TARGET 100609

The World's Largest Barbeque Cookout

An aerial view

Uruguay isn’t famous for a great many things, but thanks to the event that took place on April 3rd of this year, its beef will be a lot more famous all across the globe. over 1000 people got together to cook 12 metric tonnes of fried beef, over a 1 mile long grill set up by the military. Six tonnes of charcoal burned as 20,000 spectators screamed when the Guinness Book official announced a new record had been set.

A mile of barbarque grilling

Army personnel set up nearly 1 mile of grills. Firefighters lit six tonnes of charcoal to kick off the gargantuan cookout.

Participants and spectators

Some 1,250 people grilled the beef and about 20,000 spectators watched the event. In fact, a major part of the rest of the city also experienced the event, as the smell of steaks on the grill wafted for a mile or so.

We won!!!

Cooks and participants alike cried with joy when a Guinness judge confirmed the barbecue record had been broken.

"I'm very proud to be Uruguayan. We have the best beef and now we have the world's biggest barbecue," said one of the volunteer cooks, sporting an apron and chef's hat.

The South American country bested a Mexican grilling record from 2006 by a resounding 4 tonnes.

The barbecue was organized by the National Meats Institute, or INAC in Spanish, which tracks beef sales abroad.

Beef exports raked in $817 million last year for Uruguay, a laid-back country of some 3.2 million people squeezed between larger neighbors Argentina and Brazil, also major cattle producers.

"Uruguay is very small, it's not known for other events so we have to use these kinds of gimmicks so people find out where Uruguay is and what it has to offer," said INAC's vice president, Fernando Perez Abella.

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To learn more about the world's largest barbarque gril-out, take a look at the following web sites:

Oddity Central
We Are Never Full web site
World Records Academy web site
CNN iReport
Reuters