Desert turn-in ?

No clue. That is one time I would like to be a judge though.

The third score can be a ranking, as in all the desserts you sampled from best to worst, 1 being the best (I've also been told to rank my best from 1-9 with 9 being the best), OR what I've been asked to do lately is to grade the dessert on how it would compare to what I think the ultimate in that category would be, as in "is this the best peach cobbler you've ever had?" or "is this the best cheesecake you've ever had?" - and "How does this compare to that?" That third score really depends upon what the organizer asks it be; I've had some contests where the dessert category was supposed to be something with a particular fruit, and for that score, we were supposed to grade each entry on how well that entry filled that requirement - as in, was it a good & tasty way to represent a taste of that fruit. And then there are some organizers that don't really care HOW the scoring is done and just want to be able to announce a "best dessert"! Remember, dessert is an ancillary (extra) category and not a requirement.

Lynn H.

At many contests the tenderness score changes to a texture score in the dessert category. Hard to judge ice cream or puddin' or the like with a tenderness score.

What Wayne ^^^^^ said!

Texture.

The culinary term is "mouth-feel"...which is a fancy way of saying texture. Personally, I look for a variety of textures that create and interesting, balanced mouth-feel.

I've never seen three scores for sides/dessert, even though my wife won 1st place at our last comp last year. I always assumed they just rated appearance and taste. How would you rate texture of dessert when it might be cake, cheesecake, pie, ice cream, etc.?

I have been in contests where the tenderness score was replaced with originality.

It's up to the organizer and is usually announced to the judges just before the food comes in. Nothing hard and fast. I judged one Friday night desert and anything but event last year where scores were only givem on appearance and taste -- no third attribute was used because of the wide variety of stuff that could be cooked.