A Chilly Day for Chili

Today Was Middlebury’s 3^rd annual Chili Festival. For those of you number loving folks:

10^th:  top winter activity in Vermont

50: vendors from here to Montpelier selling chili

80: different types of Chili

Obviously and luckily I didn’t get to try everything, even on an empty stomach, or I’d be writing this from a hospital bed with an IV stuck up one arm. But boy I tried a lot.

Some of my favorites were: the Swift House Inn’s venison chili – great meat. Inception Studios vegetarian saffron chili – subtle and satisfying. Middlebury Bagel’s “kitchen sink” chili – best chili flavor but so hard to describe, with a soft piece of cornbread plopped on top. But what was probably my most favorite was Costello’s Market’s red wine and chocolate Chili. Delightful, surprising harmony, with a smooth aftertaste.

I made the executive decision that chili by itself is a no-no. Please be creative, have a bowl of sour cream to dollop, a sprinkling of queso fresco or parmesan, and hand me one of those warm corn-bread cupcakes, please.  (And thank you Woodchuck cider, for the free chapstick).

But I promise this wasn’t all about the food. The Middlebury Mamajamas were singing on the bridge around 2pm when I got there, sounding pretty snazzy. Props to the one kid on the side eating chili while singing.

With

Main Street

so lively, I suddenly understood what it feels like to be Rory Gilmore at a Star’s Hollow festival, with Taylor Doose directing traffic and Kirk selling pumpkin popsicles to kids in a pilgrim costume...

Some pretty interesting townsies turned up. One girl in a chili costume. A group of punks, including, I’m pretty sure, Bucky, the kid who kept stealing laptops from campus last year. Fire-twirlers. Lots of folks in Mardi Gras beads, which turned into a flash mob, breaking out some dance moves to Billie Jean. And two guys near the Two Brother’s Tavern tent with pigs on leashes. Which only begs the question: were they sampling the pork chili?