A few things you might not know about the American Royal

• Brooke Vandever
• This is just a fraction of the chickens smoked at the Royal.

I’d love to tell you that humankind was meant to eat 2 pounds of barbecue on a Sunday. I’d love to tell you that my body hasn’t been sending out distress signals like a dinghy aimlessly floating toward the Bermuda Triangle. But you, Fat City reader, deserve better.

You deserve the cold truth: judging barbecue at the American Royal is a series of molasses-coated haymakers that leaves no stomach unturned. The story of my experience as a certified judge at the 33rd annual barbecue contest is in this week’s paper (and online here). What follows are a few tidbits and observations that didn’t make the piece.