This is Barbecue Nation After Hours.

The conversation that took place after the show ended.

Hey, everybody, it's jt and this is a special version of Barbecue Nation.

It is brought to you in part by Painted Hills Natural Beef.

Beef you can be proud to serve your family and friends.

That's Painted Hills Natural Beef, everybody.

Welcome to After Hours here on the Nation.

That's Barbecue Nation.

I'm JT along with Ms.

Leanne Whippen.

Hall of Famer Tuffy Stone is with us today.

He's a Hall of Famer.

Both of them are restaurateurs emeritus.

That's a good way to put it.

You can have that on your card now, Leanne.

That's a nice way to.

I like it that way.

Yeah.

Restaurateur emeritus.

So this is the part of the show, Tuffy, where we do what we call the lightning Round.

And it's a bunch of really fun, silly, irreverent, and sometimes just plain dumb questions that we throw at you and we see what you come up with.

You ready?

All right, I'm a little nervous, but I'll go.

Don't be nervous.

Oh, no, no, You're.

You're right.

I.

I'll start out with some kind of serious ones.

Okay.

If.

Okay.

If you started your career all over again, what would you do?

Man, I don't know, but I don't think it would be in the food world.

It's.

I think I could take my problem solve.

I don't know.

I'd love to be a professional photographer, but I'm not that good.

Or fly fishing guy.

That would be nice.

That would be fun.

That would be fun.

Okay, here's one.

You're going to have to put your thinking cap on for just a second.

If you could.

If you could cook for, then dine with a historical figure, who would it be and what would the menu be?

Oh, my gosh.

I could go so many directions with this.

I tend to get a little sappy, so that's all right.

You know, I'd like to be able to cook for my grandmother, Florence and my mom, Charlotte again.

And I'd probably do a version of my grandmother's fried eggplant and make my grandmother's pineapple hot dish and, I don't know, just riff on some of their old menu items and just be able to just tell them one more time how much I love them.

That's probably a little sappy, but that.

No, no, no.

That's all good.

That's it.

Have you ever eaten haggis?

I have, and you live to tell about it.

Yeah.

Okay, next question.

Next question.

What is one of the, for lack of a better term, hottest new things on the market that you have seen that will help people cook or learn to cook?

Well, I mean, there are some.

There are some apparatuses out there that, that I kind of shied away from a little bit.

I used to stay away from those temperature measuring devices because the kind where you would put the probe in while you're cooking.

Right.

And I didn't like the cables and all that now, but as I've gotten older technology, I've embraced it a little bit better.

And, and so these, these devices now that we can, like, monitor the temperature on our pork butt or our brisket and multitask has.

Has made it a lot easier for me to.

To nail the doneness.

So I.

Where I used to shot and, and they're so much better than when Leanne and I started.

When we started, they weren't that accurate.

The cables would crimp, the sounds were annoying.

But there are some devices out there now for monitoring the temperature of our pits and our meats that just make these long cooks when we're cooking a pork butt or a brisket.

Yeah.

So much easier, so much better.

Yeah, absolutely.

If you could cook with one, and you've.

You've probably already done this, so you might tell a side story on this.

If you could cook with one of your barbecue heroes, who would it be?

You know, I like.

I want to cook with Marcos Levy out of Brazil.

This guy is a genius.

He's mind blowing.

I watched him do some things in Brazil, Churrascata, that, that I never even thought about before, and I think that that's really cool.

So, so I would really.

I mean, I.

Historically, I've been having to cook with some really great people over the years because I used to go and volunteer at this event called Masters of Food and Wine, and people like Julia Child and Thomas Keller and Charlie Trotter and Alice Waters and people like that would cook at this event.

So I used to volunteer and help those kind of people.

But it's, you know, it's like.

And I think Leanne, you can probably relate to just, you know, when you can get your brain fed and, and, and so.

But this guy in Brazil is just.

He is cutting edge and he's doing some cool stuff.

But like I said earlier in another.

In our previous segment, this is not.

This is not.

This is not clever getting in the way of delicious.

