Judge My Box Via KCBS Standards!

[I_Use_The_Force]

Hi Guys,

So we just finished a competition, and once again ( ) the judges were all over the board when they graded my entry. I don't get how a table of 6 judges can routinely be 2-3 points apart on a scale that ranges from 1-9.

So, I want you guys opinion on my box. Please let me know if your an amateur, pro team, or KCBS judge, as I'd really like to know. Please make your opinion entirely your own and don't be influenced by other people's posts.

Here's the boxes, please let me know how you'd score each one, and why you might (if at all) ding them on their presentation:

Pork:

Chicken:

Ribs:

Brisket:

 

[jread23]

I'll go with amateur, because I don't feel like a pro. Garnish is messy all around, but I left that out of the score since it's not supposed to be taken into consideration.

Pork is a bit tough to judge from this angle, it looks like slices on the right might be sauced a bit much and the back left might be a bit dry. Probably a 7.

Chicken 5, burnt skin and the rest looks rubbery.

Ribs, I'm not a huge fan of the sideways presentation, but I wouldn't mark off for that because everything else looks pretty good. 7, the dark spot on the second from the left and the way the 4th is cut and out of alignment with the rest brings the score down.

Brisket, 5 at best. Slices look dry and everything looks disheveled.

At one comp last year, I cooked the worst ribs ever and thought I deserved 5's for appearance and tenderness. Taste was fine. Most judges gave me 6 & 7's and one gave me 8 & 9's. I've read a bunch of comments from judges who are loathe to give 5's and sometimes 6's because of the work put in by the cooks. As a cook, I think if I deserve a 5, or even a 4, I should get it.

 

[Burnt at Both Endz]

I'm so confused as a KCBS Master judge and as a champion cook... Is the first pic chicken or pork, same for the second?

Anyway 8 on the ribs and 5 or 6 on the others....sorry, I am.

 

[Blanton]

Judge and a cook here. With scores all over the place I bet some judges allowed the gsrnish to influence their score. All the entries are drowning in sloppy parsley. Shouldn't matter except it doesn't make the meat look any better.

For the pork, was there 5 or 6 slices. Looks like 5. Technically that is ok as you had enough overall samples, but that too could have altered scoring.

Of all the meat, ribs themselves look the best and better presentation would have helped.

That was chicken?

Brisket slices not uniform, and burnt ends look fatty, but could be the light

 

[thirdeye]

Here are my scores, and explanations. I tried to simulate the 15 seconds or so each judge gets to view the box and arrived at my score from that. I did review the photos again when putting the comments down.

I'm a KCBS-CBJ that has been judging 6 years with a total of 15 or 16 contests. That said, I too would appreciate any feedback on my scores. Competition BBQ is a two way street.

Chicken: 7. I like the overall arrangement and the placement of both choices of meat. The color of the slices is too dark, and contrasts with the shredded meat. The shredded meat looks bland. You would have gotten a comment card from me explaining my score as I can see you put a lot of thought into planning this arrangement. Comment: Not a factor for scoring, but your picture frame of meat is sitting low in the parsley.

Ribs: 8, a very good looking box. The color is a little uneven, as is the slicing on rib #4, and the top border of the 5 ribs is not aligned. The arrangement of 1 over 5 is fine by me, and you have a nice full box. Comment: Not a scoring consideration, but the gap in parsley one the left side does draw the eye there. I'm guessing you were using the bottom edge of garnish to cover some uneven pull back, or darker bones and if so that worked well and prevented any further scoring down (what I don't see does not hurt your score).

Pork: Solid 7, but maybe an 8 in person. I'm seeing some nice colors and the plugs look moist. You have a balanced arrangement. The sauce on the money muscle is a hair thick (but maybe it's the focus on that photo) Comments: Do I only see 5 slices of MM? There is ample pork for all judges to get a sample, so no score down from me... but 6 slices would have been a better choice in case the person in the #6 chair felt differently. There is a lot of un-used space in the box. Not a consideration for scoring, but the parsley is kind of haphazardly placed and could show off the meat better if it was tighter and more groomed.

Brisket: High 5, maybe a 6 in person. The arrangement of the slices is very unorganized, and that meat looks dry and bland. I don't find the color of the burnt ends attractive and a couple of them appear to be fatty. You would have received a comment card from me on this one. Comments: In addition to the reasoning above, and again... not a scoring consideration but the parsley needs work so it can show off the meat you selected to turn in.

 

[Pappy Q]

Sorry but those are pretty rough. 6 on ribs and pork. 4 on the other two. They look very sloppy like just thrown in the box and not appetizing.

Pro cook and CBJ

 

[watertowerbbq]

It's been a couple of years since I've competed and I was a KCBS judge until I let my membership expire.

