I would like to say that we could not have done it without our awesome Chicken Sponsor, Springer Mountain Farms – who have the absolute BEST chicken in the world. You can order it online from their website or get it at selected Shop Rites in NJ under the Readington Farms label.

You too could cook chicken like us. We use Ribs Within Wahoo Chicken Rub and Ribs Within Rub 4 All – available on this website – and a basic BBQ sauce to finish the chicken. Buy some and let us know what you think.

Keep on Smokin’

Doug

The 3rd place was 4th top 3 finish in a row in Chicken, the first such run we have EVER had. Our 864 KCBS (Kansas City BBQ Society) Chicken points puts us in 101st position after just 4 contests. Our total for chicken in 10 contests last years was 884.

We have a few weeks off until we hit our crazy stretch in July. July 9-11 we will be in North Wildwood, NJ. July 16-17 we will be in Troy, NY, July 23rd we are catering in Boston at Yale Appliance. July 29-30 we will be in Mount Holly, NJ. Aug 6-7 we will be in Manorville (L.I.), NY. We take one weekend off and then go to Highland, NY on Aug 20-22, to end a stretch of  cooking 6 out of 7 weekends! That’s a lot for anyone, but we smell chicken points, and they smell SO GOOD.

You can follow us on our “No Guts, No Glory” Chicken run in 2011 right here on RibsWithin.com.

Keep on Smokin’!

Doug

Bamboozle Festival April 29, 30, May 1 VIP Catering for the Bands, Producers, Promoters, and other VIPs:

   Wow, what fun we had and what cool food we created. Friday we served appetizers for 6 hours. We had standard veggies, dips, hummus, spinach dip, and then we got serious. Ribs Within/Pat LaFrieda blend sliders, BLT cups (Homemade bacon, lettuce, tomato) with a BBQ Special Sauce, Bacon chicken skewers (using homemade bacon paste), and finally our own creation, Pork Belly Shooters – smoked pork belly, braised in a mango/tequila sauce, in a shot glass. For dessert we offered sliced fruit, fruit cobbler, and chocolate dipped marshmallows. People we served included, Gaslight Anthem, Bruno Mars, Boys to Men’s management, Harvey Leeds - manager of Marky Ramone, and Johnny Cupakes, of T-shirt fame.

Marky Ramone

    Saturday was the longest day. We served food from 1PM until 2AM. Brisket, pulled pork, pulled chicken, mac and cheese, BBQ tofu turine, more PLF sliders, homemade cole slaw, and at the end of the night, a whole pig. Many bands and VIPs “pigged out” on our tasty BBQ, including Legendary promoter Ron Delsner, Kevin Jonas, and my personal highlight Marky Ramone, who gave me a bottle of his Marky Ramone Marinara Sauce for a bottle of my BBQ Rub. Late night highlights included a couple of guests who ate a piece of every part of the pig, with the brain being the only bad part of the pig. Desserts included peanut butter pie, homemade chocolate truffles, fuit cobbler, and a homemade Bamboozle Guitar cake.

    Sunday was Ribs and RibEye day from noon until midnight, as we served applewood slow smoked babyback ribs, and our thin sliced bbq rubbed ribeye steaks, as well as the same bbq and sides as Saturday. Guests included Dee Snyder (Twisted Sister), Isane Clown Posse, and Little Wayne’s band and posse. After it was over, we realized we served over 600 people, some as many as 10 times, and everyone enjoyed themselves greatly. Can’t wait until next year.

Boston May 6,7 Yale Appliance Demo. We rolled into Boston on Friday with beautiful weather, ready to demo outside on Capital Grills and Weber Grills. One hours into the demo the skies got black and the wind and rains came as we scampered to cook inside on a Wolf indoor grill. Sunday (Mothers Day) was more rain and cold, and more demos inside. But we sold lots of RUB and then we headed back home to New Jersey.

With focus and determination, my wife Laura and I braved the humbling 25 degrees – she spent a lot of time indoors working on presentation boxes – and masterfully exceuted the plans we had made in practice the week before. We put aside our frustration of the night before, and just went for it. Each product from each of the 4 categories, beef, chicken, ribs and Chef’s Choice came out close if not better than the practice run.

Because of that, there was none of the usual bickering or yelling – OK, I am usually the one doing the bickering and yelling, but hey it is my team…Things went smoothly, the beef tenderloin was perfectly cooked and wonderfully seasoned. The chicken lollipops worked like a champ, and the ribs were our best ever. Our chef’s choice, Dougie-Aki Salmon was not as good as usual because the fish was wild caught and a little fishy, but still pretty good.

After the last turn-in, I took a deep breath, and really thought that our food was tasty and well executed, and we had a real shot at winning the championship. But first clean up time. Bitter cold and no help made it much more difficult than usual, although somehow we finished. But there were many computer problems with the scoring and we waited an extra 1.5 hours for the scores.