This is like, this is taking cool ideas and making food Taste great.

And you want to wear an asbestos shirt, right?

So you.

That's right.

Wear a metal hat.

Okay.

All right, we got that down.

Now, if you could erase a mistake, just one from your past, what would it be and why?

Dad, I hope you're listening in heaven above, but I wish I'd never wrecked your Ford Bronco when I was 16.

Yeah.

Yep, yep.

Same goes for me, dad.

My dad with the GMC pickup.

Okay, so we'll just go from there.

What's your least favorite food to cook?

Tuffy.

Least favorite.

Golly, I'm having.

I'm struggling with this, and I like to cook a lot of things.

I don't like cooking flatiron steak when.

When it comes in and you it.

And it's not all trimmed nice and neatly like you would get it in the grocery store.

I did an event at Charleston, Charleston Wine and Food at one time, and I got cases and cases of flatiron that I had to do way more trim work than I was accustomed to, and it took a really, really long time, so.

Oh, and I would also not recommend.

I had this brilliant idea one time of getting dry aged brisket and it came shipped to me from New York and it was dry aged bone in brisket.

And that was a lot of my.

Okay, on a scale of 1 to 10, how much barbecue do you eat on a regular basis?

1 to 10?

1.5.

Yeah.

Well, hold on, let's define barbecue because if it's grilled, if you're defining it as grilled meats, then it's.

It's a lot larger than that.

But if you're saying pulled pork and brisket.

So pulled pork and brisket.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like 1.5.

Okay.

All right.

Um, do you remember the first thing you ever grilled or smoked or barbecued?

The very first.

I got a couple of stories that take me back to my childhood.

I remember grilling a hind quarter of venison with a bunch of my high school buddies.

And that would have been back around like 79, 80, something like that.

And that turned out really good.

But it was probably because we were drinking beer and we were hungry.

Um, and then another cooking memory that I had took place probably when I was around 16 or 17, is I like to hunt and fish.

And I had, I had caught some native brook trout, fly fishing, and I had also gone squirrel hunting.

So I did my, my teenager version of surf and turf where I, I cooked a squirrel in the skillet and I also did pan fried some, some brook trout.

The trout were Pretty good.

The squirrel wasn't very good.

Wasn't very good.

Yeah.

Um, well, this.

I guess this next question then fits right in.

If you were an animal, what animal would you be and why?

Probably not a squirrel.

Right.

Well, I mean, I guess I'd be.

You know, if my mom was around, she'd tell me that I'm a crab because I'm a cancer with my horoscope, maybe a fish.

Okay, if we put Tuffy Stone skills to music, what would the music be?

Gas jazz.

Okay, here's one that I think you'll.

You'll like.

If we declared you supreme ruler of Barbecue for a couple of days, you were supreme ruler, what would you, as supreme ruler, decree?

Get outside and grill.

Okay.

There you go.

You remember the worst concert you ever went to?

The worst concert I ever went to.

I probably wouldn't have gone to them if they were bad, but.

No, I don't.

Oh, that's okay.

There's a lot of concerts I don't remember either.

If you were on death row, what would your last meal be?

Ice cream.

Ice cream.

Well, I mean, I like Cherry Garcia, but maybe vanilla, but, you know, I might.

One of my.

I mean, anybody really knows me knows I love to cook barbecue and.

But they know I love a steak, and I love a steak.

Yeah.

But if I was getting ready to, like, be put down, I think ice cream would be it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

After all your years of experience in your.

Your victories and some defeats and all that, what is the biggest change you think should be made in competition?

Barbecue, if any, you know, for Kansas City Barbecue Society.

I.

I wish that we would allow the judges an opportunity to go back and adjust their scores until they feel like that they have really given those scores what they think they should have.

And I.

And I don't think there's anything wrong with us picking the best out of the entries that we get that day.

You know, it's like.

I think it's all right, you know, I think.

I think, you know, if you get five or six entries on your table of pork or beef or chicken or ribs, let those judges kind of, like, work those scores until they feel like they've done the best job.

