Official SMF N. FL Gathering -- April 13th 14th and 15th 2012

[orlandosmoking]

What a great weekend!! Thanks to everyone who helped organize, cook, prep, conduct demos, etc.. Special thanks to our gracious hosts, Jerry and Karen.  And of course the sponsors who helped make it all happen in grand style.

It was great meeting so many new friends and the food.....

Can't wait 'till next year! Camp site reserved in advance!!

Don

edit. Almost forgot... thanks to Brian for assembling and seasoning the Cajun Injector smoker I won in the drawing. It will be put to good use. Thanks for taking the time to share your experience working with this smoker.

 

[callahan4life]

Wow!!!!! What a fantastic weekend!!!! We had great weather, awesome food and really great people!

It was great meeting everyone face to face.

Thanks goes out to everyone that helped out with the cooking as well as the sponsors and those individuals that brought and/or donated items for the door prizes.

Special Thanks to Jerry and Karen for all their hard work and for hosting this event! Job well done!!

Jerry, I have only one question, what are the dates for next year’s gathering? Keep my campsite warm because my wife and I are so there!

I have a lot of pictures that I took at the event and a few are posted below. All of them are posted in the albums on my facebook page ( www.facebook.com/david.haskett ).

africanmeat and Fife

mballi3011

bmudd14474

Pineywoods

JckDanls 07

TulsaJeff

Me

 

[JckDanls 07]

"TOTALLY OFF THE CHAIN"​

What a blast we had... First off, Jeff you don't know how much ALLof us appreciate what you have done... If not for you creating this awesome forum, NONE of this would have been possible... So for that my friend, "WE ALL THANK YOU" ...

What can I say about Jerry and Ms Karen... These two people are "AMAZING"... The relentless time and effort you 2 put into this gathering was "ABSOLUTELY ASTOUNDING" I have VERY HIGH praises for the both of you... Thank you so much for the hospitality...

ALL the others that helped prepare, cook, clean, demonstrate, tutor, guide, offer, contribute, and anything else I missed... I thank you all so much for doing what y'all did...

This was our first time attending the gathering.. and to meet all these great people was a true blessing as I can now say that I just made some wonderful new friends (I hope) You can bet your ass I will attend the next one (PS. Jerry please reserve my same spot for next year).

Any of y'all that didn't make it... TRUST ME you don't want to miss this next year...



Now for my 12 hr trip home that should have took 5 1/2 hrs...

Joel, I think I got your bad luck from ya as I had 2 blow outs on my trailer.. The first one was in Ocala, the tread separated from the tire, but the carcass was still holding air... So I limped down to the next exit and called AAA, They came and looked at the camper and said "Sorry, you don't have RV coverage".. I asked If I give ya a big tip will you let me use your jack and wrench and I'll change it myself... "Sorry, But I can't do that either" the guy said... FFFFFFFFF.... OK, so I unhooked the camper, run to walmart and buy a jack and wrench.. while looking at the jacks I remembered I bought one of those ramp things that you drive the good tire on and it's suppose to raise the other tire of the ground to change, but couldn't remember if it was in the camper... So I buy a jack anyways just to have my bases covered... I find the ramp deal.. back the good tire up on it... wasn't tall enough... get the new bottle jack out... slide it under and it's to tall.. even with the good tire on the ramp deal... FFFFFFFFFF.... So I find some plywood laying around to put under the ramp deal to make it higher.. this works and I get the tire changed finally... so fast forward an hour and a half down the road into Tampa...
The other tire on the same side does the same thing.. blows tread off and leaves the carcass... FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF SO I'm about 30 minutes from home... I said F%#K IT.. I limped along in the far lane at 35 mph trying to make it to the house... stopped every 10 minutes or so to check things out... It finally lost all the air 2 exits from the house... Now I already used my spare and have no other... FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF... So we called Charlotte's son and had him bring us the spare off his camper... Finally made it home 10:30 last night...

As far as pictures go... I still have to load em from the Camera yet.. I'll post em on the Pic thread


Again, Thanks to Jeff, Jerry and Ms Karen, and all the others that made all this possible... "I WAS TRULY BLESSED"

 

[raptor700]

I'm glad you made it Keith, I can't help but 

 

[sumosmoke]

Keith - that is awful and so sorry to hear that happened to you on the way home! Glad everything turned out safe and you did limp home.

 

[solaryellow]

Joel, I think I got your bad luck from ya as I had 2 blow outs on my trailer..



 

Wasn't my bad luck. That was Mike's. And I think you got it from winning his money in that poker game Friday night.

