Posts By / Amy Mills

2
Jun

Reading this week

Hingham High School graduation.

This week was filled with end-of-year activities, prom, and graduation.

Here are some links that made me think:

The Chicago Sun-Times fired its photographers. As a journalist and a friend to a number of photojournalists, this makes me sad and makes me shudder. The best photojournalists I know have a gift for capturing humanity. That trained perspective will surely be lost when an accompanying photo is an iPhone afterthought.

Speaking of photography … as someone whose event photos have been compromised by multiple “photographers,” I found this to be dead on and kind of sad. Let’s all try to be more courteous and let event photographers do their job. And to take it a step further, sometimes it’s more fun to just live the experience and put the phone away.

Texas Monthly barbecue critic Daniel Vaughn talks brisket grade and pricing.

The Glass Castle was a fascinating memoir and this profile of Jeanette Walls is equally interesting and disturbing.

I follow Rachel Sklar on twitter. She seems smart and savvy and this profile confirms it. The headline is incorrect, though… she’s not trying, she pretty much IS a social media entrepreneur.

The media landscape has changed for all of us in the restaurant biz and nowhere more so than New York City. The feverish quest for online coverage is exhausting.

The Worst End of School Year Mom Ever confessional took the internet world by storm and had mothers and teachers alike howling with laughter and nodding in agreement.

My daddy taught me long ago that “first-class people associate with first-class people.” “I don’t shine if you don’t shine” and “People know you by the company you keep,” are two gems from this article:  Why powerful women make the best friends.

Frank Bruni on why siblings are a gift. So good.

10
May

We're getting the band back together.

BoysAreBackPoster

Our rigs are loaded and we’re heading to Memphis tomorrow.

Mike and Pat Burke are getting the Apple City Barbecue band back together and competing at Memphis in May for the first time in 18 years. The team extinguished its fire in May 1994 after going out in a blaze of glory as four-time World Champion and the first three-time World Grand Champion of Memphis in May. While there are several teams that have racked up impressive cook-off statistics, there is no team that can match Apple City Barbecue’s storied record achieved in just 69 competitions.

Flavor profiles, styles, and cooking methods have evolved in the competition barbecue world. I can tell you that there will be NO foil, Parkay, honey, or brown sugar in the Apple City Barbecue tent. We’re going old school all the way and cooking on the pit that Mike and Pat made out of an old propane tank – the same pit on which they won many contests. We’re attempting to bring back the old-fashioned way of cooking that results in a distinctive style and flavor profile. That will either work for us or against us; I guess we’ll find out. Thoughts? Are we brave or crazy?