We Do The Que To Benefit You

On May 29^th,2011 I competed in my first BBQ contest in Safford, AZ. We stayed up all night cooking meat hoping for a win.  We came in first place for the amateur contest. I was the only entry for it, but I placed.  I didn’t come in last for the event, I came in next to last and was happy with that. My wife worked full time as a firefighter for the Eagar Fire Dept. and I was a member as a volunteer.  My regular job was the police chief for the Town of Springerville. When we got home from the contest both of our emergency pagers started going off. That was the start of a nightmare to our community.  Dispatch was advised us that there was a fire in the Bear Wallow area. This was the start of Arizona’s largest wildfire burning over 500,000 acres in both Arizona and New Mexico.  Knowing that with the forest being burned up that it was going to severely affect our economy, I took it upon myself of getting people back on the mountain. 

Tourism is a big part of our economy and without people coming it hits our community hard.  So with me just competing in a BBQ competition I started organizing a local BBQ event.  We called this event “ OUT OF THE ASHES” BBQ contest. The first year was very successful. We had a $10,000 prize purse and about 20 teams from all over Arizona and other states competed. This proved to be very beneficial  for the community and the charity we held the competition for. This was a 4 meat event, just like you see on tv. The competitors loved the area and have come back.