Chili Today, Gone Tamale

Well, my Chili didn't win first place, but overall it was the most authentic and most flavorful chili of all!  Granted, I feel I should have won since it was the first one that disappeared off the table. LOL.

The judges were people from other departments at M.D. Anderson with no affiliation to Breast Medical Oncology, because last year there were complaints the contest was rigged.

So it was a first for me on two different levels.  One, I created the cream corn and mozzarella cheese tamales hoping they would turn out great, and they did!  Second, I have never entered a cooking contest before - yep, this was my first time. :-)

The three judges read the results aloud starting with 3rd place, "It's Always Chili in BMO", the northeastern bean and chicken won them over.  Then came our team's chili, "Chili Today, Gone Tamale" - they stated my chili was the most authentic and most flavorful of all. Uhhh hellooooo?????   LOL.  And finally first place went to "Ready To Rock N' Roll" - for being the "most odd chili they've ever tasted - it was sweet, spicy and different."

Afterwards the entire department was able to feast on all the food.  Of course I had to try my competitor's chili and went with the winning chili, and it wasn't that bad actually.  But if you added potatoes and carrots - you'd definitely have some beef stew since it contained mostly pot roast.  So yeah, that was a little odd.  In either case, congrats to them.

Thank you all for the support and wish me luck next year! :-)