Cool weather, warm food served at area cook-offs

Chili, gumbo and soup are excellent complements to cold weather.

Multiple Houma events capitalize on cool temperatures to deliver the warm soupy dishes in concert with friendly competition, as three cook-offs are scheduled for Jan. 11 and Jan. 25.

“It’s fun to get around the black-iron pot, with a little camaraderie, a little competitiveness and a little pride in your chili,” said Tommy Guarisco, a co-founder and participant in the Downtown Houma Beautification Chili Cook-off, set for Jan. 25.

The Krewe of Mardi Gras’ 15th-annual Chili Cookoff runs from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., Jan. 11 at the Terrebonne Livestock and Agricultural Building, 2221 Moffet Road, Houma. General admission is $10.

The top four cooks split a $2,000 purse. Judges, sometimes members of the audience and other times representatives of various clubs, begin rating the cooks at 2 p.m., said the krewe’s president Marlene Jewell.

“We usually have anywhere from 65-70 people cooking, different teams,” Jewell said.

Each team has two members, pays a $50 registration fee and follows a loose set of rules, primarily the use of at least 5 pounds of meat, though it doesn’t matter what kind of meat is used. “Somebody made seafood chili” in the past, Jewell said.

No Way Out perform from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., with a live auction featuring a variety of items and a disc jockey following that entertainment.

Two weeks later the downtown Houma event and the United Way’s SOUPer Bowl are scheduled.

The downtown chili cook-off is scheduled to run from noon to 6 p.m. in Courthouse Square. Admission is $5. The second-annual cook-off was originally scheduled for October but was postponed due to Tropical Storm Karen.

Roughly 23 competitors compete in two categories – traditional and nontraditional – for the top three places.

“Traditional, to us, is ground meat, beans and a red sauce,” said Anne Picou, director of Houma’s Main Street program and event organizer. Nontraditional is anything else, including tofu, white sauce and various toss-in ingredients. “One thing I have to say about people in south Louisiana, they will put their own spin on it. They’re always going to put on their thumbprint of south Louisiana.”

Although wary of revealing too much of his recipe, Guarisco said his brand of chili is made special by the inclusion of cubed pork butt, which disintegrates and meshes with the other ingredients. Guarisco won the People’s Choice award at the inaugural event in 2012.

For the first- through third-place awards, a sequestered panel from Nicholls State University’s culinary school ranks the entries. “It’s totally unbiased,” Picou said.

Unlike the Krewe of Mardi Gras cook-off, cash prizes are not bestowed upon the winners, as proceeds are funneled to beautification projects downtown. Instead, the top three winners in each category receive trophies and, of course, bragging rights.

Autumn High perform alongside Billy Stark throughout the event.

Also on Jan. 25, soup and gumbo are on the menu at SOUPer Bowl for United Way, a cook-off running from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Courtyard by Marriott, 142 Library Drive, Houma. Admission is $5. For more information, call (985) 879-2461.