It's time for Barbecue Nation with jt.

So fire up your grill, light the charcoal, and get your smoker cooking.

Now from the Turn It, Don't Burn it studios in Portland.

Here's jt.

Hey, everybody.

Welcome to the nation.

I jt, along with my co host, Leanne Whippen, hall of Famer.

There'll be new news next week about hall of Fame inductees this year.

Too exciting.

So that's exciting.

Coming to you from the Turn It, Don't Burn it studios in Portland and Tampa.

Today, we've got a friend of the show and we've been on here a number of times, and it's always great information.

Stan Hayes from Operation Barbecue Relief.

Stan and his crew are coming up in my neck of the woods in June, but they've got other stuff going on, so we're going to cover everything for the next hour.

Stan, welcome.

Thank you, guys.

I appreciate you having me back on.

No problem.

So let's take it from the top.

You're coming back up here in June.

I think it's the 14th.

That area working with Alena Casino, they have a big barbecue fest.

Aena does, and Stan's been part of it now for several years with obr.

And it's kind of interesting what you do, and I'm just going to let you tell us about it.

Yeah, well, you know, we were one of the, you know, inaugural groups, if you will, that were part, that was part of the barbecue fest.

And what we ended up doing, you know, we've done vending, we've done classes there, we've done demos.

And, and this year, instead of, you know, doing the same class that we've been doing, like a barbecue academy one day class on a couple of different meets, you know, one of the things that we've been hearing is, man, I'd like to learn more about vending or, hey, how you guys do this.

And we thought, why don't we put together a class, the business of barbecue vending?

You know, what it takes to, you know, really put on, you know, and go to an event, you know, so what we're going to do is we're going to talk to them about, you know, how we price things, how we, you know, how we figure out how much we're going to take based on what they believe the, the attendance is going to be for an event and really get into, you know, how we plan for it before we ever get there.

You know, what we're looking to buy, you know, why we choose, why we're choosing, what we're choosing for the event and you know, we're going to do, know this year we're going to do two different meats, you know, for this and, and we were asked to do ribs as one of them pork ribs and, and put on the show because when we, when you do pork ribs, you know, you just can't pull them out, slice them and hand them to them.

You got to have the, the grill out front and caramelize them and do, do some of that show with it to really bring people over.

But if we can get beef ribs, I don't know that somebody's going to spend the amount of money you want for a beef rib, but, man, they make great sliders too.

So we're looking at doing a beef slider.

We're not sure what it's going to be, whether it'll be that, whether it'll be brisket, whether it'll be chuck roast or, you know, beef clod.

I mean, it could be, you know, and we're looking at that.

You know, obviously we're trying to use our relationships and get everything donated.

So all the proceeds benefit the organization.

Right.

You know, ALA has been great to work with over the years and they really, you know, they're really working with us to make this happen.

I'm doing this with a team of volunteers.

I'm not going to bring in any of my team this year.

I'm bringing in some of the people that we've been training in our lead positions that want to do more on disaster.

So these are, these are people that have already stepped up to do more.

And so it's a little bit of a thank you, but a little bit of hey, thank you with work involved.

Right.

And for us, you know, they will, we'll go through that business of barbecue piece, but then we're going to get them hands on.

You know, we'll, we'll tell them why and show them why we do what we do around.

Like I said, you know, to me, at a festival like that, if you're not out front with a, with a big party grill based in the ribs so they can smell it, see it, you know, and, and then passing those ribs over to get cut for those people, you're missing out on an opportunity because that draws people in at those events, you know, and then the little things that we've learned over the years about, about this, we want to be able to give to them.

So, yeah, it's, it's, it's a good way to get our, get volunteers and get People engaged.

But it's also a way that people that may have interest in vending and getting more involved in barbecue of how to do that can learn.

I think there's two important things you need to include in this.

They need to bring.

Bring two books, their checkbook and their prayer book.

Because if you get the numbers wrong, you know what that means?

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

You know, and, and you know, we're going off of experience, you know, because we've done this.

Now, the vending side of it, like I think three out of five years, this will be the third one.

