This weekend, Madison Square Park will be filled with the sweet smell of smoked flesh, as the ninth annual Big Apple Barbecue Block Party rolls into town. We spoke to pitmaster Ed Mitchell last week about his plans for the gut-busting party, and today we're checking in with a few of the other pitmasters (there's 16 total—that's a lot of meat).
"If America is a melting pot then New York is the spoon," said Garry Roark of Ubon's Barbecue in Yazoo City, Mississippi. "New York barbeque picks up flavors from different styles across the country, but the techniques are modified to accommodate space and equipment issues. To small town folks like us the flavors are exotic and exciting." Roark and his crew are bringing a 16-foot trailer filled with smokers, beer, bourbon and Bloody Mary fixings, and then, in his own words, "we're making sauce, mixing dry rub and making a plan for cooking almost three tons of pork butts."
What else? Myron Mixon of Jack’s Old South in Unadilla, GA, is bringing 2,500 lbs of beef brisket, and Tommy Houston of the Checkered Pig in Martinsville, VA plans to "stay ahead of the crowds" with his two Southern Pride smokers, which can cook 2,100 lbs of meat at once. The party runs this Saturday and Sunday, and plates full of meat run for $8 a pop, plus $4 for dessert. A word of advice from years past: go early and go hungry. See the BABBP website for more details.
