Greenbrier East FFA Celebrates National FFA Week
Richard Tipton, reporter
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The first thing apparent when entering the banquet room of the Pullman Plaza Hotel at 8 a.m. for the 2008 Ham, Bacon and Egg Show is the smell of ham, bacon and eggs.
While I stood there wishing I hadn't sworn off pork, I began to notice the number of people who turned out to eat breakfast and support the HBEP.
The place was packed with a mix of young and old, rural and urban, politicians, constituents, and business leaders who talked, laughed, and broke bread Thursday morning at the 20th Annual Ham, Bacon and Egg Show and Sale, March 6, 2008.
The HBEP provides students the chance to engage in real world scenarios involving marketing, responsibility, and management skills.
Lincoln County High School FFA teacher Ryan Saxe said the program requires students to prepare a budget and business plan, but the fun doesn't end on paper, these students get involved.
Saxe said students purchase and rear an animal. The animal is processed and the meat cut. After the meat is cut, the student gets two hams and two bacons. They calculate the salt ratio and do a salt cure. After a drying process, the meats are cured from the salt. After the salt cure, the meat is trimmed, so they have a uniform shape. And after that final trim, they go into to a smoke house and are smoked for about half of a day.
Students polish their bacon and ham and they are judged to see who has done the best trimming, who has done the best cure, and who has picked the best animal with the largest hams.
"In the food industry, we're looking for those genetic traits the consumers want. Those are the skills they are learning through that," Saxe said.
The polished ribbon winning hams do shine underneath the banquet room lights. Displayed on pulled together banquet tables and positioned on dark blue table cloths, the prize winning ham and bacon entries seem to lie in state.
That doesn't last long, though, as a guy wearing a cowboy hat and boots and an ability to rapidly speak steps up to the stage and begins to take numbers.
"This boy's my neighbor, now I know who's been stealin' my eggs," the auctioneer said.
Young Zachary Call, who earlier could be seen filling patrons empty coffee cups with hot coffee, steps up to the stage holding a dozen eggs. He walks through the crowd with the eggs as the auctioneer pleads with supporters to buy the eggs.
I don't recall how much money the eggs Call displayed brought to the foundation, but I don't think it was as much as Chelsea Smith's Grade A. grand place, white eggs, which sold for $1,250, and that's without adjusting for inflation.
However, don't cry for Call, his grand place bacon was purchased for $2,000.
Cabell Midland's Tabitha Linville knows how it feels to get the highest price paid for champion bacon, a feat she accomplished in 2005 when she received $1,300 for her bacon from Chapman Printing. The Marshall University Freshman is pursuing a degree in agriculture science, a degree influenced and financed by her 4-H and FFA involvement.
"I think I've actually been doing this for 10 years now. I did 4-H, I started when I was 8, and now I'm 18. This is my bacon. This is eighth-place bacon. And I got fourth place ham," Linville said.
Her prime bacon and ham were auctioned at $800, money Linville will use toward education.
Cabell Midland FFA Hosts State Officers During FFA Week
Commissioner of Agriculture Visits Lincoln County FFA During National FFA Week