And, and we know what, what our numbers have been in the past and we know what other vendors did like.

And we also.

Last year they got caught off guard.

Last year was one of the years I didn't vend and they got caught off guard because Ala na gave all their high rollers like a $50 seed, you know, because they do it all off of a little wristband, you know, where you tap and pay well.

They gave all of those high rollers, I'll call them a dollar fifty, you know, like credit.

Right, right.

And then, you know, they hook their credit card up to it.

I mean, they threw.

Flew through money because the way you can just go around tapping stuff and tapping for beer, tapping for food, tapping for this.

But what they weren't anticipating is they didn't know about that 50 bump.

And that was about 200 and something people that got that and vendors were flying.

I mean, food was flying off.

I was sitting there behind the scenes and with our class last year grilling extra tri tips for one of the groups because they were so far behind that they needed proteins, you know, and they were bringing them over and we're grilling them and having the students help with it, you know, to, to keep up with the demand.

Right.

So I mean, it, it's always a logistical nightmare.

You know, I'm actually, you know, right now I'm using their equipment and they don't have a lot of big equipment.

So I'm going to be pre cooking some stuff, you know.

And you know, the nice thing about combi ovens is, man, you can't tell the difference when you reheat something in the combi versus, you know, other other ways.

But you know, I'm still the kind of guy that would like to be pulling off ribs fresh, you know, throwing them on that grill and doing that.

So I'm working to try to find an old hickory up in that area that we can get up in there to be in our Spot.

We're, you know, we're.

Excuse me.

There's a saying around here.

It's been here for years.

Keep Portland weird.

And there's merit to that on a lot of different issues and levels.

But we're not huge.

Huge barbecue country like Kansas City, if you like.

Yeah.

And so sometimes it's hard.

I mean there's some vet vendors that sell those types of cookers, but they're not always readily available up here.

I mean if you, if you wanted a Weber kettle or even a Traeger, you're in the home turf right here.

You know what I mean?

So it's, it's tough on that the, and they've moved it up this year, haven't they?

Date wise from previous.

So they, it's, it's really moving it back to where you.

It was in the earlier years.

Okay.

Last year they, they were, they were way, you know, they moved back over a month, about six weeks further back.

And, and it's, you know, just things that are going on.

They've had a lot of, gone through a lot of management change at Alanae from the casino side and looking at it and, and you, you'll notice this year's Barbecue Fest does not have the slew of, of celebrity chefs that it has in the past.

You know, it's got, it's got some influencers and it has some, you know, people that, that have, you know, big networks and stuff.

But it doesn't, it's, it's not the, you know, you're not going to see Michael Simon or.

Well, at least I've been told you're not going to see Michael Simon or, or Jet Tila or these others that they've been bringing in over the last few years as they've gotten, this has gotten larger and larger.

I mean they, they're expecting over 5,000 people between Saturday and Sunday and they're, they're four hour SL.

So you bought, you know, you buy your ticket for a four hour slot to come there and it'll be Sunday, you know, Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening or Sunday afternoon.

So.

Well, it's a, it's a big event.

I mean it's turned into a big event.

They're still doing the barbecue contest, you know, and, and they've expanded that to, to, for bigger space to bring in more teams and, and they want to grow that more as well.

Yeah, well, they've got the money to do it.

Why did they cut the celebrity chefs?

They did, they didn't, they didn't see the, the need for at least the full number of them and didn't see a cop.

You know, the, the, the reciprocal increase in, in attendance.

Yeah.

For having those big names.

And so they're like, hey, why are we spending money to bring these people, big money to bring these people in when we're not seeing like a huge spike in the numbers?

Because we have these people.

And so they've been playing with them with different festivals and not having as many of the big names and numbers haven't gone down.

People are coming out for the food, for the experience.

And not necessarily, you know, because somebody like Michael Simon or Aaron Mayer is getting up on stage and doing a demo.

Yeah, yeah, And I can understand that.

I mean, it's, it's, it's great to have them.

They're a wealth of information and personality and all that.

But again, that kind of keep Portland weird crowd, even though it's across the river in Vancouver, if you will.

