PigFest: It gets bigger and better every year

During the summer, folks in the good old U.S.A. tend to re up the grill and cook up their favorite barbecue recipes. OK, well here in Colorado that’s more of a summer activity. I know that it’s a year-round thing in states with a warmer winter climate, but two feet of snow kind of dampens most people’s enthusiasm to step outside and stand around the grill with tongs in hand around here.

Now, there are several levels of grillers out there. ere are the folks like me who just use a little charcoal grill a couple of times a year and feel lucky when they get the food to cook all the way through before the coals go out.

Most of us are limited to hamburgers and brats on the grill, but occasionally give a steak or two a shot. en there’s the gas grill gang that probably have a slew of recipes and do this at least once a week. Nothing is o limits for these backyard chefs. ey even grill pineapple when the mood turns tropical. We don’t want to forget about the charcoal enthusiasts that know what kind of wood to burn to get

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speci c avors and have a selection of everything from hickory to applewood on hand. ese chefs even make their own bacon.

Next comes the smoker crew. ey have these kettle looking things that take hours to cook big chunks of meat or whole chickens and usually make enough food to store some up for the winter…for the next ve years.

And then we get to the professional level with the huge smoker/ grill things that look like a tanker truck which can roast an entire pig at one time and they either own a restaurant or put on a special event to feed scores of people.

Well, the latter group is what we are going to talk about today because our local Golden VFW Post 4171 will be partnering with e Gallery Sportsman’s Club and Range as well as e Barrel Room to present their annual PigFest on is is an all-afternoon, into the evening event that gets bigger and better every year. It features live music from three bands starting at noon and continues on until 8 p.m. is year’s bands include e Walker Williams Band, Nightwolf and the Strange Brew 5280 Band. OK, that’s a bit of shameless selfpromotion there that I do about once a year in this column. Yes, I’ll be playing drums with Nightwolf right here in my hometown of Golden for this one! ere will also be ra es with great prizes, but the main attraction is always the food. Of course an entire pig will be roasted but there will also be all the trimmings like baked beans, grilled corn on the cob, potato salad and homemade green chili. e food will be served from 1 p.m. until 8 p.m. but I’d plan on getting there at least a little bit before the end.

Aug.19. It will be held at the Golden VFW Post located at 15625 10th Avenue in the Pleasant View area of Golden.

You can get tickets in advance and they run $20 for food and the music if you buy them in advance on line. If you get them at the door, they will be $25. Kids under 10 tickets run $10 or you can just get an admission ticket to check out the bands, with no food, for $10 as well. You can order tickets by going to the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/pro le. php?id=100092981606745. You will nd a link to order tickets there. All of the proceeds from this event go toward helping out our Veterans, which is the main mission of all of our local VFW posts. is is always a really fun family event that I encourage everyone to come out and enjoy. You don’t have to be a VFW member and it does raise a lot of money to help people here in our community. Plus, you don’t have to clean your own grill after you eat. at in itself is worth $20!

John Akal is a well-known jazz artist/drummer and leader of the 20-piece Ultraphonic Jazz Orchestra. He also is president of John Akal Imaging, professional commercial photography and multimedia production. He can be reached at jaimaging@aol.com.