The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Local, national barbecue eateries featured
Two restaurants situated next to each other at the Willowick Rib Burn Off highlighted the range of the event.
Off the Bone BBQ was a well-oiled traveling machine.
The Mobile, Alabamabased barbecue joint has been packing up and traveling every weekend from the start of April until the week before Thanksgiving for the past five years. It has traveled to Maine, to California to South Dakota. Next week it will be at the Heinz Field Kickoff and Rib Fest in Pittsburgh.
Its set up is elaborate, with a huge sign highlighting its many awards. “Best Sauce 1st Place 2018” in St. Augustine, Florida, “Best Sauce 1st Place 2017” in Augusta, New Jersey and “Best Ribs” in Willowick’s inaugural rib burn off in 2017.
“People love what they can’t get every day,” Hank “The Tank” Marshall of Off the Bone BBQ said.
Traveling the country is good for them, too, he said. They get feedback from people all over the U.S.
“The key to making good barbecue is love,” Marshall said. “A lot of people overthink
it. It’s about how you rub it. We spend more love than time.”
Next to them in a more
modest tent and just short drive up from its 34840 Vine St. Eastlake restaurant was Mama’s Boy BarB-Q.
Mama’s Boy was participating in its first-ever rib burn off.
“It’s definitely a learning
experience,” owner Andrew Johnson said.
Mama’s Boy opened up in Eastlake just over a year ago. Johnson was a restaurant kid and always dreamed of opening his parents’ restaurant back up. The original Mama’s Boy operated on Lee Road in Cleveland Heights in the 1970s through 2001. In 2015, Johnson began selling bottles of the BBQ sauce and opened up the Eastlake location in 2017.
While Off The Bone gives people the chance to eat something that can’t every day, Mama’s Boy had the chance to show off what fest-goers can get right in their own back yard.
“It’s a good chance for exposure,” Johnson said, adding that people who may have seen the restaurant while driving by on Vine Street have a chance to sample what they have to offer. Maybe next time they’re driving on Vine Street, they’ll swing in.
Mama’s Boy and Off The Bone were two of five restaurants that participated in the three-day burn off that ran from Aug. 24-26 at Dudley Park in Willowick.
The others were Orrville, Ohio-based After Hours Barbecue, who like Off The Bone boasted a large sign showing off its awards; Madison Villagebased 528 Tavern; and Eastlake-based Regovich’s Catering.