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Chilly chili day

By: Elizabeth Ryan
(Contact)

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Fire Chief Wendell Rowe

The smoky flavor of Fire Station No. 1’s thick “High Rise Chili” won over the crowd at the Chattanooga Market for the third year in a row Sunday as five teams competed in the sixth annual Firehouse Chili Cook-off.

“I’m thinking that next year, we need to wear pinstripes like the Yankees because we’re starting to dominate,” said firefighter Dave Matthews, who has belonged to the firehouse on Main Street for two years.

This year’s winning formula for the People’s Choice prize, he said, had a combination of ground beef and smoked sausage and involved a few changes, including the substitution of white beans for kidney beans.

Bragging rights for this year’s Chef’s Choice award went to the Hook ’N Ladle team from Station No. 19, whose “Fire in the Hole” chili also won last year thanks to a secret ingredient, according to firefighter Damien Vinson.

With competition as hot as the chili, the event raised more than $7,500 to help the Muscular Dystrophy Association pay for services such as electric wheelchairs, leg braces and summer camps for the about 250 people living with muscular dystrophy in Southeast Tennessee and Northwest Georgia.

“As much as possible, we want to give them the lifestyle that they deserve,” MDA Director Holly Carroll said.

Fire Chief Wendell Rowe said he was proud of his crews for taking time out of their busy schedules to give back, adding that the spirit of philanthropy was even more important now than in years past.

“In light of these hard economic times, in my opinion, that’s what it’s going to take — all of us banding together and just helping one another,” he said.

Indeed, the event seemed to be a labor of love for all those involved.

At Station No. 6 in Hixson, the team held a blind taste test for their family members to determine whose recipe would win the honor of becoming “Lupton City’s Best Kept Secret.” Preparations for the event also began months ago at Station No. 13 in Brainerd, where the Lucky 13 team went through four different practice batches and three different recipes before coming up with their formula for “Red Hot Satisfaction.”

“We’ve eaten a lot of chili at the fire hall when we’ve been on shifts lately. Even when it was hot, we’ve had chili,” Lt. Shellie Thorne said. “The rest of the crew ... has been very patient with us.”

On Saturday the team met at the firehouse to prepare the 50 gallons of chili they served on Sunday, combining 20 pounds of onions, 90 pounds of ground beef and 120 pounds of beans.

From the adjacent booth, Senior Firefighter Jason Rains of Station No. 5’s May Day Mayhem team, playfully taunted Lt. Thorne, trying to persuade her to vote for his team’s “Be Advised” chili.

“Ours is the best,” she called back, laughing. “Do you think after 10 hours of cooking, I’d vote for yours?”

The spirit of competition also prompted many lighthearted proclamations of superiority.

Senior Firefighter Rains said he had not tasted any of the other recipes because he didn’t want his “opinion of chili to go down.”

Senior Firefighter Terry Knowles from Station No. 1 said his team’s assortment of shredded cheese, jalapeños and sour cream was intended more for the other teams’ chilis than for his own.

“We set those out because all of the other ones taste so bad that people come down and doctor them up so that they’ll taste good,” he said.

For Randy Thompson of East Brainerd, who attends the event every year, however, each team’s chili has its own virtues.

“We purposely waited on this (and skipped breakfast) so we could enjoy all the different flavors without having to stop,” he said.

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