Then finally the results… 2nd place Beef, Ribs Within  – trophy and a check in the first category of the year. Then 4th place in Chicken and another trophy. Then came Ribs, a category that has vexed us for all of our 8 years competing. They called 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, and finally #1 Ribs Within. I wa stunned and so happy. I think we finally got it right. Then 6th place Chef’s choice, and I new we were in the running for Grand Champion. I all comes down to points.

They announced the overall top ten teams in reverse order. Once again the ticked of 10 through 4, with those teams not having a shot. Then came third and it wasn’t us. Then Reserve Champion, not us again, and we knew it had to be us. And Finally, after 2 very hectic days, it was us. Ribs Within had taken home its 4th Grilling Grand Championship, but first since Aug 2009.

It was a great feeling and a great time. It is still a little surreal, but I’ll take it any day.

I am posting some links to blogs about the event. Please check them out…

http://www.sheepsheadbites.com/2011/03/live-blog-grillin-on-the-bay-2011/

Josh Bousel’s excellent pictures  http://www.flickr.com/photos/joshbousel/5563078944/in/set-72157626360485326/

http://newyork.seriouseats.com/2011/03/grillin-on-the-bay-in-brooklyn-where-barbecue.html

More posts will follow as we crank up the heat on the 2011 BBQ season. Follow us all year right here at www.ribswithin.com

Happy Smokin’

Doug

Ribs Within Rub-4-All was named a finalist for About.com’s BBQ and Grilling “BBQ Rub” Award.

http://bbq.about.com/od/organization/ss/Barbecue-And-Grilling-2011-Readers-Choice-Awards_7.htm

You can vote for us once a day until March 8, so please vote often…and remember a “Vote for Ribs Within Rub-4-All” is like a “Vote for Pedro”

Pretty cool for a little guy like me – it is tough to be a little guy at 6′6″ tall – to be mentioned with some big names. Let’s show’em what we got.

Rub-4-All is the feature Rub for Ribs Within, and has been around since 2005. It has been available commercially since 2007. It is truly a unique flavor and as its name suggests, can be used on almost All food – veggies, meats, desserts, too.  We also have 5 other really great Rubs and Seasonings, including our Texas Rub – which has won us multiple grilling awards, and our three new seasonings, Secret Rub, WAHOO Chicken Rub, and BBQ Salt. To find out more, check out our products page.

Also if you are in the Boston Area, come check out Yale Appliance on Feb 19-20. I will be doing some outdoor Winter Grilling (and Chilling) Demos, along with some other awesome chefs from New England, including Andy Husbands from Tremont 647, who was on Hell’s Kitchen. You can sample my Rubs and my food! hope to see you there!

http://readme.readmedia.com/Meet-Top-New-England-Chefs-at-Yale-Appliance/2012488

And soon I will post our 2011 BBQ Schedule. Keep an eye out to see if we are coming to your town this year!

Keep on Smokin’

Doug

If I would have to label the season, I would have to say “Consistently Inconsistent”.

This season was a season of change, and it really showed. In reality, different rubs, different sauces, different meats and different grills should not ALL be messed with during the season. But due to circumstances beyond my control, each was featured this year. So this is how it went.

10 practices, 8 BBQ competitions, 2 full grilling competitions, 4 catering jobs, 3 demos and dozens of  trips to several different markets (Amish (pork) and Green Market (parsley, etc) and meat suppliers (LaFreida – Creekstone Briskets, and pigs from the awesome Green Village Packing).

We cooked in MD, PA, NY, NJ, MA and drove through DE, CT, and RI. Drove 2000 miles, 1500 in “Big Blue” our BBQ Tour Bus.

We had 3 top 10 finishes overall,  one 5th place (grilling), one 4th place (grilling), and one 3rd place (BBQ), just 2 points from first.

Every BBQ product (chicken, ribs, pulled pork, brisket) had multiple top 10 finishes, but almost never at the same time.

Overall, we finished between 310 and 360 in all 4 categories (out of about 6000 teams) in the Pickled Pig KCBS Power Rankings, even though we only competed in 8 contests (out of 10 possible). Next year, with a better running vehicle, we can do 10-12 and finish in the top 200.

I would like to say thanks to our AWESOME Sponsors – Yale Appliance (Viking) in Boston, Springer Mountain Farms Chicken, and Minton Solutions – with whose help we can practice over the winter, and with their continued support next year, try to bring home a Grand Championship.

And while you are thinking about BBQ, buy some RUB from our PRODUCTS Section. They can be on food for grilling or in the oven, too. Every product is ALL NATURAL, NO MSG and all Rubs are KOSHER, made with all kosher ingredients in a Certified Kosher Facility!

