Food vendors? Doubled. Drink stations? Doubled. Expanded
location? Yes. More meat? You betcha. This isn’t your typical
backyard weenie roast. The second annual No Bull BBQ Cook-Off
– a fiercely competitive state barbecuing competition – will
hunker down at the Community and Cultural Center parking lot Friday
night in great anticipation of Saturday’s 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
meat-lovers’ dream.
Food vendors? Doubled. Drink stations? Doubled. Expanded location? Yes. More meat? You betcha.
This isn’t your typical backyard weenie roast.
The second annual No Bull BBQ Cook-Off – a fiercely competitive state barbecuing competition – will hunker down at the Community and Cultural Center parking lot Friday night in great anticipation of Saturday’s 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. meat-lovers’ dream.
Chicken, brisket, tri-tip, sausages, pork shoulder and ribs will run rampant and this year more barbecuers have joined the party. Up from 52 at the first go-around last May, 66 competitors will try their hand at the Kansas City Barbecue Society sanctioned contest; 2010 marked the first KCBS competition in the Bay Area.
The Chamber of Commerce is organizing the event again after a wildly successful first No Bull BBQ when the expected crowd nearly tripled to 12,000 and restaurants were packed by early afternoon because most barbecuers ran out of meat to grill.
“This is the largest sanctioned barbecue competition in California history,” said Ben Lobenstein, the barbecue coordinator for the Chamber. “Staff on this has quadrupled since last year after the huge crowd. They certainly didn’t RSVP,” Lobenstein said laughing.
Free parking is available in the Caltrain parking lot off Butterfield Boulevard, but limited, though parking fees along Dunne and Church avenues go to charity. The cook-off is expanded to Depot and Fifth streets from the parking lot near Monterey Road and Dunne Avenue; Lobenstein said it won’t interfere with the first Saturday of the farmers’ market in the lot of Caltrain station.
Last year’s grand champion Harry Soo of Slap Yo Daddy is back again from Diamond Bar in Los Angeles County. The prize money isn’t too shabby – $13,000 in all for the best of chicken, ribs, pork and beef brisket in appearance, taste and tenderness.
Three local barbecuers will defend their homecourt: O.G. BBQ of Morgan Hill, Royal Smokin’ Hot BBQ of Morgan Hill and Huminie’s Hogalicious BBQ of Gilroy.
Admission is free to the event and new this year is a Friday night kickoff, where antsy and thirsty visitors can listen to live music, drink wine and meet the competitors before noshing overpowers talking Saturday.
For $2 a taste, samples of some competition meat will be available along with a vote toward the People’s Choice Award, though it’s more common for competitors to sell non-competition meals like tri-tip sandwiches or drumsticks. This year, the Chamber will combine food and drink sales into a single ticket purchase.
The No Bull BBQ Cook-Off will open its tents at 10 a.m. until awards at 6 p.m. Saturday. For more information, visit the website www.mhnobullbbq.com.
