My first recollection of barbecue goes back to the early 1960’s, to a joint called Peebles BarBQue that was run by the Peebles family in Auburndale, Florida. It was a big screen room with a brick pit and chimney inside and a huge Mulberry tree outside. They were only open on the weekends and during the cooler months of the year, and my whole family would go there about once a month. Flash forward
25 years and I was building my first barbecue pit in my folks back yard out of some blocks and bricks I salvaged off a job I was on. It wasn’t as nice as Peebles and there was no chimney. I burnt up a lot of perfectly good meat on that pit, and every now and then a decent piece of edible barbecue was cooked. Take another 25 year jump and now we are cooking barbecue for parties, a couple of restaurants and competing with the pros of the Florida BarBQue association at events scattered around the state. It’s the perfect thing to do when the weather is to rough to go fishing and I get to spend time with my son and some buddies and their families. We always have a good time no matter what the outcome. This year we are changing our smokers from our old reliable pull behind tank smoker to Weber smokers and grills. Seems to be the wave of the future and I’m not one to stand in the way of technology. We’ll keep the web site up to date on our progress as we kick the tires and light the fires and hopefully we can afford to make the whole year and have some fun. Here’s to smoke in your eyes,
Phil Sr.