Give’m all a try! Order a 6-pack and get a free Ribs Within T-Shirt – limited to the first 20 orders…

Happy Smokin”

Doug

1) Battle of the BBQ Brethren, Holtsville, NY  2) Hudson Valley Ribfest (Grilling and BBQ) – New Paltz, NY  3) New Holland Summerfest – New Holland, PA

The results in order were…

1) Battle of the BBQ Brethren, Holtsville, NY – We struggled with temps on the overnight, and I overcooked the pork, and undercooked the brisket. Our chicken was 8th out of 34, and that was it. Brisket was the lowest score in 4 years. Our overall score was the lowest ever. Needless to say, I was not the happiest Qer in the house. We finished 24 out of 34.

2) Hudson Valley Ribfest (Grilling and BBQ) – New Paltz, NY – Every year we look forward to the HV Ribfest because I love to Grill as well as BBQ. In 2008 we were 3rd overall with 2 trophies. In 2009, we had 2 first places (steak and shrimp) and won the Grand Championship. In 2010 we got shut out of trophies, settling for two 6th places (dessert and shrimp) and finished 4th overall out of 35. I was disappointed because I did not do a good job with the steak and it cost us. As far as BBQ, I will first say that it rained a little from midnight Sat until Sunday 6PM or so…… actually it rained a lot  . If you know anything about BBQ contests, you will know that that is the time that we cook our Q. Although our food was mostly well cooked, our flavors were flat except for the brisket. We got 8th place out of 72 in brisket, and finished 24th out of the 72 overall, which seems like a trend – it is our 4th 20-25 finish out of 6 contests (3rd and 16th were the other 2 finishes).

3) New Holland Summerfest – New Holland, PA – This contest is the only one that has a Kids Q. Therefor it means extra work, extra people, and extra fun. It is set in a beautiful park that is really long and very narrow. 72 teams are spread out, with the ends being VERY far from each other. We are at the farthest end. The kids Q is at the other end. This year we had 2 teams cooking one in the 11-15 year old category, one in the 16-18 category. Our young ones included my son Jordan, his friend Rob, and Ilana and Noah, children of RW team member Wendy. We call them Team ADD. They scored a 3rd place Chicken, and 5th overall out of 14 teams. Our big kids Travis, Shai and his friend Mac, took 1st in Chicken, 1st in Beef and 1st in Chefs Choice and swept their way to Grand Champions. They won $25, our only money in August. They were awesome. On the BBQ front, we had a nice cook. Our food was good, but not great. We got 17th in chicken out of 72, and were 25th overall. We though the pork was very good and the brisket was cooked perfectly for a change. Both got good, but not great scores.

With all of that, August BBQ  finally is over. One more contest left, in September in Seaside Heights, NJ. We will try and break our streak and win something.

If you want to here a fun Podcast talking about Beer, BBQ and Cheese, check out http://finalgravitypodcast.webs.com/ and choose archives Podcast#9.

Happy Smokin!

Doug

We ended up with 633 points, a mere 2.7 points out of first and 1 point out of second in a tightly contested top 3. But after the start we had to the season, we will take any good news.

Even better news was that Big Blue, our BBQ Tour Bus, ran just fine. We have had problems with it all year because of sever squirrel damage to all the wires on then engine. But thanks to the great work and never give up mentality of Dave and the Repairs Unlimited crew (Hillsborough, NJ), its finally running well.

We have a few weeks off until out really busy August – 3 contests in 4 weeks, Battle of the BBQ Brethren, Aug 7-8, 2010, Holtsville, NY, Hudson Valley Ribfest, Aug 21-22, New Paltz, NY and New Holland Summerfest, Aug 28-29, New Holland, PA. That should be an exciting and tiring month!

Please follow us on Tour, on this site or on facebook on the Ribs Within Fan page.

And if any of you are in the Boston area, please check out Yale Appliance + Lighting (www.yaleappliance.com), our awesome new sponsor!

Have a Smokin’ rest of the summer,

Doug

My shtick was cooking a total meal on a grill – app, meats, sides, and dessert. Other than shooting outside for 5 hours in the 90 degree heat over a hot grill, AND shooting right next to the noisy I-93 (in Dorchester), I think it went pretty well.

For a closer look…

Notice the Ribs Within BBQ Rubs – now available on this website!

I really enjoyed doing the video, and when I can figure out how to post it, I will.

Until then enjoy the pictures and turn in for more pictures from our July 4th Grilling Blowout.

Or check us out as we restart our BBQ competition season in N. Wildwood, NJ July 9-11 at the NJ State BBQ Championships.

Thanks again Yale and Viking – The best store and the best gas grills in the world!

DK