And, you know, I think it's all right, personally.

I mean, in Memphis in May, it's comparative judging, and I think that's all right, too.

I think.

I think we should judge entries for, you know, for what they are.

I mean, you know, as cooks, and Leanne, I think, would agree.

It's Leanne and my.

Or any competition Cooks challenge to try and put out a taste and a texture that's appealing to the judges.

That's our responsibility.

But I just think allowing the judges to.

To adjust those scores until they feel like they given those scores, given those products, the scores that they want, that, that would be.

Yeah.

What's.

Even though you sold your restaurants, what was the hardest thing about owning a business like a restaurant?

Well, I mean, the last one was probably the most difficult for me because it was a really cool spot, and I think it had really opportunity, but it was poor.

It was poor timing on our part.

We didn't know it.

I purchased it two months before COVID hit.

Oh.

And.

And that was really hard.

I had this naive belief maybe, Leanne, maybe you can.

Maybe you can.

I don't know, maybe you can agree with this or not, but when I.

I never knew I was going to be a cook or a chef, and that was going to be the way I earned my living.

But.

But became my path.

And, and as I went down that path and honed my skills, I always thought that I began to believe that being a cook was like being a plumber.

And if I could feed people, I would always be able to put a roof over my head.

And it wasn't until Covid hit, and here I had this restaurant that I just purchased, which I thought was going to be super cool and full of opportunity.

And then all of a sudden, the governor shut us down for four months.

And, well, I don't know.

We made the decision.

I don't know.

I don't know if it was the governor, but anyways, and I.

And then when we opened back up, I found myself working the lawn, cleaning the kitchen, cleaning the deep fat fryer, and going back to the task that I had began my career with, you know, these.

These, you know, the.

And anyways, it was.

It was a lot of hard work and a lot of long hours, and.

And, and it was a challenge.

And.

And I learned a lot from it, you know, and I, I gave it the work that was required.

But, but, you know, Leon and I both know that the.

Probably one of the riskiest businesses out there is the restaurant business.

And.

And sometimes they make it, sometimes they don't.

And it's not always a reflection of how hard we worked or how good our food was.

There's lots of variables in there, so.

Sure.

Absolutely.

Sure.

Boxers are briefs.

That's a little personal.

Boxers.

There you go.

There you go.

Do you have a favorite event that you like to go to when you were competing all the time.

Well, I mean, the list gets a little bit long, but since Leanne's on here, one of my favorites, it's unfortunately gone away.

I think her dad was responsible for bringing together and try out in North Carolina was about as special of an event as that you could ever go to, too.

Dillard, Georgia, was amazing.

1.

Of course, I love the Royal and the Jack and Memphis of May and Houston Livestock Rodeo show, but.

So I can't, I can't, I can't nail it down to one, but, but try.

North Carolina was in a beautiful part of the country, and it had a fair and it had music and it had kids playing in a creek, and it had all the things that, you know, just a really nice slice of Americana.

There you go.

What's one thing you miss about your 20s?

That list as long.

I like my knees better in the 20s.

Yeah, me too.

I was, I was a much better drinker in my 20s.

I was a lot, I was probably a lot, a lot less pessimistic and a lot more positive in my 20s than I find myself today.

But anyways, I could, we could do a whole episode on that.

Oh, sure.

Commiserate with each other.

What's your favorite movie?

If you have one movie, you know, I don't know it's gonna be a favorite movie.

I don't, I don't know if I could just pick one.

No.

What's your favorite movie?

Mine is Godfather.

I like Godfather.

I always called it Business 101, so.

Yeah, I like Amadeus.

You like Tommadeus?

Yeah, that's one of my faves.

Yeah.

I don't know, I, I, Someone reached out to me recently and wanted to know my, I'm poor at certain answers, so I don't know what my favorite movie is.

I mean, I like, I don't know, I, I, there's so many movies that I like out there, but, you know, my son watches a lot more movies than I do.

I was talking to him just this past week, and he, he says he probably watches 100 movies a year, which is amazing to me.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

When my, when my daughter was little, we watched, I grew up on a ranch.