But you know what I mean, it's just those things have never been huge, huge draws.

And I understand why they did it, but I understand why they brought them in originally.

But I think they're right.

And I think you're right there, Stan, that if it made a difference of a 15% bump in your audience, the cost might be worth it, you know, but if you're not seeing 10% to 20% increase in your warm bodies out there on doing it, that can be a big expense.

Yeah.

And you know, those guys aren't cheap.

I mean, and gals, you know, and, and for me, it was great because I, I've met many of them.

We've had a chance of, of, you know, building relationships with many of them so I get to see them at these events.

But for me, that's not why I'm there.

You know, I'm there because I get a chance to work with, you know, first responders and veterans and, you know, and, and the business, the barbecue class, we're still focused on, you know, trying to get the veterans and first responders around the area that are interested to come out, but we're opening it up a little bit, you know, because we're also trying to build the, our base of volunteers.

You know, the Pacific Northwest has been lucky in, in many ways.

You know, you guys have had your fires and, and, and they've been some bad ones, but there could be, it could be much worse.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

There's not a lot of human exposure to that, you know, the after effects of smoke and whatever, but we don't have like, they have in la.

Big residential areas being wiped out.

We're going to take a break.

We're going to be back with Stan Hayes, Leanne and myself right here on the Nation right after this.

Stay with us.

Hey, everybody, it's Jeff here.

I want to tell you about something really cool.

Heritage steel cookware.

I just got mine.

I do a lot of cooking and it's got five ply construction.

Stay cool handles.

It's titanium strengthened.

It's got all the great stuff.

Just go to HeritageSteel us and find out more.

You'll love it, I guarantee it.

Welcome back to the Nation.

I'm J.T.

along with Ms.

Whippen.

She's busy, this boy.

She's just trying to get her on the phone someday, I'll tell you that.

It's, it's tough out there.

If you want to follow the show, we're on all the social media platforms and all the podcast platforms and excuse me, Leanne has her Instagram, which she's got about 9 million people that follow her on that.

I've got mine, which I have three, and of course Facebook and Twitter and all that.

So we're pretty easy to find.

Like I said, we've got Stan Hayes with us.

Stan's been on the show a number of times from Operation Barbecue Relief, the Carolinas, the storms they had there, all through that swath of the South.

And I followed it.

You know, I watched your posts and stuff, how you were, you were responding to things.

This isn't so much about the instantaneous response, but are you still in some of those areas on occasion helping or what's going on back there?

Yeah, so especially in western North Carolina, we have, you know, we were there for over a month.

We left, but we've been back subsequently probably five or six different times to do different things in different communities.

Most recently over Easter, we, we did meals for four different communities, sort of centralized it in one one of those communities and then sent it out to three additional communities to do a few thousand meals, you know, to get out to those people because it's amazing that, you know, it's a double edged sword really for, you know, many of them live there because they want to be left alone.

Right, right.

You know, they, they, they don't want government interaction, they don't want, you know, sometimes people interaction.

But when something like this happens, you know, we have to do better.

You know, I mean, you used to have people that live in intense, they lived through the winter intense.

I mean, how, how can that be, you know, with, with, with everything that we have today.

And, and so we, we did it.

You know, when you saw the response to the LA fires was greater than what happened in western North Carolina, you know, it just, that's politics at work.

Right?

And, and I'm not a political person.

I don't like to play games like that, but I think it was just glaringly obvious what was happening and, and we were in la.

I mean, don't get me wrong, we went out there because there was a huge need and we were, you know, we were asked to come out and.

But it doesn't compare in my, in, in my eyes of, you know, when you look at what happened out there and, and we'll continue through this year, you know, probably every other month, almost every third month, we've got something planned to go back in there and do thousands of meals, you know, with different groups and, and teaming up with groups to, to continue to help up.

Because it's going to be probably two years before many of these people get back into, into their home if, if.

They have ever built.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, you're, you're way south from where I am and from Stan there.

Are they on the local news?

Are they covering the people in Carolinas or.

Occasionally, but, you know, occasionally they're covering la, occasionally they're covering us.

And I mean, my daughter's house just got imploded two days ago and the storm was quite a while ago.

