How Good Is Your Chili Recipe?
Come prove it!

 3^rd Annual Chili Cook-Off
Wheat Ridge Carnation Festival
Saturday, August 18^th • 5-7 PM
44th And Field at Anderson Park

Can your chili recipe stand the heat of competition?  Great awards (and bragging rights) will be presented for the best chili in two categories: red chili or green chili.

Winners will be selected from votes cast by people’s choice and announced at 7:30 pm.

There is no entry fee but chili cooks are responsible for all set-up equipment:

6 -foot table (to share with one other entrant), canopy, tablecloth, chili pot, two gallons of your prize-winning chili l and a ladle or serving spoon. We provide electricity, if needed. If using, please provide at least a 6 ft. extension chord

We are looking for the best of 30 entries.  Act early.

To enter, send an email to chili@ngazette.com with:

• First name and last name
• Mailing address
• Phone number
• Email address
• Category of chili (red or green)
• Name of your prize-winning chili
• Propane or electricity?

If you have any questions, please contact Tim at 303-995-2806

History of Chili

 From the time the second person on earth mixed some chile peppers with meat and cooked them, the great chili debate was on; more of a war, in fact. The desire to brew up the best bowl of chili in the world is exactly that old.

Perhaps it is the effect of Capisicum spices upon man’s mind; for, in the immortal words of Joe DeFrates, the only man ever to win the National and the World Chili Championships, “Chili powder makes you crazy.” That may say it all. To keep things straight, chile refers to the pepper pod, and chili to the concoction. The e and the i of it all.

The great debate, it seems, is not limited to whose chili is best. Even more heated is the argument over where the first bowl was made; and by whom. Estimates range from “somewhere west of Laramie,” in the early nineteenth century – being a product of a Texas trail drive – to a grisly tale of enraged Aztecs, who cut up invading Spanish conquistadors, seasoned chunks of them with a passel of chile peppers, and ate them.

Never has there been anything mild about chili.

Our travels through Texas, New Mexico, and California, and even Mexico, over the years have failed to turn up the elusive “best bowl of chili.” Every state lays claim to the title, and certainly no Texan worth his comino (cumin) would think, even for a moment, that it rests anywhere else but in the Lone Star State – and probably right in his own blackened and battered chili pot.

There may not be an answer. There are, however, certain facts that one cannot overlook. The mixture of meat, beans, peppers, and herbs was known to the Incas, Aztecs, and Mayan Indians long before Columbus and the conquistadores.

Fact: Chile peppers were used in Cervantes’s Spain and show up in great ancient cuisines of China, India, Indonesia, Italy, the Caribbean, France, and the Arab states.

Fact: Don Juan de Onate entered what is now New Mexico in 1598 and brought with him the green chile pepper. It has grown there for the nearly four hundred years since.

Fact: Canary Islanders, transplanted in San Antonio as early as 1723, used local peppers, wild onions, garlic, and other spices to concoct pungent meat dishes – improvising upon ones they had cooked for generations in their native land, where the chile pepper also grew.

Dear Carnation Parade Participant,

As Chairman of the 2012 Carnation Festival Parade in Wheat Ridge, I would like personally to invite your organization to participate in our 43rd Annual Carnation Parade down 38^th Avenue on Saturday, August 18 at 10:00 AM.

The Parade is just one part of our Carnation Festival celebration, which kicks off on Friday, August 17 at Anderson Park (44^th Avenue and Field Street) and finishes on Saturday, August 18.  There will be a midway, food and games, crafts and exhibits, dance bands, an art show, fireworks, and great fun for kids of all ages!

I’ve included some information and an entry form for your participation in this year’s Parade. Please get involved! It’s fun and it’s free! All you have to do is to think of an enjoyable way for your group to join in the Parade.

Please return the completed form ASAP to ensure entry, and please no later than August 1.

The Carnation Festival Committee very much appreciates the generous Parade donations that Parade participants have made over the years.  The Festival can boast that the Parade has always been free to all participants and also is one of the few parades in the Denver metro area that doesn’t charge an entry fee.  The Festival Committee intends to continue this tradition because it helps keep the Parade open to everyone and also enhances a spirit of friendship and enjoyment.  I do recognize that the Parade participants devote time, energy, and expense to preparing their entries, and for this I would like to extend thanks from the Festival Committee. The Parade does, however, have expenses such as sound system rental, printing and mailing costs, and supplies for our Parade volunteers.  Since we began asking for donations several years ago, the Wheat Ridge community has been very responsive.  Your contributions have supported not only the Parade, but also the Festival as a whole – including the fireworks display, the entertainment, and the art show, all of which are free.   If your organization can make a donation to support the Parade and Festival this year, we would much appreciate your generosity.  You can donate along with your entry form or use the “Donate” button on the Festival web site (http://thecarnationfestival.com/).

Please e-mail or call if there are questions – I promise to respond to all messages.  Please note that I will be on vacation June 4-20, but will respond to emails and phone messages upon my return.

Mark your calendar for Saturday, August 18 for a great time! We look forward to seeing you.

Click Here to Download Parade Form (PDF)

Best regards,