With the inaugural “Smoke on the Farm” barbecue fest a few hours from starting, things were escalating quickly early Friday morning on Mason Hills Farm in Grand Bay: As the morning mists slowly faded from the fields, trucks were towing in elaborate barbecue rigs that soon would replace them with the smoke of slow fires.

For proprietor Joseph Mason, it seemed to be business as usual, in the sense that things have been escalating quickly since he purchased the property in 2020. Back then he was a businessman with zero experience in agriculture who’d just bought a 250-acre cattle farm. Less than four years later he oversees his own USDA-certified processing plant, which he says can produce 75,000 pounds of finished protein a week from area farms; a stable of brands and products including steaks, Southern Gentleman Meat Co. smoked meats, Hershel Burger patties (named for his dad), Rooster Ridge chicken, pork products and Ranch Juice sauces; and an on-farm retail store with another coming soon in coastal Mississippi.

“I’m not scared to ask questions first,” Mason said of the way his foray into farming has snowballed. “I had to learn how to ask the right questions. I believe that the quality of your life is determined by the quality of your questions. You want a better life, ask better questions.”

He’s also hoping to provide some answers, at least for people looking to know where their groceries are really coming from. “I don’t have to do this for a living,” he said. “I get to do it for a living because it’s more of a calling to me. I wanna know where our proteins come from. I wanna know that we’re eating as clean as we possibly can.”

Mason Hills Farm already has a distribution deal with Piggly Wiggly and serves some Mobile-area restaurants, notably the high-end Le Moyne’s Chophouse in Mobile’s newly renovated Admiral hotel. Smoke on the Farm is a way of introducing his operation to the community at large.

The event runs from 4 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 11, and from 10 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 12. Attractions start with the opportunity to observe dozens of teams competing in a Steak Cookoff Association-sanctioned steak cookoff and a separate, less formal barbecue challenge. Categories in the latter include Boston butts, sausage, Herschel Burgers, pimento cheese and shrimp, and several of those will be open for People’s Choice voting.

Additional attractions include a full slate of live music, art & crafts vendors, a children’s play area, and the simple pleasure of spending a beautiful fall day on an actual working farm. Passes are available through a ticketing link at smokeonthefarm.org; adult admission is $15 for a two-day pass or $100 for a weekend VIP pass. Children’s admission is $10. A full schedule also can be found at the site. Entertainers include the John Hart Project on Friday, and Strut Douglas and Phil Proctor on Saturday.

The primary beneficiary of event fundraising is Victory Health Partners, a faith-based organization that provides medical care for uninsured adults in south Alabama as well as coastal Mississippi and northwest Florida.

Mason Hills Farm is at 11652-A North Wheatcroft Road in Grand Bay. For more information on the event or on the farm, visit masonhillsfarm.com.