No need to get salty.
Or go hog wild.
Friday's annual Ham and Bacon Breakfast and Auction were just the cure for whatever might be on your mind this summer. And there was plenty for everyone. The event featured 19 fresh slabs of bacon and 70 whole hams.
For 2022, Cole County 4-H and FFA students raised $45,825, which many pledged to put into savings.
Reid Millard of Jefferson City set the pace for the morning auction, and won the grand champion ham, which Melanie Loesch of Russellville prepared and cured. He paid $850 for the prize.
Missouri Sen. Mike Bernskoetter then won Adler Kautsch's grand champion bacon at a cost of $800. Adler attended the auction representing the Stringtown-Corrinth 4-H.
The winning bidders weren't done. They both went on to offer winning bids for several other products.
Millard also won a bacon cured by Ethan Leonard, Wardsville 4-H, with a $450 bid; and a ham from Emmett Rackers of St. Thomas with a $550 bid.
Bernskoetter soon got back in the bidding, and for $500, took home the cured ham of St. Thomas' Alexander Loethen; for $450 he took home the ham of Stringtown-Corinth's Waylon Rollins; and for $450 took home the ham of Jefferson City's Elise Stammer.
Early in the auction, Bernskoetter found himself in a bidding war with Missouri state Rep. Rudy Veit, for the ham of his grandson, Trenton Bernskoetter (Taos). The bidding reached $900 before Sen. Bernskoetter shook his head, "no," leaving the ham in Veit's hands.
Veit didn't mind, he said. He bid on several other items, and won bacons from Ethan Strobel, Stringtown-Corinth ($500) and Conred Sullivan, Wardsville ($400), and won hams by Cooper Leonard, Wardsville, and Kylea Kempker, St. Thomas ($550).
"You can't buy them all," Veit said as Kylea helped him carry his winnings to his vehicle. "Everybody bids out here because it keeps the kids coming out the next year, and they keep participating."
The 4-H programs teach leadership and responsibility, he continued. And, Veit said, they go to potential bidders to market themselves. Veit said he had probably 60 children on a list who had contacted him about bidding on their products. He couldn't buy all of them, but promised to at least bid until they reached a certain level.
"If they hit a certain level, then I back out," Veit said.
He pointed out that Kylea, the Jefferson City Jaycees Cole County Fair princess, also had livestock at the auction the previous night. She said she raised a wether goat (one that has been castrated) for the fair. It brought in several hundred dollars during an auction earlier in the week.
Bernskoetter said he also had a long list of young people who had reached out to him about bidding on their products.
"I have a huge list," he said. "Over the years, I've gotten to know a lot of them. A lot come back year after year.
"Part of it is that young people use this as public speaking experience. They come around and tell you about their animal or they tell you about their bacon or ham."
Conred Sullivan, who is 18 and aging out of the programs this year, said he had engaged Veit (who bought his bacon) and others about the possibility they might bid on it. But not as much as in past years.
"This year, I didn't go to the extreme I have in other years," he said. "Other years, I've written letters and sent them out, asking people to come to the sale."
His little brother, Oliver Sullivan, 15, who sold his slab of bacon for $450, said time was limited this year. He said participants didn't know until later in the process than other years that their meats would be offered in the auction.
Both said they put their money in savings when they earn it.
Meredith Benne, of the Russellville FFA, received the highest bid of the morning for her cured ham. Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Jefferson City won the ham with a bid of $1,050.
Julie Smith/News Tribune Josh Braun Burrows presents the ham he cured for this year's Jefferson City Jaycees Cole County Fair. Burrows is a member of the Wardsville 4-H Club and was one of dozens of young people in FFA or 4-H who showed their work in hopes of high bids.