We watched a lot of westerns.

Okay.

My dad loved westerns and of course, all the John Wayne film.

The point is, I think my favorite John wayne film is McClintock.

Okay.

But Mercedes couldn't say McClintock.

She called him Mr.

Clock.

And so about once or twice a month, if it was bad weather or it was just the two of us around there she'd say, dad, let's go watch Mr.

Clock.

So I can probably recite most of the dialogue in that movie too.

But that was a fun one.

When you retire, Tuffy, if you do ever retire, which I think there's a question mark behind that, what would you like to do?

I would love to be like, spend a lot of time fishing in the flats.

Saltwater fishing.

Flats fishing.

I get.

I love beaches.

I love warm weather and see you soon.

Yeah, I love.

I love there.

There is amazing.

There's amazing fishing down where you live, Ian.

I mean, absolutely.

And my son in law has a boat and he is quite the fisherman.

And I am spoiled.

And that's one of my favorite things to do, if not my favorite thing to do.

I get pictures of her.

She texts me a picture.

It's.

It's snowing sideways here.

And she's.

And she's down there in shorts and a tank top and she's got some big red fish she's holding up smiling, you know, And I'm like, you know.

I.

I realized that Florida is where you go after you make your mark in life.

My wife and I, when we first got married, we moved to Marco island and we had a house on a canal and we were catching snook and redfish and Jack Cavell and lady fish and.

And there's speckled trout.

It was so much fun.

I don't remember that.

And that's where my grandmother lived for years.

And my mom, Marco island, that's.

I just.

I don't know why I didn't know that.

Ford or Chevy.

Wow.

So I was GMC forever, and now I drive a Ford truck.

And I felt like such a trader for a long time.

I had 1, 2, 3.

I had three GMC trucks before my Ford F250 that I dropped now.

There you go.

There you go.

And the cumulative cost of those trucks probably matches your Ford F250 are close to it.

I think if I can get all the money back for those trucks, I can come down there and get a condo near Lean.

Yeah.

Yeah, probably.

Probably.

Probably.

Okay, here is the Chris Lily question.

Oh, me for you.

Okay, so your answer is very important on this.

Have you ever cooked in a thunder or snowstorm in your underwear?

I have not.

Okay, Chris has got you on that one.

Yeah, he.

He told the story about cooking.

Was it at the Jack land or was it.

No, I don't think he defined exactly.

Where it was, but he was his.

His son was sleeping in like a little pup tent and Chris was Sleeping in the truck.

And a big storm came up, and they were trying to save their pop ups and their fire.

And so he said they were running around in their skivvies out there trying to.

To save the world.

I think that was the Jack, because his.

His site that year got a ton of it flooded bad.

Yeah.

So my guess is it was probably the Jack.

Yeah.

And then.

And then Brad said, well, he probably got an underwear deal out of the thing, too.

So do you have a favorite barbecue book besides yours, Tuffy?

Oh, well, I mean, mine's not.

I mean, golly, I mean, I already mentioned John Willingham's.

John Willingham's had some really great words.

Smokey Hale.

I really liked his book.

Adam Perry Lang.

I really like the way he thinks about food and talks about it.

So I think Adam Perry Lang's books are great.

You know, I don't want to slide any of my friends.

I got so many friends and got great cookbooks out there, but, you know, I finally had to put down my friend's cookbooks when I was working on my own.

I'm like, dang, Garnet.

Adam's already said that.

I can't say that.

But, you know, I will say this.

I've had a.

And I think Leanne probably can agree with this or relate to this, too.

I've been really blessed to have a lot of mentors and a lot of people that are way smarter than me.

Share.

Share advice and educate me on.

On cooking.

And, And.

And so my book is, as the words of many.

And my book is, you know, lots of time at the grill and at the fire and cooking and Chef Alan yelling at me and teaching me.

And so it's.

I just.

I'm very grateful and thankful for all the mentors that I've been able to.

I have in my life.

Okay, one last question.

