9th annual Pork & Brew kicks off

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - If you have a big appetites for bar-b-que it's that time of year you've been waiting for! The 9th annual Pork & Brew is starting on Friday at the Santa Ana Star Center in Rio Rancho.

"You know, it's a fun hobby and people take it seriously so it's a serious cooking competition," says Frances Montano from Mad Max's BBQ in Corrales.

Frances and her team from Mad Max BBQ came close to becoming the grand champions last year, but won't be taking any chances this year.

"It's not as easy as you think as you see on tv," says Montano. "It is a lot of work and in addition for this contest we have a couple of other, side dish and desert, we do an anything but and a few other things, there's other prize money also available to win."

This year, about 60 bar-b-que teams will compete in four main categories, everything including brisket, pork, ribs and chicken.

"It's not going to be an easy competition, we have some new teams that are coming in and we have a lot of local teams such as sweet peppers, we've got gary from smoke wing, OKC as well as our sauce by max's bbq," adds Montano.

Most would agree, the real winners are the people who get to eat all that good food. "I'm not a pro cook, I was never trained professionally, something I love to do so that makes it really gratifying for myself and being able to do that for somebody else is really great," says Montano.

If you're one of the thousands looking to come out to the fest this weekend, it's not only good food, but games and fun for the family, good music on Saturday as well.

The Pork and Brew starts at noon on Friday and goes until 9 p.m. On Saturday it runs from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. then on Sunday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.