Outside in the falling snow, students skate around the ice rink, stand around the warm fires and wait for rides in the horse-drawn carriage. Inside, with the sound of a coffeehouse in the background, a welcome scent meets the students coming in from the cold — chili.
Ten students tied on their aprons and brought out the secret recipes to try and win $100 of AJ’s money. The $100 was awarded to the judge’s choice, $30 was awarded to the people’s choice, and $20 was awarded to the people’s choice runner-up.
Junior Elizabeth Anne Odell said she enjoyed the chance to enter her chili in a competition.
“My family has a good recipe, and I thought it would be fun to see if other people thought it was good,” she said.
And Odell did get good feedback from Director of Student Activities Kevin Boyle, who even asked for leftovers.
“He said it had a good consistency, and that it had a smoky flavor to it,” she said.
Junior Cathy Feeney said she also enjoyed the unique opportunity to test her cooking skills at Winter Fest.
“We wanted to start out the semester doing something we don’t normally do,” said Feeney, who made her “Chilly Chicken Chili” with juniors Maggie Danaher, Brittany Parks, and Dani Simpson.
The “Chilly Chicken Chili,” a white chili, won the people’s choice award in the contest.
“I think the special ingredient in this was the tomatillo salsa verde — and Velveeta cheese,” Feeney said.
The only other white chili in the contest, made by Garrett Holt, won the judges over for the top prize.
“I didn’t try it,” Feeney said. “I was hoping mine would be the only white chili.”
Feeney was not the only one irked by Holt’s entry.
“I’m kind of bitter about the fact that Garrett’s chili won,” Odell said. “I drove him to Kroger to get his ingredients, so I facilitated him beating me. It was a risk I shouldn’t have taken — being nice to my friends.”
Holt called his creation “Momma Holt’s White Chicken Chili.”
“When I taste it, I imagine I’m skipping through a field of daisies on a cloud which is probably heaven, licking my favorite ice cream cone which is quite possibly bunny tracks,” he said.
While Holt was not surprised his chili won, he said senior Nate Jebb’s “NomNom Chili” “tickled his taste buds.”
But Odell said Jebb’s chili wasn’t quite to her liking.
“I was biased from the beginning that I wasn’t going to like it. I thought it was too spicy,” she said. “So we’re not on very good terms with that.”
But Jebb said he was very surprised that his chili did not receive an award. He described the taste of his chili as “playful, yet robust.”
“I tried two other chilis and then had, like, eight servings of mine,” he said.
Jebb said he made his own chili but did have some help.
“I was under the tutelage of a secret mentor,” he said.
The chili contest was a great addition to the Winter Fest, Jebb said.
“It was really fun with the anticipation and smack-talking leading up to the contest,” he said.
sleitner@hillsdale.edu
