Eagle Point BBQ business qualifies for Texas championship

Feb. 14—Less than three years after taking the local food scene by storm with big wins at Battle of the Bones, an Eagle Point barbecue business will find out how an award-winning burger recipe fares in the big leagues.

Stick-E Fingers Barbecue of Eagle Point earned a qualifying “Golden Ticket” to compete at the World Food Championships in Dallas, Texas, at the end of the year. The competition, which dubs itself “The Leader in Food Sport,” draws about 1,500 cooks from six countries competing in categories ranging from sandwiches to steak.

Chad Lindstrom, the founder of Stick-E Fingers, said he’s looking forward to seeing how his skills stack up against cooks from 42 states and six countries and a chance to learn from some of the best in the business.

“I guess you could classify this as the Super Bowl of food,” Lindstrom said.

Lindstrom qualified last weekend in Puyallup, Washington, after his burger took first place out of 33 teams competing at the Outdoor Cooking Championship hosted by the Pacific Northwest BBQ Association.

Lindstrom said that behind his big burger win was a blend of two types of ground beef sourced from The Butcher Shop in Eagle Point, plus a secret sauce.

“We have a combination sauce that’s very appealing to the palate,” Lindstrom said.

The Washington competition, which offered Golden Tickets in seafood and burger categories, is the first of more than a dozen major qualifying events ahead of the November championship in Dallas, according to the World Food Championship website.

The bulk of the major qualifying events through October are in the United States, but the schedule also shows events in Canada and Australia.

For Lindstrom, barbecue was just something he enjoyed in his backyard until the summer of 2019, when he bagged first-place trophies for ribs and tri-tip at the Battle of the Bones in Central Point.

The awards and feedback from crowds convinced him to go into business in 2020 selling barbecue rubs and locally grown pear wood for smoking, and he and his team started competing at barbecue competitions across the West.

Stick-E Fingers products are available at The Butcher Shop in Eagle Point and Ray’s Food Place stores in the Rogue Valley, and online at stickefingersbbq.com.

Reach web editor Nick Morgan at 541-776-4471 or [email protected].