In general, your presentation is sloppy. You need to take a look at some of the other boxes people show and try to make it look as good as possible.

Pork 6-7
It looks a little dry on the chunks and a little dark on the top of the slices.

Chicken
To be honest, I don't think it looks appetizing at all. Remember, when it's sitting on the judges place mat, if it looks bad before you taste it, it probably won't score well. To be honest, I'd say a 5 - 6.

Ribs
Best of the entries. I could see it as a 7, maybe higher if it was a little neater in the box

Brisket
It looks like the slices were thrown in the box at the last second. Some are high, some are low. The one slice looks very dry. Maybe 6 - 7.

I always tried to make sure I had more meat showing than greens.

Not trying to bring you down, just trying to give you feedback that can help you down the road.

 

[Ron_L]

I scrolled past the other responses so I wasn't biased. Remember, you asked :-D

CBJ for 9 or 10 years, Pro cook for 8 or 9 years.

In general, the garnish is taking away from the meat. Besides the yellow color, the meat is buried in the garnish. Work on making the garnish a platform for the meat and make the meat the star. Yes, garnish isn't judges, but if it hides the meat, you will lose points.

Pork - 6 - The meat looks dry and there isn't enough in the box. 5 slices, while not illegal, can cause a psychological issue if the judge that didn't get a slice really wanted one. Judges are supposed to judge what is presented, but they are also human (most of the time :-D)

Chicken - 4, and that may be generous. The pieces in the middle (breast slices?) look burnt and the rest looks like mush.

Ribs - 6 - The look dry and the cuts are uneven. The arrangement is a bit sloppy.

Brisket - 5 - Looks dry, the arrangement is sloppy, the knife marks are distracting. The burnt ends look fatty and have very little color.

 

[Rusty Kettle]

Maybe look for a class. I realize I have a long way to go myself but a class might help you. I am not going to score you as I feel I don't have experience enough to do so. Don't feel discouraged by low scores just keep at it and work to improve that is what I am doing. As captain Jason Nesmith once said "Never Give Up! And Never Surrender!"

 

[J&B'sBBQ]

I did not read the other posts so I could give you my honest opinion...Please remember, you asked for our opinions because some may be a tad harsh.

I am a pro team in our 3rd year competing.

I'm honestly confused by boxes 1 and 2 because at first glance (without reading the labels) they both look like pork to me...this could be causing an issue in your scores.

Pork: the MM (I'm assuming that is what that is) would look better fanned out and sauced on the fronts. If that is a finishing powder sprinkled on the top, use a misto to get that to blend in so you do not see the speckles. The chunks are not very appetizing to me. The color is bland. I would sauce the exposed meat on all of it. If you're proud of your turn in meat, then spread it out and showcase it...you scrunched it all together here and it doesn't show well. 6 at best.

Chicken: I am not sure that this is chicken....is that pulled white meat and breast meat that has been grilled? The color on the middle stuff is WAY WAY WAY too dark. I would not want to eat whatever that is in the middle of that box. The pulled stuff does look like it has a decent moisture level, but I'm not sure how I feel about it. We've recently chatted about throwing in some pulled into our box "just to see what happens", but the reason we have not is because I do not feel it will be well received. Unfortunately, the stuff in the middle ruins this one for me...4 or 5.

Pork Ribs: Overall, these are not 1/2 bad! I'm not a fan of the layout, I would do 3 on top of 3 or 4 on top of 4, but overall not bad. This is your best box. Cuts are a bit uneven. I would try to smooth out the appearance of the sauce some to make it more "smooth". Again, hitting it with a misto would assist with that. Also, showcase the meat here and make sure it sits higher in the box; it's a bit buried in the garnish. 7

Brisket: Slices are way too short, uneven, and I think some may be upside down (?). Did you cut your slices in half to get enough? The left sides look like they were cut, but the right is not. If you're cutting a side, do both. The BE's need to be as uniform as possible in size and shape. I even use a pair of little scissors to clean up hangers or bits that are taller so all of mine are exact duplicates. The slices look very dry; hit them with some sauce or au jus before turning it in. Again, display your meat as it is sitting too far down in the box. 6 (maybe a 5 in person)

 

[Gowan]

Overall my first impression of all four of these boxes can be summed up as "parsley explosion". Of course greens are not part of the scoring criteria, but if your salad is distracting judges from the meat then it is Not A Good Thing.

The angle of your photos for the pork and chicken boxes make them hard to score. The chicken box has the appearance of half burnt, half boiled meat.

Ribs box is ok - might look better if you aligned each rib to give the appearance that they came from a single rack. Parsley looks like it is trying to crawl out of the box.

Brisket appears dry and doesn't fill the box well. All pieces seem a bit haphazard in their placement.