So I mean, it's going to be a year before she even gets another house.

So it's, it's touch and go with the news.

It's, as you said, it's kind of political.

I have family in North Carolina and I know how devastating it was and I feel that they got slighted.

Well, for what they went through.

Even me sitting 3,000 miles away, I thought they've always, they've kind of turned their back on them or just, you know, they came in for the.

I promise not to get too political here, folks, but the powers that be at the time came in for the photo ops and yeah, we'll do.

But it took a while to even get them there and they did that and then they left and then it just kind of sat.

I think the most important thing about the Carolinas is those people didn't have insurance because they didn't expect this to happen to them.

Whereas in Florida, you know, they have insurance or they should.

You know what I mean?

So when they lose something in the Carolinas, it's not coming back to them.

They lost it.

And I feel like that focus has been lost.

You have a lot of generational homes that were paid off, you know, handed down from family to family in some of those hollers and some of those areas around there that, you know, they didn't see a need to have insurance because, you know, most people think of insurance for that, you know, know, tragedy and, and it, and sometimes it becomes, you know, that cost benefit.

Is it, is there a benefit to having it or not?

Unfortunately.

Right, right.

And when, when things are paid off, you don't have a mortgage company that tells you you have to have it, you know, so.

But again, it is, There's a lot going on now and there's a lot more people involved and, and other groups that we've worked with, that we've gone back and worked with, you know, are helping in those efforts to get people, you know, a little bit more situated.

You know, we worked with a group that I think in one weekend brought in a, they brought in a group of Amish from Pennsylvania, Ohio area.

I saw that.

Yeah.

And they built 20 tiny homes in a weekend.

Amazing.

And, and I'm like, look, this is what humanity is about right here.

You know, it wasn't the government, it wasn't the state, you know, it was non profit organizations, church groups, civic groups coming together to say, you know what, we're gonna have to take this in our own hands.

Right, right.

No, I, I saw those news clips on that, Stan.

And you know, those Amish folks, they got, they can build stuff, you know, we all know that they can build stuff and they could do it.

You know, they raise a barn in an afternoon, a huge barn, you know, and they got the roof and siding on.

By the end of the day, maybe the interior isn't finished.

But, you know, you, it's, it's up, it's tangible at that point.

And I saw those clips about the Amish coming into North Carolina and building those little homes and stuff, and they were just knocking it out.

You know, I thought that was impressive.

We're going to have to take a break here in a minute, but what I want to talk to you about is I think you came on the show the first time, what, six years ago or something?

It's been a while.

It's been a while.

Yeah.

And you were really starting to hit your stride with OBR then, you know, and if you don't know what that stands for, it's Operation Barbecue Relief.

All right, but when we come back, I want to talk to you about the expansion.

And now you have what I want to say satellite divisions.

I'm going to let you explain it better than that around the country where you can, you know, your response can be as soon as they open the gate, we can be there type thing.

All right, we're going to take a break.

We're going to be back with Stan Hayes, Leanne and myself on the Nation in just a second.

Got to listen to the commercials, though.

But we'll be right back.

Hey, everybody, it's JT And I have eaten, if you've ever looked at me, you know that.

But I have eaten seafood all over the world and I can tell you there's no place better than here in Oregon and our Dungeness crab.

If you want to learn more about Oregon Dungeness crab, just go to oregondungeness.org find out how to cook it, how to catch it, where to buy it, and the sustainability of what they're doing there in the Oregon Crab Commission.

Check it out.

Welcome back to Barbecue Nation Nation.

I'm jt.

One of the things we mention every week on this show has to do with this blonde lady with a steak growing out of the back her head right now, if you can see her back picture.

Yeah, I was in a steak kind of mood.

Yeah, it's a beautiful looking steak.

Pig powder.

Love pig powder.

She's going to give us an update on that because it's a great product.

You can go to pigpowder.com and order it.

And Leanne's the only one on the show I ever let do this, so.

Yeah, and I appreciate that greatly.

It is available on Amazon as well.

And it is a rev, an award winning rub.

And you hear award winning a lot with food and anything.

