Looking for feedback/advice from first comp

[TwilightChrome]

We had a great time at Mohegan Sun Fest BBQ festival. It was our first KCBS contest ever, and we met a lot of great people and enjoyed the entire event. It was very well-run. We were pretty well-prepared for everything from doing dry-runs all Spring and didn't have to scramble much. We made all our turn-ins and thought our food was very good. The judges didn't exactly agree so I wanted to see if folks here had any suggestions. I know it's hard to say how our food was without taking a bite, and we shouldn't read too much into any one contest's results, and we were up against some really accomplished competitors, etc. We are interested in improving rapidly though, so your suggestions are appreciated if you have any!

Our scores:
https://goo.gl/photos/Cfu3eMEjCaCtHGsk8

All cooks:

• We trimmed at home on Thursday, vacuum-sealed, and had everything in the Yeti all weekend. No problems staying well below 41 degrees.
• We used tried and true commercial sauces, rubs, and injections. Butcher's injections, Blues Hog Original mixed with Tennessee red, etc, etc. Basically just battle-tested things seen on "BBQ Brethren" that we tried at home during practice cooks and agreed were delicious.
• Everything was cooked on a Stump's Stretch or WSM. 260 overnight for the large proteins, 285 in the morning to finish those off once wrapped and to do the small proteins. Wood was recharged in the morning as well.
• We finished everything and had it in the Cambro by 11:20. I did not want to go hot-off-the-pit at all to avoid running out of time. Our goal was to re-therm each meat before boxing it. We managed to do so for 0 - 15 minutes depending on time left.
• We were sticklers about tenderness. I cooked everything until it was probe-tender deep into the meat. Either my standards are way off (I don't think so), I should have cooked a little over-tender to account for temperature loss, or something else is up?
• We did not use an insulated carry bag to carry the food to turn-in. Lines were not long to turn in and we were maybe 90 feet from the turn-in station so we figured we did not need it. Upon retrospect, I think an insulated bag that had been primed to be warm would have helped. It was pretty windy.

Our chicken did OK on appearance but taste and tenderness were pretty much all 7's. We did Myron Mixon's cupcake chicken, I learned it from taking his class in February. The thighs were brined with his recipe, we used a standard rub but without salt to avoid double-salting. We ran the cupcake chicken in disposable pans half-filled with chicken broth. Finishing sauce was Myron's new Honey Hickory sauce. Cooked until it was in the 170's and probe tender, around "room-temperature butter" resistance. I really liked the flavor, we had bite-through skin, and tenderness seemed good. Those small pucks of chicken lose heat very rapidly though. I am wondering if the heat was part of the issue, and/or if I need to change the sauce or rub up. Pic here:

https://goo.gl/photos/Eu3wzXT2MNZWpiYH7

Our ribs won the Rib Challenge on Saturday and I thought the ones we cooked on Sunday were even better. I expected this to be our best category. We joke that they taste like "MORE!" or that they are "addiction ribs" because you just want another bite immediately. One judge agreed with us but the rest 7'd us to death. I thought our appearance was decent but could have been much better. I believe tenderness was as far as you can go without being fall-off-the-bone. The racks formed an upside-down U when held, and were probe tender. We did NOT re-therm after cutting, maybe we should have? Pic here:

https://goo.gl/photos/dy9ZaYrYon6TtWk36

Our taste and tenderness was generally in the 8's for pork. I know we could have used more time to re-therm the meat here after cutting. I was slow in cutting the meat, saucing, and arranging.

We were pretty proud of the brisket we did. I honestly thought we screwed up by running the point for about 30 minutes too long because we forgot about it during turn-ins. The burnt ends were a little drier than I like them to be. Had I pulled them on time I feel we could have done even better. We did have time to re-therm the slices and chunks before turning in.

Amongst our team we came up with the following ideas:

* Get cutting, saucing, and arrangement time down low enough to always allow for re-therm time.
* Use a primed, insulated bag to carry the turn-ins
* All of our team members have taken the CBJ class; use this to judge some contests this summer and see how other teams' stuff is for taste and tenderness. Compare our flavor profile to what they have.
* Offer to swap some food with other teams local to us to get some opinions.
* Research flavor profiles some more, try some more top commercial products out from teams that are winning now


If you have any suggestions after reading this, please feel free to comment. I have pretty thick skin, so if you think our process is off or should be rethought, let's hear it.

