As the sun begins to peer over the horizon, the team has been working for hours. The smell of the fires make the cookers feel at home. Pits of all shapes and sizes fill the parking lot as the cook-off starts to take shape. Brisket, ribs, chicken and beans are what is on the minds and menus of the students as they plan, cook and turn in their masterpieces.
The Pit Kats will be in Fort Worth this weekend at the High School BBQ Regional Cook-off. This is a chance for the team to show off their skills and learn new things as they continue their experience as a team.
“We get on site at 4:30 a.m. and start cooking at 6 a.m.,” sophomore Hadlee Davis said. “We are turning in brisket, ribs, chicken, beans and dessert. I am the team captain, and this weekend I’ll be smoking brisket, but I’ve made all of them for competition before.”
The team has a few seasoned cookers on the team. Davis is joined by another cooker with experience, sophomore Eli Majkszak. He comes from a family of barbecuers.
“I joined the BBQ team because my dad did BBQ for a long time,” Majkszak said. “I love to do it.”
Cooking and seasoning the meat is a big step to success, but time management is one of the toughest aspects of a competition cooking team. If a team gets the meat done too early, it can get dried out, but if you don’t reach the right temperature at the right time, cookers could have to turn a substandard entry.
“The most challenging parts of BBQ are time management, especially when it gets down to turn in time, and knowing how and when to pivot when things go wrong,” Davis said. “We start cooking at 6 a.m. and everyone has their own task, but you need to know what to do with the time you’re given. In BBQ it can seem hard to fix mistakes or know when to cut your losses and try something else, but no mistake can’t be fixed.”
Since this is the team’s first competition together, there is a lot to be learned. The basics of good barbecue does not change, but every competition and every judge look for little things to separate the winners from the other competition.
“The best BBQ in my opinion is ribs,” Majkszak said. “I have not learned anything so far but I hope I can soon.”
As the cookers start their day early and turn in the meat, beans and dessert, the will look to their prior experience when things get tough. These students has generations of cookers and their experience guiding their decisions.
“I grew up around BBQ and doing competitions with my dad,” Davis said. “He got his passion from his dad, and I got mine from him. BBQ has always been in my life, and my dad has always been my biggest mentor.”