But it did win best rub on the planet, which is a very big award.

It can be used on pork and chicken and french fries and baked beans.

It's very versatile.

Jeff, you've used it a lot.

Yes.

And then we also have a spicy pig powder coming out and that will be on the site as soon as I receive it.

And some labeling changes, too.

I'm even gonna use it Friday on a live show.

Oh, good.

I'll tell you what I'm doing then.

We'll get back to Stan here.

I'm doing a grilled chicken thigh with basil and then some mango peach salsa on rice and some couple of sides.

Oh, that sounds good.

Yeah, it's one of those things.

I went to the fridge and went, I didn't plan anything for dinner.

And so I yelled in the front room, shell just Got home, I said, hey, how about some chicken and rice?

And she goes, sure.

Well, we had not to belabor this, but we'd gone to Costco and got one of those big peach mango salsa containers.

I don't know if they have them in your area, but they have them up here.

So I did that and I got to thinking about it and I thought, I can do that.

And so I used a little pig powder on it.

Yeah, pig powder would complement peaches, mango, anything like that.

Yeah, it's perfect.

So go to Amazon or go to pigpowder.com I'll show you.

I'll send you a picture of the hero shot when we're done.

See it?

I want to see it.

Anyway, we're talking with Stan Hayes today from Operation Barbecue Relief.

And as we said going into the break, when Stan first came on the show, they were just really gaining traction and he'd been, he's put a lot of years in on this.

So.

But now they not only have that, they have their retreat farm, if you will, where they can tail with veterans and, and as you know, you hear me rail about it a lot that we need to do more for our veterans and Stan has followed those leads.

So bring us up to speed from where you started, stan, to where OBR is now.

Well, you know, this is our 14th year actually tomorrow I believe.

So we're right on, on that, you know, already talking about 15 years what we're going to do for a little celebration.

But as you look back at where we've come, you know, from, from the days of a volunteer group, you know, caravanning around the country to major disasters and feeding communities to, you know, last year we did 24 different disaster events across the country.

Just shy of 1.6 million meals provided to those communities after disaster strikes and first responders and groups that come to help them.

But we did 100 non disaster events last year across the country to support our veterans, our first responders, communities in need outside of disaster in some way, fashion or form.

I mean, one example is, and we just finished, it was at the beginning of May is International Firefighters Day.

And on that day three years ago, we started a small little movement of hey, let's go out and feed the firemen at firehouses on that day.

And we did it in Vancouver three years ago was one of the first areas I just happened to be out there around that time and was able to go help feed and you know, was part of this event.

Well now as you move forward this year we did over 180 different firehouses and 30 different cities and 21 different states.

Wow.

So in three years that movement is just jumping up and you've got, we've got companies and groups coming on board.

You know, Leanne down in your area, Sonny's barbecue jumped in and said we want to be part of this.

We love this idea of celebrating our heroes, you know, on a day like this.

And, and for us, you know, this is how we keep our, you know, our volunteers that we spend a lot of time, effort, they're the backbone of what we do.

This is how we keep them engaged by getting to do things in their own community that, you know, for their friends, their neighbors and, and such.

And, and so it's, it's just been a great thing for growth wise.

It's been a great thing for engagement.

But more importantly, it gives a lot of ownership to those individuals to help with the brand in their community.

Sure.

How you've got a lot of people that are members, if you will, of obr.

How has that grown over the years?

I mean you just gave the example of Sunny's Barbecue helping you with the first responders.

Sure.

But.

And I was thinking while you were talking, I think it's probably closer to eight years ago.

You were on the show.

First time this show's been, wow, we've been on the air.

We're going into the 11th year.

So it's, it's been a while.

Anyway, you've got, I know like Meathead is a supporter.

Yep.

You know, we do stuff here, so on and so forth.

But how has that grown?

You know, by adding that the, the first responders and veteran component and even active military.

It's growing us into new verticals out there because there's more companies that want to support those than there are just those supporting disaster relief.

And then there's more foundations.

I mean we've just started working with and been in the works for quite some time.