Thanks,
-TC

A link to them all pics on Google Photos https://goo.gl/photos/H3C8NeY8k2NY3KvWA

 

[Burnt at Both Endz]

Since you guys have judged some, my best suggestion would be. Take a piece of what/like you turned in and set it on a plate. 10-12 minutes after you turn in, taste that piece and see if the texture/taste has changed on you.

 

[Pappy Q]

Cooking more is the only way to improve. More practice and more contests. The teams that are getting calls are literally either practicing or competing about every weekend (and more practice during the week even)

 

[DUBBAGA]

Finding it difficult to determine what more the judges would be asking for re: appearance on ribs, those were beautiful (as "full box" isn't one of the requirements).

Damn, Judge 6 at table 646 was a real SOB based on his average score for the day

Excellent looking boxes for your first comp!

 

[Ron_L]

I have a question. What do you mean by 're-therm'?

 

[Scottie]

Myron doesn't do Myron chicken. You have flavors, you need to add the meat to that flavor. Over beats under

 

[luckysob]

Like you said its hard to say with out tasting but... We thought that our ribs were amazing until I did a backyarder where we got live feedback from the judges and were told they were "bland". From that point forward I swore that I would never be told that again, we have upped our heat profile and increased the amount of rub used and have seen immediate results.

In terms of chicken I don't know of any teams in California doing cupcake (I am sure there are some), but have heard others say it doesn't score well. I have also heard that drumsticks don't do well but recently learned there is a team that does and has won chicken in back to back years at the biggest comp in California. So take this advice with a grain of salt.

Also make friends out there especially with the experienced teams and ask for honest feedback, many will let you taste theirs as well and you will start to get an idea. The best way to learn is to start judging, but the classes can be difficult to find and you still need to get accepted to a comp to judge.

 

[Burnt at Both Endz]

I have a question. What do you mean by 're-therm'?

You mean you don't warm your meat up in the microwave? :razz:

 

[DUBBAGA]

luckysob ... Nothing Compares 2 Q is still doing cupcake chicken, this year their highest score is 168.5600. They had much better success with it in 2015

 

[jread23]

Mohegan was a fun and very well put together competition. I managed to get a call in ribs and we just missed one in brisket as well. We were the furthest from the judges tent and didn't use an insulated turn in bag, honestly I don't think you need it.

The ribs formed a U when you held them where? I assume in the middle. I've not found the bend test to be a reliable check for tenderness at comps and I've never checked ribs for tenderness by probing. Doesn't mean they don't work. Did you happen to try a rib about 15-20 minutes after turn in to see what the tenderness was at that point?

Are you doing any more competitions this year? Old Orchard Beach was fun last year, even with all the rain.

 

[TwilightChrome]

Thank you all for the feedback! I think the "let it sit in a turn in box for 12 minutes then try it" is good advice, something we can try at home. We have already taken the class to be KCBS CBJ's now we just need to find a contest to judge, maybe in August in the New England area. Anyone know of any going on then? If so please let me know and I'll volunteer our services to the organizer.

Re-therm just means reheat, in this case by putting them back in the smoker to warm the meat up some more. I picked up the term from chef-y people in the restaurant industry. Do most of you pull from the Cambro to make turn-ins or are you dealing with meat "hot off the cooker"? If working from the Cambro do you goose up the temperature on the meat a little with a trip back into the smoker?

For testing rib tenderness, yes I slide my four fingers, palm facing up under the middle of the rack of ribs and lift up until the ends of the ribs are off the foil completely. When both ends of the rack point straight down like an upside down U (but the rack does not split or crack a lot in the middle) I find that to be a very good tenderness. Poking them with the sharp point of a Thermapen then feels like butter, I do that as well to confirm. The ribs will still leave a bite mark and are very tender but not quite yet "fall off the bone". I thought this was enough, maybe I need to go one step further in tenderness? How do you determine "done" for your comp ribs?

Scottie - not sure what you mean with "You have flavors, you need to add the meat to that flavor." Do you mean let the meat shine and don't cover it up with the other stuff (rub, injection, sauce)? I was under the impression that most use a pretty liberal amount of rub, decent amount of injection, and at least a light coat of sauce to make it pop? I have slowly layered the three on over time and believe in using them all on large proteins. Am I off?