 

[dougmays]

Keith sorry to hear about the troubles getting back!

Glad everyone had a good time, i plan on attending next year! and all of ya'll are welcome down to our South Florida Gathering...stay tuned

 

[tedstarr]

Erin and I (and Sluggo) had a great time!  What started out as a "what the heck" type of thing to do has now turned into a "MUST DO" from now on.  It was much more fun than I could have ever imagined it would be.  Great bunch of people and incredible food and conversation.  And now I know that I'm supposed to bring the Crown Royal and Jack Daniels for the next one. 

It was great to meet everyone and I'd like to add my thanks to Jerry and Karen as well as everyone else who put so much work into this.  It was a total blast.

- Ted

 

[pineywoods]

Here's a link to a bunch of pictures that Laurel/Sumosmoke and I took thanks Laurel

http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/gallery/album/view/id/95551/user_id/2

The album is open so anybody can add more pics

 

[sumosmoke]

Keith sorry to hear about the troubles getting back!

Glad everyone had a good time, i plan on attending next year! and all of ya'll are welcome down to our South Florida Gathering...stay tuned

Yep - am going to keep my eyes open for that one!

 

[cdldriver]

got any room for a truck for n ext year or some place close to park? I get runs that way all the time to fl.

 

[sweett]

Now you guys know how to party :sausage:

I had such a wonderful time even though it was brief. To have a NATION WIDE forum where as many people showed up as they did is a wonderful achievement and we can thank the admins, hosts and sponsors for that. Even heated arguments were still dealt with respectively and the fact that people passed out in chairs around a fire in the middle of the woods in north Florida and the worst thing that happened was a piece of wood was placed in their laps and a funny picture was taken really goes to show the class and admiration you all have for one another and the light of your characters.

Good show everyone i'm looking forward to next year and ill bring things to contribute.

 

[alblancher]

Jerry

Just wanted to say Liz and I made it home Wed afternoon.  Spent Sunday night at Florida Caverns SP and then Monday and Tuesday nights at Top Sail SP.  Liz got to sit on the beach for a couple of hours and I got to try Fat Clemenza's and McGuires   Wanted to stop at the Blue Angels practice but the weather blew in and we decided to stay on the highway.

Thanks for the hospitality and good time.  You and Karen are good friends and I hope to see you guys at my place in a couple of months.  I need a couple of days to rest up from our vacation!

 

[alelover]

Did you have the smoked prime rib at McGuire's Al? Their beer is quite good too.

 

[alblancher]

Liz had Shepard's pie, I had a Reuben sandwich.  Both where excellent and very large protions for a fair price.  After the meat fest at Jerry's I couldn't handle prime rib.  We had the bean soup and Margaritas where 2 bucks a piece.  Liz said there was no alcohol in the Margaritas but the two I had kind of knocked me in the backside,  I fell asleep in the truck on the way back to the campground.

Very cool place and worth a return trip.

 

[alblancher]

Can anyone help with a list of the food we had?  I remember

Red Beans and rice

Collard Greens

Boiled Crawfish

Boiled Shrimp

BBQ Shrimp

Fried Onion Rings

Brisket

Pulled pork

Filled pork shots

Corn bread

Fresh Biscuits and sausage gravy

Eggs

ABTs

Moinks

Several different types of sausages

Nepas's cake

Joel's pastrami

Tim's coleslaw

lots of Bacon

garbage grits

Lost Bread

Dutch's Baked Beans

Smoked chicken

Buffalo Chicken wings

Karen's special ice cream pie

what did I miss or not get a taste of?

Pineywoods added

Sherrie's Potato Salad

Chicken Salad

Crumb Cake

Dip Chip Gunk Junk

Oysters

Ahron made a breakfast dish

Tri Tip on Thursday night

Chocolate covered Potato Chips

Solaryellow added

 hot dogs,

Spanish chorizo

pepperoni

Brian added

Ribs

Hands on Fire added

Fried cobia chunks

3 layer  taco dip

 

[pineywoods]

Sherrie's Potato Salad

Chicken Salad

Crumb Cake

Dip Chip Gunk Junk

Oysters

Ahron made a breakfast dish

Tri Tip on Thursday night

Chocolate covered Potato Chips

 

[alblancher]

I should have remembered the chicken salad,  I just had the last of it on crackers for lunch. 

 

[solaryellow]

I also brought hot dogs, Spanish chorizo, and pepperoni.

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[solaryellow]

I also brought hot dogs, Spanish chorizo, and pepperoni.

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