up at 8am the next day for the main events....Pulled Pork, Brisket, Chicken, and Rib competitions.

All of the pulled pork were delicious, making it a really hard category to judge. This was the same case with the chickens. We had to judge all categories on 3 criteria....appearance, texture and taste. And for me in the pork and chicken categories all my texture and taste scores were very high and similar, so it came down to small details like how it looked and how they presented it in the box. goes to show that in food it's the little things that seperate good from great and great from perfect.

The brisket competition had much more discrepancy. There were a couple that were outstanding, a lot that were a bit average and a couple that weren't so good. This is due to the higher degree of difficulty in brisket. It's one of the most difficult cuts of meat to cook properly, but when done correctly it's simply magic. The ribs competition had the same thing on a lesser scale. There were two ribs that I judged that were absolutely perfect, and they were actually the two best ribs I have ever had.

After that it was time to head home, which was bittersweet but the overall experience I had there was amazing. One thing I will say though is that I really can't stand Whistler as a town. I said to one of my friends "If there wasn't an awesome BBQ event going on in this town right now I'd be pulling my hair out." It doesn't even seem real, it's like some snobby yuppies fake paradise. Paved hiking trails, people riding mountain bikes around while drinking their nine dollar Starbucks caramel frappulattemochachinos. It's way too white for even me, and I'm white as hell! Why places like that exist and people starve is beyond my comprehension....

Anyways, before i get going on that too much I'll get back on topic. This experience for me as a chef and a lover of great food was really life changing, and I'm not exaggerating one bit. I had an experience I will never forget with great friends, I opened my mind to a type of cuisine I'm only somewhat familiar with, I got educated on many of the finer points of said cuisine, and I've come back extremely inspired and motivated to cook. Not all of the people in this competition are chefs or are trained....but they are extremely creative cooks and they love what they do. And in the end those are two traits that you cannot teach, and are arguably more important qualities in a cook. I highly recommend that you go next year...I know I will be!

Cradle To Grave, Scythia, 13th Prophet at The Red Room July 27th 2011

Due to the nature of my culinary career, I work evenings. It's just what you have to do to make it in this business. A good busy lunch is of course integral to the success of any restaurant but dinner service is the show. That's where most restaurants make it or break it. So because of that, I don;t get out to shows enough, and even when I do i rarely catch the whole thing. But with Cradle To Grave hittin the stage for the first time in a few years...there was no way I was missin out.

After a frantic closing of my station and a good sprint from the restaurant to the bus, i managed to get to the Red Room for the last 2 or 3 of Scythia's songs, so really not much I can say about their set. I will catch one of their shows in the not too distant future, and obviously i missed 13th Prophet altogether. Next up was Cradle To Grave...

Cradle opened up with Broken God off their latest release "Texas Medicine", which is one of my favourite tracks from them, so I got fired up right off the bat. If you don't have that album I highly suggest you pick it up. It's laden with aggressive riffs, big grooves and well written songs. It's a staple workout soundtrack for me when I'm in the gym too.

Myself I am more familiar with this album than their earlier work, so it was cool for me that their set focused a lot on some of their older tunes, which I haven't heard as much. A big standout for me was "Burn It All". Really cool bass groove with a cool riff over top of it that reminded me a lot of Supernaut by Black Sabbath, and the song itself reminded me a lot of Tank, one of my all time favs, but with a modern twist. They also played an older version of one of my favourite tracks that I first heard on Texas Medicine, Beheaded In Paris, and I personally liked the version they played live better. As We Lay Dying was another killer, just really crushing riffs.

The sound started out a bit muddy during the set but got better really quickly. Denis Barthe has probably one of if not the best guitar tones in the city, and it sounded particularly crushing coming through the massive PA at the Red Room. I was partial to Glenn Chisolms bass tone as well, as a Fender bass through an Ampeg is just pure glory to my ears as a bassist. Vocalist Greg Cavanaugh is like a ramped up version of Oderus Urungus from Gwar with a bit of a Mike Muir swagger and an original voice, and he was on his game vocally this night. Easily one of the best frontmen in town.

All in all one of the better if not the best sets I have seen from a local band in a long long time. They focus on writing riffs and hard hitting grooves rather than trying to just impress with technical playing ability, which is something as an old school metal fan that I really appreciate. Good turnout as well especially for a Wednesday night, as this town is usually asleep by 930 on weekdays. Hope to see more shows from these dudes in 2011 and beyond!