Chicken

I dont scrape skin. I either use Springer Mountain or Smart Chicken so the skin isnt a blobby yellow skin or I would scrape.

I brine as well. I had always used Oakridge Game Changer with a little phosphate but recently switched to University of Que Party Fowl. I still use just a little phosphate. I've had great luck since switching including my first 180 in chicken.

1.Game changer brine. Kosmo Chicken Injection.
2. No scraping.

Fat is flavor. Scraping it off in my opinion hurts you. You might want to read Brad's chicken article on the Gateway drum smokers blog about comp chicken. He gives a process on cooking chicken without scraping that will get bite through skin. It's a great place to start on developing your own cook process. I would also advise on focusing on more than just your texture of your skin. Classes over the years have made alot of VERY good chicken cooks. To get a high call in chicken these days at least in my region you need perfect tenderness and moisture. Brines help, cooking it right helps even more. It also helps to cook a quality brand of chicken. Smart, springer mountain etc..

Personally I'd spend money on a class especially where you live. Lots of awesome cooks putting on classes very close to you.

no scraping for us.......and since we made the move we've improved our chicken scores. in last 4-5 contests, spread out over a couple of years because we dont compete alot, we've had one 165, and the rest have been above 170 since we stopped scraping.....in fact, we did like 175. something and finished in 4th in Barbourville, KY with non scraped chicken.

we too, are living by the motto, fat is flavor. lol

I'll second Brad's article for help with chicken. I've ran similar methods on an offset, UDS, WSM, and pellet smoker and it works for all of them. We don't scrape skins and use Kosmos brine. I like brining the night before, draining, then letting them sit in the brining bucket in the cooler over night.

http://blog.gatewaydrumsmokers.com/basted-competition-thighs/

Interesting to hear all the folks that don't scrape. Around here I feel like everybody does. That or I just think everybody does...

No scraping for us. Chicken has been fairly consistent for us over the years. We don’t compete a lot however.

I think when a judge gets a scraped chicken it just doesn’t eat the same. Just my opinion

We trim with an open mind, if the skin has heavy subcutaneous fat then we will scrape off some. More has to do with steaming to render, important to focus on this.

As most have said - it depends on your chicken whether you need to scrape or not. Many of the air dried have a thinner layer of fat under the skin and with proper steaming/jaccarding there is really no need to scrape. We as James said do a little cleanup of really fatty deposits. So experiment with different chicken brands and you will find a better brand that reduces or eliminates the need to scrape... Harry Soo has a great set of videos on youtube about comp chicken prep techniques.