This past weekend UMB Bank hosted its' 7th annual "Smokin in the Vault" bbq contest, held on the grounds of the Kemper Arena, home of the prestigious American Royal bbq contest. This contest brought in 29 competitors from Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, all bank employees and many that compete in sanctioned KCBS contests on a regular basis.
Each cook on our team was invited by Monty Spradling to take part and compete as "VooDoo BBQ". The team members were comprised of Billy Rodgers of "Big Billy's BBQ", Jay "Snail" Vantuyl of "
Our evening began with Billy Rodgers grilling 20lbs of chicken for the general public to raise money for a charity fund raiser. I was so impressed by the flavor of the grilled chicken that I made the decision to have Billy grill our competition chicken for turn in the next day.
Each team member cooked a specific meat/category to be turned in for judging. Our briskets, pork and chicken were smoked and grilled on the Lang 84 and Char-Grill. The ribs were cooked on one of Snails custom built upright barrel smokers.
To say the least, we were like a well oiled machine on the day of turn in's and the judges agreed with me. Our chicken came in third place, our ribs came in fourth place, our pork came in sixth place and our brisket came in first place (Thanks Billy), with us becoming Grand Champions and winning the contest!
What a great weekend to cook with great friends on an excellent cooker for a worthwhile charity!
Our third place chicken
Our fourth place ribs
Our sixth place pork
Our first place brisket
VooDoo BBQ (from left to right) Monty Spadling, Paul Kirk, Billy Rodgers and Jay "Snail" Vantuyl