But the Bob Woodruff foundation is one of the biggest ones out there that focuses on first responders, you know, veteran groups and such like that for.

And they've become sort of what a gatekeeper, I guess might be the best way to put it for so many foundations that if you aren't sort of an approved organization with the Woodruff foundation, you aren't going to be eligible for a foundational grant.

That's like, it's like a weed out question.

If you're not a part of the they call got your six member then you, you don't even qualify.

It's just like, yep, that's just a weed out.

You're done.

Yeah.

And, you know, it's taken us a while to get there and understand it and, and be able to get through that.

But that's just a new thing for us.

That's a new avenue, It's a new relationship.

But that relationship is they want to support these groups that make it to that point.

And you know, I was with a gentleman yesterday who's a brand new member as well, and he's already, you know, seeing benefits from it.

He, he trains therapy dogs for veterans for PTSD and anxiety and stuff like that.

And you know, he has a tremendous facility.

You know, they're, they're growing leaps and bounds and we both, you know, they're, they're a couple months ahead of us and in becoming a member.

But we were, we just happened to be talking about it yesterday how it's already, that relationship's paying off and each one of them's like that.

Right.

I mean, the number of companies, you know, we, it's amazing.

You know, after 14 years we have some of the, you know, same people that we had in that first year, second year, as we started growing.

Yeah.

And still right beside us, still promoting, you know, how we do good in the community and have deepened their relationship with us.

How do you feel at the end of the day?

It's kind of an abstract question.

Exhausted.

Exhausted.

Exhausted.

You know, I'm down here at the camp right now.

We just did a, we did our Monday was our annual golf fundraiser.

Huge success until about, you know, about 4 o' clock in the afternoon when amazing, you know, massive storm came in.

So, you know, only about a third of the field actually finished 18 holes.

But there wasn't anybody complaining.

I mean, it was, you know, when you have a golf tournament and you have seven different chefs on holes around the golf course putting out fresh, you know, you know, handheld items for the golfers and, and if there's not food, there's booze.

You know, everybody had a great time.

And then we took and, and we decided, hey, let's get some of these people that are coming in from out of town.

Let's get them down to the camp.

So we did a VIP one day camp experience yesterday and had a small number of them stayed overnight because of their travel and left this morning.

But it gave us a chance to showcase the property.

But they all got to, you know, with Johnny, I, my chef, get to sit down and they got to break down a, you know, a whole chicken to do A half chicken.

They all got to, you know, hear about it, watch them do it, then go do it themselves.

And that really, you know, and then get into the fun part of.

All right, how am I going to season this?

What am I going to use?

Right, Pig powder.

Pig powder, yeah.

Right.

You know, know, we're going to hit up Leanne after this to get some down here because we do.

We have a little bit of.

We have like a, A little pantry there of different spices.

So.

And, and that's part of the culinary therapy, when you think about it.

That's the creative side of the brain that if you are painting and you're trying to decide what color you want to paint something or what you want to put in there, what kind of flower you're going to do or whatever it is.

Well, it's the same thing.

How do I want to.

How do I want to season this?

Do I want to season.

Do I want sweet?

Do I want savory?

Do I want, you know, do I want he.

And, you know, those are, you know, it's engaging the same, same part of the brain that you would if you were doing art therapy or music therapy.

It's just food, you know, and the biggest distinction between all of them is everybody has to eat.

So at the end of the day, you know, it's not just the culinary therapy is not just therapeutic for them.

It's life skills, you know, on a grill and smoker for people.

And, you know, we had people that were, you know, gung ho, people that were really ginger as they're trying to get through, you know, cutting the backbone out of a chicken for the first time ever or something.

But everybody had a blast.

And then they, at the end, they're sharing their chicken, you know, say, hey, you should try my chicken.

Here, let me try some of yours.

And, and it's.

It's that, you know, food's the greatest unifier in the world.

Oh, yeah.

So if we can use, you know, that therapeutic, you know, approach, everybody left you know, and, and several with organizations that will probably look at renting the camp, you know, and, and including the culinary therapy along with what they do.

So for us, each of these that we do gets more awareness for the organization, gets more awareness for the camp.

You know, that's how we grow.

