Chicken Thighs for Competition, Bone In or Out?

[Boots]

So my cookbuddy Yoda asks, "Bone in or bone out for competition?"

Evidently the poor guy read or saw something where a competition "pro" deboned his thighs, skinned out the thigh whole, then pounded or stretched out the skin, seasoned the meat, and then re-wrapped the meat whole with the stretched skin and pinned it up like some kinda spring roll, then marinated it in butter before cooking it. Sent Yoda straight off to the K Klinic at Walmart for 30 minutes of cheap mental therapy and a 6 pack of Bock.

I told him, "Who the heck are we supposed to be, NASA? Keep the blinkin' bone in for flavor and COOK the dern chicken, we are not a bunch of navel gazing Martha Stewarts, WE ARE NOT JUST MEN AFTER ALL, WE ARE CAVE MEN!!"....I mean, if God had meant chickens to be running around in a bunch of little bitty butter bras, he woulda' given them a Victoria Secret credit card. My advice did not help. He started poring through the yeller pages looking for the National Chicken Thigh Emergency Hotline, and ended up running a bill on 1-900 Hot Thighs. His wife has asked me to intervene before their kids come home and find their spaced out Daddy sitting out on the floor of the kitchen, a phone in each ear, wearing a Williams Sonoma catalogue for a hat and muttering, "Rosebud!".

Any help from the gurus is appreciated.

[3 star redneck]

For all my KCBS, i use bone in, tried bone out, thighs came out very un- uniform on shape....

[Gomeat]

Gotta agree with Redneck. When I judged the Sam's KCBS event I had one chicken entry that was boneless as you described. Not impressed visually and did not seem to have the taste either. Gimme the bone in there!!

And of course KCBS rules are the ones around here that allow any piece of chicken. IBCA or LSBS requires one half fully jointed chicken.

[n2dabluebbq]

Kansas(BS) allows for it(unfortunately). but then i am not the hugest fan of their ways. at any rate, i seen more bone in win than boneless.

[steveblount]

When I'm doing a KCBS I always do bone out. You just have to make sure and replace the flavor you are losing by de-boning. For appearances sake it just works better for me. Sure does take a long dadgum time to prep, though!

[RangerJ]

You will find winners doing both. I'm a fan of bone in as they are more forgiving. While my chicken did not do well in Bedford, my apperance scores were all 8's and 9's with bone in. Seems I missed on the flavor profile.

I think judges like a piece of chicken to look like a piece of chicken.