International Chili Society

Laughlin Regional Results

It was a gorgeous day for a cookoff!  Yes, you heard that correctly—-temperatures were in the 70’s and NO WIND!  Well, maybe a little breeze late in the afternoon, but not so you’d notice.

This weekend would have been JR’s 96^th birthday.  He was missed by all.  However, Margo came to cook, accompanied by Dave and Kathy Hipskind.  It was great to see them.  Barry Steinberg celebrated his 69^th birthday and I celebrated my 75^th.  Sadly, we also mourned the unexpected passing of Steve Wright with a brief memorial at the cooks meeting.

There were cooks from Illinois, Ohio, Connecticut, Colorado and Canada, as well as from California, Arizona and Nevada.  Among the officials, judges and competitors in the various divisions, we counted 16 World Champions, including the reigning World Champions in Salsa and Traditional Red Chili.  That only goes to show what a truly tough contest this is.

There is always a quality raffle here and this year surpassed them all.  The raffle was conducted by the Rotary Club of Laughlin, spearheaded by chilihead Tony Inglese.  The top prizes were a helicopter ride with Don Laughlin himself and a three-day, two-night stay at the Golden Nugget, including dinner.

Gary and Dawn Nehf coordinate the cookoff for Patty, the Golden Nugget Director of Hotel Operations.  Gary also serves as Chief Judge.  I was Chief Scorekeeper, assisted by Nicole Caimi, Allene Macklin, Louise Dinnewith and Ellen Dyer.  They did an outstanding job of tallying the results with speed and accuracy.  Chief Wrangler was Dennis Macklin.  Bob Dyer helped in several areas and Pete Caimi was, as usual, everywhere—-keeping an eye out for any place that needed his help.  Dave and Carol Hancock were also in attendance.

Everyone agreed that this was one of the best Laughlin cookoffs ever, especially the winners, who were:

Salsa (24 contestants—two tables):

4^th - Dave Schulman

3^rd - Judy Omerza, a former Salsa World Champion

2^nd - Dione Cooley, a former Salsa World Champion

1^st - Jim Beaty, the 1986 Traditional Red World Champion

Chili Verde (34 contestants—-two tables)

5^{th -} Armando Sanchez

4^th - Irene Menchaca

3^rd - Bob Hall, a former Chili Verde World Champion

2^{nd -} Steve Crawford, 2^nd place in Chili Verde at the 2011 World’s Championship

1^st - Skip Cooley

Traditional Red Chili (68 contestants—-four tables)

5^th - Miranda Beaver

4^th - Bob Plager

3^{rd -} Tish Crawford, the reigning Salsa World Champion

2^nd - Eileen Beaty

1^st  - Margo Knudson, a former Traditional Red World Champion

Good luck to all of the winners in West Virginia in October.  See you down the chili trail.

Submitted by Karen Ray