There will be MANY pictures! This weekend, Ed and I made our way to Boston for the Phantom Gourmet BBQ Beach Party. We attended last year, but just for one day. I think this year was even better. They pushed some of the vendors back, so it seemed like there was more room. They also moved the stage to City Hall instead of on the “beach.” I think this worked out MUCH better. They also had more places to buy beer, which we didn’t partake in. Water was PLENTY expensive thank you very much!

We sampled ALMOST everything. There was one place we didn’t try that we had tried last year and weren’t impressed enough to go back. We also didn’t try Firefly’s, as they are Boston-based and we could go there. We wanted to make sure we tried all the out-of-staters.

Where to start…

Yes, one of the vendors came all the way from Australia, and it was totally worth it! The Aussom Aussie. They had some fantastic sauces. The Raspberry Chipotle comes to mind. A little sweet, a little spicy…very different from your “regular” BBQ, but very, very good. So good in fact, Ed actually ate shrimp. He’s not a shrimp eater, and neither am I. I can’t say that I liked it, but at least I tried it.

We had some excellent ribs and beef brisket from Rasta Joe’s. They put “real Jamaican Rum” in their sauce. It was pretty darn tasty too!

Oh, and allow me to introduce you to Wicked Whoopies. We sampled several of the flavors. The best, was just the plain old original. I am kind of a whoopie pie snob. We have a fantastic recipe for whoopie pies that my parents have made since I was little, and it’s really hard to beat. None of that stinky Big Y giant whoopie for me! (ICK!) These were quite yummy though!

Yet again this year, we visited Cowboy’s for a fantastic beef brisket sandwich. I got my own here. No sharing for me, which is actually how I worked most of the time. I just took bites.

This is the most delicious beef brisket ever. The sauce is yummy and the beef is just spectacular!

And finally, where was the absolute best of the entire trip? When we walked up to order, the guy said to us “You’ve tried the rest, now try the best!” and we were kind of skeptical. It was so good, Ed went back up to him and told him he was right, then got more ribs!

So, Q, you win as most delicious ribs in our book! (Alas, there is no site, but they are out of Virginia and I love them very much now!)

It was a great mini-vacation and we can’t wait to go again next year! (Especially now that I’ve gone back through and done all of the linking and looked at the pictures!) I didn’t get much knitting done, but I did get to relax.