225BatonRouge.com

Like any amateur sport, grilling features a continuum of participants who range from the serious to the lighthearted. On one end are the gear heads who spend thousands on rigs, and can debate for hours the merits of cooking at 220 degrees versus 222. Then there are those who fly by the seat of their pants and still produce winning ’cue.

So it is with five LSU fans who call themselves “Suspicious Rinds.”

John Richardson, Kevin Grelle, Les Bratton, Rob Stewart and Kerry Norris have put on their own pre-game barbecue fest for more than two decades. They relish in trying new recipes, passing around samples of chicken, pork and seafood rubbed or sauced in new flavor combinations. Their gathering has become so large, that hundreds of family, friends and insiders join them each home game.

Richardson is in charge of breakfast, cooking 20 pounds of bacon and five dozen eggs as the team prepares for hours of fire-tending. Using just “two regular ol’ backyard pits,” they throw on what seems an endless supply of meats, including pork shoulder, pork tenderloins, boudin, ribs, fresh seafood and game. They get especially excited about North Louisiana venison, says Richardson. They also cook whole pigs in so-called “Cajun microwaves.”

“We all grew up hunting and fishing and cooking,” says Richardson, a Ruston native who teaches at St. Joseph’s Academy. “Those of us who are married are the main cooks in our families.”

This year, the friends decided to take their show on the road, entering a series of qualifying barbecue competitions in order to compete in the granddaddy of them all, the Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest, which was May 17-19. Richardson’s brother Ed, an event veteran, and his Atlanta-based team, “Barefoot in the Pork,” helped tutor the Baton Rouge group.

If ever there was a place where people take barbecuing seriously, it is the Memphis in May cook-off, where hundreds of teams, both professional and amateur, square off for rights to the best ribs, sauce, hot wings, seafood and more. The teams are cleverly named, and many have sponsors and flush war chests. It’s all about showmanship and bragging rights, John Richardson says.

“But we were determined to do things the way we’ve always done them,” he says. “We didn’t want to do anything differently, and then wonder if we could have won just doing it the way we always do it. We really just moved our tailgate up there.”

Literally.

The group hauled its duo of jalopy grills, the kind, Richardson says, that “most people would put out on the street.” Then things got interesting. A downpour soaked their charcoal, so the friends ended up cooking exclusively on wood that Bratton, a landscaper, had in his truck. It was another unorthodox move.

“Everybody cooks on charcoal. They may add a little wood from whatever part of the country they’re from for flavor, but nobody cooks just on wood,” Richardson says. “We really had to work to keep the temperature even.”

But Suspicious Rinds fared well, placing fifth out of 98 teams in the amateur “Patio Porkers” division for their hot wings, 10th for poultry, 10th for beef, 15th for seafood, and 15th for their vinegar sauce. Ed Richardson’s Barefoot in the Park ended up winning overall, and will compete in the professional division next year.

And in the notoriously competitive environment, Suspicious Rinds spent the week passing out boudin, making friends and cooking for the fun of it.

“By the end of the week, our tent had become exactly what it does at tailgate, the place where everybody is hanging out and having a good time,” Richardson says.