Yes, sir?

Do you recall the biggest mistake you ever made during a competition?

Well, I mean, I've made a lot of mistakes, and I think the mistakes make me a better cook.

Probably one of the most public mistakes that I ever made was cooking in Lakeland, Florida.

And they accepted my box.

And then about 47 minutes later, I was doing an interview, and my phone kept ringing and ringing and ringing.

I finally apologized during the interview and grabbed my phone.

It was my dad.

And he said, you got to get over here.

We got a problem.

So I told the interview, I said, I'm sorry, I got to go check on my dad.

And I went to my cook site in Lakeland, Florida, and the reps were there to tell me that I'd been disqualified and that I was, like, two seconds late on my brisket turn in.

And then we went on to awards, and we pulled a first, a second, and a fourth, and the other three categories, and we could have been last, not disqualified in brisket.

We had won the contest.

Anyways, I was devastated.

And I was driving back to Virginia from Florida, and the next day, I had stopped at a truck station to refuel and was filling up and got back on the highway, and I was driving back home, and I got a phone call from a barbecue buddy of mine.

He said, tuffy, did I just see you driving south on 95?

I said, no, I'm driving.

Driving home.

I'm driving north.

He said, I could have swore I just saw you driving south on 95.

And he was right.

I was so devastated, I got back on the freeway.

Wow.

But here's the lesson.

The lesson, what I learned, because I thought, all right, so I'm really fast.

I'm really good at building a box.

I can do a really good job.

I've got a lot of years of plating foods and making things look good.

And, you know, the French have a term mise en place and being organized.

And anyways, long story short, that lesson, I had no world championships before that experience.

And then I was fortunate enough to have great success afterwards.

So here's what I learned.

Here's what the mistake had a lesson.

And so the mistake was get your meat on time.

But the lesson was this.

I gave myself more time to build boxes.

I started to really search through that brisket or that pork butt and find the most delicious portions.

Because here's the real truth.

The real truth is our food has got to eat cold.

I thought it was so important to give hot food to these judges.

So on pork and brisket, they sort our entries because they don't want our entries to go to the same table twice.

So that process becomes slower.

So what I learned is I don't need to be at the tail end of turn in for pork and brisket.

It needs to be turned in time, and it needs to be turned in on time.

And I need to give them the best examples of the food that I cooked that day, give myself time.

And when I.

When I sorted that all out, because initially I started turning them way early because I just was so hyper focused on never having that happen again.

But so cook it.

And here's.

And so that also taught me this.

It's a tenderness contest.

It is not.

The taste is really important.

But generally speaking, we can fix taste.

We can fix taste with a brush of sauce, a sprinkle of dust, whatever, but texture.

The best foods in the world.

I don't care if you're Thomas Keller at the French Laundry or ice cream or Caesar salad or barbecue.

Those.

So how does.

How does ice cream and barbecue get in the same conversation?

Well, the best barbecue, the best rib is the one that's got the best chew.

The best pork has got the best chew.

The best brisket's got the best bite.

The best ice cream's got the best mouthfeel.

The best Caesar salad's got crisp, fresh romaine with crunchy, crisp, fresh croutons and just the right amount of salad dressing.

So, anyways, that mistake in Lakeland, Florida, ultimately taught me a lot of lessons, and those lessons didn't come quick.

It took a lot of reflection and a lot of time.

But what I started to realize is I actually made a better presentation or put better food in that box when I gave myself more time and didn't try and do it, as the French would call a la minute.

Interesting.

You really are the professor, aren't you?

Yeah, I talk too much.

You know, I tell you what.

So John Marcus, when he called me in Dillard, Georgia, a few days before Leanne called and told me that she had made fun of my spreadsheets, John went on in that same conversation, said, tuffy, I got to tell you, I cast your role as the Professor.

He said you could talk for hours on smoke and wood and fire.

So in this episode on your show, I just proved his point.

There you go.

It's all good.

Well, Tuffy, thank you for taking the time.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And like I said, I don't want to make it three years again or whatever it's been since you've been on the show.