St. Louis Rib Quantities

[CSchieck]

First competition this coming weekend. Up to this point, I have been cooking 4 racks of St. Louis ribs each practice run to get enough good looking ribs to turn in, and a couple of times it has been quite a chore to locate 8 similar looking ribs that I am happy with both aesthetically and from a tenderness standpoint (I am fully aware that I need only submit 6 samples, but I am also aware that a full box tends to be more aesthetically pleasing to a good number of judges). My question is this: How many racks of Ribs are other teams preparing for their KCBS comps in order to end up wit a rib box they are proud of? I will not be limited by cooker space, so that should not be a concern.

Thanks in advance for any guidance that you may be able to provide.

 

[Ron_L]

I cook 4 racks because that fits in my cooker nicely, but I really could get by with doing three.

 

[Burnt at Both Endz]

I cook three, because that's all the space I have.

If you have room for 4, do that. I'd cook two the same size and two that were 1/4lb smaller....:roll:

 

[didisea]

We cook 6, because they come in two packs of three.

 

[Wicked Smoke BBQ]

We cook 3 just because I've always done it.

 

[EverettBBQ]

We do 3.
It fits our Rebel 17:wink:
If I could cook 6 I would:shock:
But my smoker is to full plus I do not want to double my cost:tape:
Good luck!

 

[J&B'sBBQ]

We cook 4 because we buy 2 2-pks and I don't feel comfortable only cooking 2 yet. We easily fit all 4 in the cooker too.

Have you tried getting all of your bones from the same rack? You wouldn't get mixed results on tenderness if they're all coming from the same spot. Based on appearance, I pick my favorite of the 4 racks when they're done, then my 2nd fav., 3rd, then 4th. I trim off the end bones and let my teammates check tenderness and flavor from there, and we pick the one rack we like the most and I cut the entire thing for turn ins. I can get 8 good bones from one rack that way and they fit together nicely in the box. Just a thought...

 

[Untraceable]

3 but if I could cook 4 on the same rack I would

 

[tduffy]

I cook 5

 

[New Pal Frank]

I cook 3 racks.. Last weekend was the first time in a long time I got all 8 bones out of the same rack.Finished 6th out of 43. :-D