Thousands attend annual Pig in the Park festival
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on April 12, 2015 1:50 AM
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News-Argus/MELISSA KEY
Kimbo Turner, left, and Rick Tharrington from the Oakbrook Apartments team remove barbecue meat from the bone at Pig in the Park on Saturday at Waynesborough Park.
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News-Argus/MELISSA KEY
Kate Daniels, right, the winner of the Kiss a Pig contest, gets away with a smooch from a puppy dressed as a pig.
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News-Argus/MELISSA KEY
Tony Dawson, from the Team H & D, smokes his barbecue before the start of judging at Pig in the Park. Dawson and his team won third place in the backyard barbecue category.
Kate Daniels, president of the Wayne County Chamber of Commerce, did not have to kiss a pig after all.
After winning the contest held by the Boys and Girls Club of Wayne County to raise money for Saturday's sixth annual Pig in the Park event by receiving the most "smooches" on her pig that was displayed downtown, a dog named Otis gave her some puppy love instead.
Each smooch placed on the pig represented increments of money ranging from $1 to $50, and $2,950.20 total was raised for the club this year, organizers said.
Thousands of people attended Saturday's event at Waynesborough Park, where 25 competitors in two separate categories -- backyard and professional -- cooked whole hogs for amateur and professional judges alike.
There were 13 contestants in the backyard division, and 12 contestants in the professional division.
Big Show Barbecue took first place in the professional division with a score of 870, edging out Old Hickory Cooking Team by two points.
"We've been to this event and cooked all six years," said Big Show Barbecue chief cook John Kearney. "This is our third time winning. It's five minutes from the house, in our backyard, and it supports a great cause."
Roy Parker, with Old Hickory Cooking Team, used a barbecue shredder to chop his barbecue -- a tool that is essentially a drill with a two foot long attachment that spins around in circles, using the blades on the end of the attachment to shred the barbecue.
Parker has been barbecuing since 1995, and the other half of his team is Carla Sweet. Parker won the North Carolina Pork Council state championship in 2006, and Ms. Sweet won the competition in 2010.
"We've been cooking together on and off now for about four years," Parker said.
But Old Hickory Cooking Team wasn't the only team with an interesting method of preparing their barbecue.
A team consisting of three men from Sampson County -- Don Britt, Chris Sykes and Jimmy Griffin -- used tools the length of shovels with a sharp end to chop their barbecue.
"This is how the old timers did it," Britt said. "We've got a lot to chop, so we can throw it all in the container on the ground, mix the sauce in and chop it up all at once. It's a lot easier."
One team traveled from Fayetteville to compete in Saturday's competition.
Ricky and Jennifer Chavis have been cooking barbecue for 11 years, but it was their first year at Pig in the Park.
"We came here with our friends who invited us out to support the Boys and Girls Club," Chavis said.
The Chavises arrived yesterday at 3 p.m. Friday and began cooking their pig at 11 p.m. Friday night.
"We got the hog at about 10 minutes until 10, and then it took us about an hour to prep the grill, so we put the hog on around 11," Ms. Chavis said.
Their grill was the only one with something other than a hog on it -- there was fruit, greenery and a small rifle lighter to top it off.
"They don't give you any points for dressing it up, but they don't take any away either," Chavis said. "So if I can make it look pretty, I'm going to make it look pretty."
One judge, Owen Jackson, has been barbecuing for 51 years, but did not compete in this year's competition.
"I got into it when I was 16, and I'm 67 now," Jackson said. "What keeps you in it is when people say, 'Man, that's good.'"