Foods 2 students showed their creative side in a chili cook-off Oct. 12

Juniors Ally McGrath, Aimee Cejna, Alex Turzinski and Ibrahim Zeitoun won first place with the theme tailgate chili.

“We chose the tailgate theme because my mom’s famous (traditional) chili is called ‘Boilermaker Tailgate Chili’, so I thought it was the perfect way to incorporate the tailgate theme,” McGrath said. “The main ingredients were: ground beef and usually it calls for Italian sausage, but we substituted that for turkey sausage, in the long run, chili powder was the biggest one we used to make sure it had a good kick to it.”

Other themes included Hawaiian chili, wrestling chili, Mexican chili, and western cowboy chili.

Tailgate chili won overall first place and Hawaiian chili received recognition for their presentation.​

First place winners took home a certificate.

“It felt good (winning). All our hard work paid off,” McGrath said.

The chili is judged in flavor texture and creativity.

“(I enjoyed) interacting with the kids seeing their creativity, and how neat their ideas are,” judge Donna Leahy said.

The chili contest takes place twice a year, and it’s only offered to Foods 2.

“Students are not only learning about chili from top to bottom, but they are also gaining experience in creating a recipe of their own,” foods teacher Angela Gentile said. “After this recipe is created, students then take it a step further in tweaking their recipe based on its taste, aroma, and texture.”