That's how we've always grown.

It's.

Has always been around, you know, let's just put our head down and do what we do best.

Excellent.

And it will start getting recognized and it will start growing and it'll Start a movement or it'll do this.

And that's where we're at.

You know, we're at a point that, yeah, we need more people.

We want to do more camps here because at the end of the day, you know, there are so many more blue sky days than there are gray.

So if we can, you know, have programs that are, you know, 24, seven or, you know, 24, seven.

365 days a year.

You know, most camps run on a seasonality.

Our goal is to be one of the elite camps, which means that you're doing more than 24 camps in a year.

Right.

We're going to take a break.

We're going to come back with Stan Hayes, Operation barbecue relief, and Ms.

Whippen, hall of Famer.

And me, I'm just a mic jockey.

We'll be right back.

Hey, everybody, it's jt.

You know, I talk about Painted Hills all the time, and we always say beef the way nature intended.

But it's more than that, because each bite of Painted Hills will make your taste buds explode.

Put a big, bright smile on your face, and whoever's at your dinner table will have a big, bright smile on their face.

And you can thank me for that later.

Just go to paintedhillsbeef.com and find out more.

You won't regret it.

Hey, everybody, JT here.

I want to tell you about Hammerstahl knives.

Hammerstahl combines German steel with beautiful and functioning designs.

They're part of the Heritage Steel Group, which also does their pots and pans.

So go to heritagesteel us.

Check out the Hammer Stahl knives.

If you're really into cooking, I think you're really gonna like them.

Foreign.

Welcome back to Barbecue Nation.

I'm JT along with Leanne Whippen and Stan Hayes.

I was Leanne.

I flashed on something here.

This is what, your third year sitting in that chair?

Yeah.

I'm pretty sure Stan has read the label of pig powder, though.

Not to belabor the point, but when he was talking about savory and sweet with little heat, I mean, I was like, I'm thinking that's right on your label.

I'm gonna send Stan some so he can have it at his camp and put it in his pantry.

I want to come down.

Fantastic.

I want to come down there sometime, Stan, if you're available and we can hook up, and I want to see that camp.

And because I like to do all those activities.

Hunting, fishing, you know, golfing.

That's kind of in my wheelhouse now.

What do you have on the agenda going forward.

I know we talked about the event coming up at ALA in June and that, but what other kind of static events do you have on the agenda for, say, the next four months?

So we have so many events that, you know, one, I start cutting them off about, you know, about August.

They have to be local, standalone.

That doesn't take any, you know, is being done by a local person with their own equipment.

Because once we start getting into the height of hurricane season, I'm not going to tie up equipment for that, but I would bet you we have.

Between now and then, we've got over 20 events already on the calendar.

I mean, I'm.

I'm doing.

In one week, I'm doing three different events.

Coming up at the beginning of June, I'm doing the national high school barbecue championship.

We're going to do a meal for all the kids and their families coming up to Kansas City because it's being hosted up here in Kansas City.

So, you know, I offered, since it's our hometown, we might as well show them a little hospitality because there's a lot of kids from Texas, Oklahoma.

There's a team from Florida, I believe, coming up this year for.

For it.

And as.

As it continues to grow.

That's the future of my volunteer base.

Yeah.

Is the.

Those kids.

So I want them to know who we are.

I want them to, you know, know what we do and be able to talk to them about how it can impact what they're doing today, can impact people in the future.

And so that's an opportunity, you know, and then that same week, I'm doing a thing with National Beef.

You know, we're just getting more and more, you know, involved with events.

And in all of those, I think we've got a couple of.

You know.

We'Ve done already this year several reserve units where they've been called up and are leaving the country for deployment.

And we're fortunate enough to be able to give them a little celebration with their families before they leave.

At the same time, you know, every time we do that, we offer to do the homecoming, you know, and so we have some that are now coming full circle this summer to do some homecoming barbecue for those reserve units that have been called up and been away from home for, you know, some.

Some of the.

Man, some of these are long deployments now, 14, 15 months away from home.

Yeah, and those are.

Those are the fun things.

Right?

Because disasters aren't fun.

