Comment Card Question For Judges & Cooks ~ Sauce Category Question For Cooks

Since the comment cards have been implemented . . . what? a couple seasons ago? I have turned in an average of one comment card per event, more or less. I fill one out whenever I score lower than a 6 and if I think I have a suggestion for the cook to improve their entry.
I think that if I ever receive a comment card, then I probably already know what was wrong with the entry because I would know that I would score my entry lower than 6 myself.
However, one thing I learned while studying martial arts is that everyone has something to offer to move my experience forward. From the lowliest white belt to the most seasoned black belt.
When I catch myself thinking things like 'I've heard that before.' or 'I know all about that.' those kinds of thoughts are my first clue that there is something here for me to learn and I begin considering all the aspects of the situation. I almost always find something in there that I can use. I strive to maintain [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoshin"the beginner's mind[/URL] at all times.
So, I would think that ANY information provided on a comment card would somehow, eventually, help me to improve.
My turn-in sauce is not used for cooking. I do not cook 'with sauce'. It's only applied as another 'layer of flavor' just before turn in.
This is presuming you mean the traditional BBQ sauce. I do use the juice from the brisket foil to baste the slices that I turn in . . . but I don't consider that a 'sauce' in the traditional BBQ sauce sense.

thirdeye said:

Judges - How often do you complete a comment card, and do you have parameters for filling one out? (like always filling out a card for scores or 6 and lower, or letting a team know that they could have turned a 7 into a 9 if this or that would have been different)

Cooks - 1. What information on comment cards benefits you the most?

2. In a sauce category, is your turn in sauce something you also use for cooking..... or is it a stand alone sauce designed for tasting only?

Click to expand...

Thanks Thirdeye for the questions as a cook let me know why you gave me a 9 a 8 a 7 and please let me know how I got 6 or lower. Comment cards are rare.

From a competitor POV, I want a card for anything 6 or less. I have been trying to figure you how a table can score 8-9s and then one judge hits me with 5s but yet no card.

And as for sauce, I have been trying other sauces to see what the reaction is ...


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I am here: Google Maps

If I give you a 6 or lower I'm basicly taking you out of the money, so I feel that I should tell you why. I've written comments such as: "No flavor except sauce" ... "Slices were mushy, pulled was great" ... "Way under (or over) done" ... "Looks like it was just thrown in the box" ... "The only flavor was chili powder".
I'm not writing these to be cruel, I'm letting you know why I gave you a low score so you can correct it next time.

I write a comment card any time I give a 6 or lower. That 6 might kill any chance the cook has for a good finish in the category and he or she needs to know why I marked it down (I have to have good reason to give it a 6 or less so it is easy to explain). Sometimes I'll write a card on a 7 when the cook is "close but no cigar" on something -- expecially when I know I can suggest something that will help them move it up to 8 or 9 next time.

> Cooks - what information on comment cards benefits you the most.

For me, I'd appreciate a comment on even the 7's, as constructive criticism is always appreciated. Simple comments are fine, like "too salty", "too sweet", "mushy", "tough", "burned", "thrown together", "too spicy", "bland/dull", "spices conflict". Many will write "under cooked" or "over cooked", when in truth it's either tough or mushy; I'd prefer the specific comment. For this reason I'm of the opinion that much of the comment card could be check-box listed, especially in tenderness and taste categories.

> What I was after was.... in most cases sauces are balanced with the meat,
> the rub(s), the smoke, so everything can work together to complement each
> other. Tasted alone, a sauce might be too spicy, too sweet or too peppery.
> But tasted along with the barbecue it might be a good fit.

For this reason above we rarely if ever any more put a sauce in the sauce competition. Our sauce works great with our rub and is very thin so as not to overpower the meat. Also, I think many of the sauces that win probably have smoke flavorings in them; our sauce doesn't because we've found that we have plenty of smoke flavor in the meat itself, we dont need additional/extra smoke flavors that possibly conflict or become overpowering. We'd put it (the sauce) in a few and was always in the top 1/3, but frankly it's not going to win a sauce (alone) competition, so we just dont waste our time and money going there...

I give a comment card when I have something constructive I want to tell the cook that produced the entry, something I know as a cook I'd like to know about, regardless of score. (Yes, that can be a lot of cards and yes, that can take some time - but isn't that the point?)

Lynn H.