Here are links to several reviews of Paul Kirk's class:
http://tvwbb.101inc.com/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=000731#000000
http://tvwbb.101inc.com/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=000836#000000
http://tvwbb.101inc.com/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=000629#000007
http://tvwbb.101inc.com/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=000425#000000
Here's text from a San Jose Mercury News article on the Kirk class held in Los Altos, CA in 2002.
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Posted on Wed, Jul. 10, 2002
Get fired up to learn the real thing from a barbecue king
By Aleta Watson
Mercury News
Only one thing could bring these 40 men and three women to hang out in a Los Altos parking lot for more than 12 hours on a blistering summer day: barbecue secrets from the mouth of a master.
By 7 a.m., their cookers were smoking in anticipation of a full day of barbecuing ``low and slow'' under the guidance of Kansas' Paul Kirk, a master of the competition circuit. Kirk has won seven national barbecue championships and 450 awards in his two decades of competitive cooking, and this collection of meat lovers was here to soak up his expertise.
Jim and Trisha Eskes had come from San Jose to find out how to cook the meats they love at restaurants.
``We didn't want to spend years trying trial and error,'' she said. ``We wanted to learn to barbecue professionally.''
San Carlos resident Roy Cardoza, who grew up in India, wanted to expand his cultural horizons. ``When you're an immigrant,'' he explained, ``barbecue is an American icon.''
With its roots in the South and Midwest, authentic American barbecue is bound by tradition. Large pieces of meat are cooked for long hours at very low temperatures over a wood or charcoal fire until the meat is fork-tender and infused with smoky flavor. Purists consider every other type of outdoor cooking mere grilling.
An entire meat and smoke subculture has sprung up around barbecue contests in recent years. Kirk built his reputation by sweeping some of the best, including the American Royal in Kansas City, Mo.
A barrel of a man with a neatly trimmed gray beard and wire-rim glasses, Kirk teaches 20 classes a year all over the United States and abroad. He began competing as a lark back in 1981, when he was the chef of a restaurant that served barbecue. He won big that day and was hooked.
``I tell people in these classes, `If you go to a competition just hope and pray you don't get a ribbon,' '' he said.
Now Kirk is known as the K.C. Baron of Barbecue and competes only a few times a year. He stopped in Los Altos on his way to last weekend's World Barbecue Championships near San Diego.
Over the course of the day, Kirk walked his eager students through every step in creating real 'cue, from choosing fuel to presenting the finished meat for judging. The $185 one-day class was sponsored by the California Barbecue Association (
www.cbbqa.com), which also provided most of the smokers, with support from Armadillo Willy's restaurant. Before it was over, each team of two or three would cook a large Black Angus brisket, a pork butt, a rack of pork ribs, a chicken and some spicy homemade sausage. The largest piece of meat, the brisket, would spend more than nine hours over the fire -- less than two-thirds of Kirk's usual time -- and the chicken about four.
As he talked about the steps to mixing a dry rub or showed how to prepare a rack of pork ribs, students took notes and photographs. Between demonstrations, the master wandered among the portable barbecue pits set up on the edges of the small parking lot and showed participants how to arrange their coals, trim a brisket or slice a chicken breast for serving to judges.
``I see a lot of you lifting the lid to see how your meat is doing -- that's a no-no,'' he said, warning them against heat loss.
Perhaps because it focused on the traditionally masculine ritual of outdoor cooking, the class attracted few women.
Lorraine Hastings of San Jose was the only woman who attended without a partner. Her brother-in-law, who had given her a Weber smoker for Christmas, had signed them both up for the class but got sick and couldn't make it.
``I'm the one who barbecues in my family,'' Hastings said.
Some of the men came to the class to sharpen their competition skills. Others just wanted to re-create their favorite taste memories.
``That's the holy grail,'' said Mark Darlington, a pharmacist from Novato. ``I want that pulled pork sandwich I had in Alabama, and if I can't find that, I'll make it myself.''
Contact Aleta Watson at
awatson@sjmercury.com or (408) 920-5032.