Disasters are, you know, that necessary evil out there where, you know, you have to, you need somebody out there providing a good hot meal to people on their worst day.

Where do you keep all your equipment?

Is it scattered about?

So we have yes and no.

I mean, so we have our warehouse there in Tampa you've been to before, and we've got a small amount of equipment down there.

We've got equipment in.

Our biggest warehouse space now is no longer Kansas City.

It's actually East Tennessee.

And, and that's partially because the people I have work on the, you know, and, and on the program side, operational side.

But I can get so much more per square foot in, in Johnson City, Tennessee than I can anywhere around the Kansas City metro area.

Anywhere around.

I mean, I don't think I.

In Florida I can touch it.

You know, the space that we have and, and then Dallas, you know, the Dallas area is, is the fourth location which we've moved stuff and, and most recently we, you know, we've consolidated some of our other locations, freezer storage space and everything.

You know, we warehouse around 400,000 servings of protein at any given time to ensure that when we, when a disaster strikes, we have the protein on hand to be able to serve those communities.

So, and there's no place that we can have that just in one place, you know, so we, we do have multiple locations.

They're between Kansas City and Dallas right now.

But we're adding our own freezer storage in East Tennessee.

That'll be about, you know, about a enough for a tractor trailer load to start out with.

We've got a couple minutes left here.

Stan, do you, do you, as you know, hurricane season is coming, do you ramp up your, your protein storage in, in cold storage and that, I mean, do you, you know, it's kind of like projecting the futures market.

Yeah, it's like vending.

Yeah.

Right.

So, so what we do is, you know, we ensure that we're over that, you know, 400, 000 mark to start with in there.

But we're in contact with those companies that support us and they can't give it for free every time, but they give a good portion of it.

We try to get that free and get that into storage when storage opens up or before this ever happens.

But it's easier to buy even if it's at a highly reduced cost and get a whole truckload brought in to backfill.

Right.

Fairly quickly.

And so now when you, you know, we did between Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton, it was like just under 1.4 million meals.

The majority of those in Florida, across the state, you think about that and you try to work the math backwards and I'm not, I'm not near, I don't have enough toes and fingers to figure that all out.

But we, you know, when you look at that, we're buying a tremendous amount and, and, and we keep, we don't keep quite that many, you know, sides.

Obviously we don't have number 10 cans to match 400,000 servings because we can get that a little easier.

But we have, you know, we have more than a tractor trailer load that's going to be rolling in of number 10 cans.

But you know, we've started adding more to our arsenal so we can do more diversified type meals when we get in there.

Things that can be put together so much faster than barbecue.

Right.

We do a lot of rice dishes with chicken with, with pork and things that are quicker cook stuff using the tilt skillets and things like that.

The combi ovens we just, you know, purchased, you know, some combi ovens and cooking holds, you know, cooking holds are, you know, with our testing is going to help us out greatly in that area because, you know, we can start that overn and cook and hold, you know, hot sides and be ahead of the game before, you know, and it reduces the labor in doing that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Stan Hayes from OBR Operation Barbecue Relief.

Stan, where can direct people to where they can find you on your websites and social media, etc.

Yeah, so website is OBR.org just nice sweet, short.

And you can donate, you can volunteer right from the homepage.

There's two different buttons there.

And then all of our social media, whether it's Instagram, Facebook, X, Twitter, I guess, I mean X TikTok is all OPBBQ relief.

So OPBBQ Relief is our handle on all of our social media.

Stan, thank you so much as always.

You're a wealth of information.

I really admire what you do out there, but it's terrific.

Again, thank you guys for having me on.

No problem.

We'll be back next week.

Don't know where Leanne's going to be.

I don't know where I'm going to be, but we'll be somewhere and go up to the Alna in June and see Stan and if you live in the Portland area or Seattle, come on down and we'll do then.

Until then, I'm jt, thanks for listening, thanks for watching and go out, have some barbecue, have some fun and remember our motto, turn it, don't burn it.

Take care, everybody.

Barbecue Nation is produced by JTSD LLC Productions in association with Salem Media Group.

All rights reserved.