I would probably have the energy to compete in 4-5 comps/year, but my kids have a very busy soccer schedule and that comes first. We might do our next contest in September or October. Our next contest would probably be Harvard Fall Fest or the Riverside Blues one in Greenfield. Need to figure out family schedules first. We will practice a lot this summer in any case.

Thanks again!

 

[triplezip]

Put more ribs in the box. I think you coulda easily fit eight, which may have been a little more impactful in appearance.

 

[Ron_L]

Re-therm just means reheat, in this case by putting them back in the smoker to warm the meat up some more. I picked up the term from chef-y people in the restaurant industry. Do most of you pull from the Cambro to make turn-ins or are you dealing with meat "hot off the cooker"? If working from the Cambro do you goose up the temperature on the meat a little with a trip back into the smoker?

That's a new term for me, and I've been around a lot of chef-y people :-D

Our chicken and ribs go right from the smoker. Pork and brisket go into the cambro when done, usually around 8:00am. I have never had to reheat either one. They are still too hot to touch when they come out of the cambro, and if I take more than a few minutes to get the meat into the box then I am not doing my job.

 

[Scottie]

You are using good flavors, so that should tell you to look else where

 

[bpeyton89]

Honestly the chicken kind of looks haphazardly thrown in there. I understand the look you were trying to go for, but I'm not sure it worked especially with those spaces in between each piece. Same with the ribs. Try and have the ribs touching so it looks like they all came from the same slab. Personally I only want the garnish to border the outside of the meat. Personally I don't like having to reheat any kind of meat.... thats called serving leftovers. I want the big meats to rest for at least an hour, ribs I don't mind resting for 20-30 minutes, but chicken gets boxed pretty much straight off the rack. I don't mind being on the first turn in trey on chicken because it goes straight to the table.

 

[Right on Q]

Seems like you're really worried about how hot your meat is when you put it in the box. It should be plenty hot coming out of the cambro.

A 2 time Jack Daniels winner told me that if your meat doesn't taste as good cold as it does hot then you won't win many contests

 

[TwilightChrome]

I am happy with how our Q tastes cold or warm but we had tenderness scores in the 7's when I thought we had really nailed it. My thought process absent any direct feedback is that the Q cooling off might be the culprit. Many posts on BBQB say nail tenderness and taste scores tend to elevate as well. So we will aim in that direction...

It would be really sweet if judges could comment and have it flow easily and anonymously back to the cooks. Maybe we will develop an app for that

 

[MikeJ65]

I see it as a very solid result for your first time out. Chicken and ribs need some work, pork and brisket are about average (which is excellent for your first contest). I would ditch the muffin pans. You can use mini loaf pans if you want to keep the technique, but have a more natural shape. Ribs need some more gloss. If you set sauce, you still need to add sauce right before turn in.

 

[jread23]

I am happy with how our Q tastes cold or warm but we had tenderness scores in the 7's when I thought we had really nailed it. My thought process absent any direct feedback is that the Q cooling off might be the culprit. Many posts on BBQB say nail tenderness and taste scores tend to elevate as well. So we will aim in that direction...

How many racks of ribs did you cook? Did the ribs you turned in come from different racks? Did you or a teammate taste a rib from each of those racks to determine which were best for taste and tenderness? Reason I ask is that you had 2 9's and an 8 for tenderness and then 3 7's. Rack 1 may have been perfect for tenderness and may have accounted for the 9's and 8's while ribs from another rack may not have been as tender and accounted for the 7's.

Amazing ribs has an article about checking for tenderness, one is the bend test, but they're not holding the rack in the middle, and another is the toothpick test. If you haven't already, you might want to give the article a read. Some folks don't like the site, but I've gotten some good info there (and ignored plenty of other stuff)
http://amazingribs.com/tips_and_technique/are_they_ready.html

 

[Elancer]

I wouldn't worry too much about your results from this one contest. It was a large contest, as far as New England is concerned. There were some very good teams there. More than a 3rd of the field at Mohegan has won at least 1 GC. Work on changing the chicken flavor as a couple of better taste scores would have really improved your overall chicken score. Make sure you have balanced flavors (i.e. not too salty, too spicy or too sweet ). As long as you nail tenderness and don't have any offending flavors your scores will be fine. Try 1 or 2 more contest this year, maybe Rhode Island in July or New London CT in August. Harvard Fall Festival is no longer around, so I would try Greenfield in October if that's your only option and the smaller field there may be of a benefit.