The National Fiery Foods and Barbecue Show kicked off March 3rd and ran through March 6th, at the Sandia Resort in Albuquerque. Last year’s show held an omen that predicted what’s becoming the next big deal in spicy: the sweet stuff. We’d seen a few fruit salsas and fired-up chocolate in 2015; this year, there were so many sweet offerings I half suspected to see a free insulin booth. Fruit salsas and hot sauces, jams, jellies, and chocolates made their presences felt with authority all over the showroom floor.
Dave’s Ask Those Branding Guys Appearance
Never one to miss a chance to preach the virtues of our National Fiery Foods and Barbecue Show, the Pope of Peppers recently sat down with Jim Glover and Dave Hayduk for the Ask Those Branding Guys radio show, here. It’s an entertaining and informative talk about branding and marketing. Which, as we’ve said earlier, can make the difference between life and death for any new business.
Video: See the Ad for the Show!
A big part of why our show performs so well and has been around for 27 years is because Dave DeWitt knows how to get the word out. This year, we’ve kicked up our video presence with our YouTube channel. You may have seen our recipe series on Spicy but there’s also the ad Dave’s buddy Wayne Scheiner created for the show too.
Advertise in the 2016 Show Program!
Total circulation, 10,000+ qualified lovers of all things hot and spicy and BBQ!
Hot Sauce Sales Hit New High
Earlier this week, we talked about how hot sauce has hit the mainstream market with great vengeance and furious anger, with over 50% of American homes having one flavor or another of it on hand. Statista, the Statistics Portal, says that “hot sauce sales are the eighth-fastest growing industry in the U.S. Sales were $1.07 billion in 2012 and are projected to be $1.32 billion in 2017.”
Firewater: Beverage Etiquette Solved at Last
The other day Burn! barbecue contributor extraordinaire Mike Stines and I were talking about The Pope of Peppers and just how much more he knows about chile peppers than we ever will. Dave never ceases to surprise me and now he’s solved a modern problem faced by many a chilehead: what beverage in the blue Hell is right to serve with spicy food?
Hot and Sour Halibut
I love halibut but in some ways it’s the boring sex life of seafood. Mild of flavor and straightforward without a lot of kinks, it’s usually satisfying for one of the two parties involved. You gotta spice halibut up to keep it interesting. Dave and Mike ran a great flounder recipe in an Asian seafood story on the Super Site so I adapted it for halibut. It packs a real healthy burn, too.