Rather than score these, I'd suggest taking a hard look at some of the boxes that have been highly rated on one of the many "score my box" sites on the web and Facebook pages. I think when you compare some of those to your own it will be obvious where you can do things differently.

 

[Contracted Cookers]

I am sorry if these boxes are for real. with so much info and pictures out there of good boxes . not sure what your after with these turn ins .would give the a ribs a 7.
the judges are not really blind

 

[Uomograsso]

As far as the disparity is scoring it is probably some judges being too generous with their scores on these boxes.

That said, if first pic is pork? I'd give it a 5 or 6, there are only 5 pieces in front, but enough in the back to make up for that. The meat in front looks dry. The meat in the back looks way over cooked. Too much sauce on the meat in front, looks gloppy to me.

Second is chicken? Meat in middle looks burnt or heavily charred. Makes the meat around it look undercooked even though it is not. I'd score this a 5. Does not look appetizing at all.

Ribs are your best. I'd give this a 7 maybe 8. Color looks nice and is pretty even. Some of the cuts are not straight on the ribs on the far right.

Brisket looks dry and very sloppy. Looks like you just threw it in the box. I'd score this a 5.

 

[Icekub]

For the parsley, if I had to guess, a bundle of parlsey was stripped off it's stems and dumped in this box. Think about making an even green square to highlight your meat. It's the one judging criteria (appearance) that you have complete control over

 

[DR]

Pork-7
Chicken-6
Ribs-8
Brisket-5

KCBS judge here.

 

[CBQ]

once again ( ) the judges were all over the board when they graded my entry.

Having started out as a "back of the pack" team, I used to say that a lot. We would get a mix of good and bad scores, and wonder what was going on.

As you improve, that goes away. We found that as we got better, we were better able to meet the expectations of the experienced judges and the scores became more consistent. Mixed scores really mean that the entry just isn't there yet.

Others have commented on the boxes already, but I will add that you should watch the bark on the pork. There is a lot of it in there. One of my teammates loved bark, and we used to do a bark heavy presentation. We realized that bark can became hard and difficult to chew after it cools. Try leaving a piece out for 20 minutes after your turn in, and try it. That's what the judges are getting.

 

[DawgPhan]

Your chicken box might be the worst looking box of food I have seen on here. I was repulsed just looking at a picture of it. I can't imagine what the judges thought when they opened that box.

You might have a long way to go when it comes to cooking bbq, but you have that blaming the judges thing down pat.

I guess that is something.

 

[thesemicullen]

Pork: 7

From what I can see, the pork itself looks decent, but you need to work on your arrangement. This does not make me want to gobble it up. The five slices of money muscle is also a poor judgment call. While you shouldn't get scored down for it, you will.

Now, I'm going to say something about garnish here and people will come in behind me and say, "You're not supposed to judge garnish, blah blah," but if you do this it will immediately improve your score. Follow some earlier advice in this thread and make a "putting green" of parsley which will get your meat up and make it look like a better presentation. That's less about looking at the garnish and more about using the garnish to your advantage. As it is, it looks kind of buried which makes the meat itself seem less appealing.

Chicken: 5 or 6

It's a 5 from what I can see here on the board, but it might be a 6 in person. I want to tell you up front, I think you are very brave for attempting to buck the trend and do something different with chicken. I get tired of thighs all the time, and I really like to see other kinds of entries. If you can get your cook down and your product tasting great consistently, you will probably score well in taste and tenderness. That said, I don't think pulled chicken and sliced breasts will ever score as well in appearance as a whole pieces.

Ribs: 7

Probably the most conventional looking of the set. I think it again suffers from being "buried" and that lone piece at the top looks out of place. It seems smaller and just different than the others.

Brisket: 5

I think this is a pretty rough looking box. It looks like everything was kind of thrown in haphazardly and not placed in with care. The slices look completely different from the chunks and they seem to be a bit dry.

 

[bbq.tom]

If I were to closely evaluate these boxes I would just copy and paste what Beth (J&B'S BBQ) has already written. She knows her stuff about building a good looking box and taste/tenderness as well. Just look at her last two comps - took 1st in Pork with a perfect 180, and a 1st in Brisket! My scores for your boxes would be exactly the same, and for the same reasons: 6, 4-5, 7, 5-6.

Gowan hit the nail on the head as well about checking out boxes that have been posted and scored. BBQ.Critic.com is just one of the sites where you can find LOTS of boxes that have been scored.

 

[BMerrill]

CBJ and 3 years as a pro cook team.

Best advice in the thread is to take a cooking class. It will reward you several times over what you spend and cut you learning curve by a year or more if you can duplicate what you learn. This doesn't mean take what you learn as a suggestion.
And practice not until you get it right, but until you can't get it wrong.

I'm with BBQ Tom on the scores, no need to duplicate his words here.