Today was the day, my friends. The day when I would redeem myself and punish the competition after the bitter defeat I’d suffered last year at our annual corporate Chili Cook-Off*. Today, many months later, held the promise of chance, possibility, and high hope. While my chili dreams had been sullied and marred, this next food-centric event was bound to style the backdrop of my culinary resurrection. This, our holy day, is the annual corporate Soup-Off, wherein I would show that I can not simply persevere but rage out of the ashes like a majestic Phoenix and capture a mighty victory.
People pretend not to like grapes when the vines are too high for them to reach.
– Marguerite de Navarre, surely inspired by The Chaplain’s cowardice in this tale.
The hour came upon us swiftly. I set up my soup in the same crockpot that housed the ill-fated chili from yesteryear, and laid out its myriad accoutrements (including lime-zest sour cream, freshly chopped crisp scallions and verdant cilantro, a combined four Mexican cheese blend of my own creation, and crushed blue corn tortilla chips) for my chicken tortilla soup. This soup is legend in my family. I make it every Christmas season as our own particular tradition, and it is THIS soup that relatives and friends make plane reservations for every holiday season. If it isn’t on the table, I never hear the end of it, so it’s been a tradition every year since I developed the recipe 5 years ago.
Imagine the scene: our little cafe once again, crockpots bubbling and simmering as far as the eye can see in a crowded room of hungry lunchtime worker bees, buzzing away with their water cooler chatter. I staked out my table at 8:00am this morning and put my soup on a gentle heat, slowly warming everything through until noon when the competition was supposed to start. I learned my lesson from last time: people DO like spicy food, it doesn’t have to be a classic or standard recipe, and DEFINITELY remember to be present to serve people yourself so that folks feel pressured against being too greedy. Also, monitor your own ballot cards to ensure all who eat actively cast their votes in turn, and guard the main entrance to prevent those rogue rodent-esque snackers from “passing through” while NOT voting for their choice. Not to mention the fact that this time, I made enough to feed the people of Guam. One full 8-qt crockpot and then another huge covered casserole dish filled to the brim. No way was I going to run out. NO. WAY.
Surprisingly, my arch nemesis, The Chaplain (who “won” the chili cookoff) was not present. He was home sick, according to credible sources. A likely story. He knew this day of reckoning was coming. You don’t have to have a PhD in the good book to know what happens to double-crossers and thieves, now do you? Better our resident Judas stay home with his Kleenex and cough drops.
HOWEVER, lots of unforseen competitors came out of the woodwork this time and many made some very creative dishes: Caribbean fish stew, lots of variations on veggie soup, and the dreaded but yet somehow ever popular “roasted butternut squash” concoctions. But then, there was MY soup. Undoubtedly, it was the first thing you saw (and SMELLED) right when you walked in. And all those toppings! Cleverly designed to give the voter an opportunity to create their own combo of all these classic Tex-Mex flavors, thus giving them a false sense of ownership in the creative process. Diabolically brilliant, yes?
They started filling the room at exactly 12 noon. I made sure to personally serve everyone with a bright smile (regimented, restrictive, Dickens-inspired portion sizes of course) and even took some time to casually chat up my competition. I was feeling at ease on the whole, but there could always be that dark horse that I didn’t account for….where were they? Who was thinking of trading in their ladle for a sharp knife with which to stab me in my backside???? I made a point of walking around during the lulls, trying to see inside the crockpots in front of me. I saw a few promising colors and textures but we ALL know, it comes down to taste……BOLD taste and FEARLESS culinary skill.
Well, my friends, the people were served and the tasting began. One by one, they went through the gamut of choices. And what do you think happened next? People started to hang around….waiting….for what, you ask? Well, it turns out that they were waiting to see if it would be ok to ask for SECONDS….OF MY SOUP!!!!!
That’s right, it was an ONSLAUGHT!!! Cups, bowls, pitchers, any vessel that they could get their hands on to ladle in more of my famous recipe was fair game! I started to refill my supply with the extra batch I had made, but 2 hours later, all the toppings were gone (even though I had brought a full Hefty bag of supplies) and so was the soup. I looked at the ballots: my list of supporters was SO LONG that they had to TURN THE SCORE SHEET OVER!!!!! People began improvising on the back of the ballots – just scribbling their name down in a frenzy and then getting back in line. Those who were late to the party were harangued by their peers: “YOU DON’T GET ANY, YOU CAME LATE!!! I WAS HERE FIRST!!! OUT OF MY WAY!!!” It was sad to see the usual feelings of camaraderie at our place of business get reduced to shreds of desperation and prideful greed, but, at the end of the day, I was WINNING so whatevs.
You see, my friends, it’s not JUST about the thrill of winning. It’s about making people know that you RULE. You DOMINATE. You will NOT be shoved aside in the heat of battle while others take the prize booty for themselves. It’s about excellence, and determination, certainly. Taking pride in your craft and accepting the many perils of culinary pursuit – severed tendons, scalded forearms, constant threats of dehydration. But of course, it is really about making people cry, weep, moan, sob and, with a little luck, you might even get them to publicly flog themselves during the bitter agony of defeat. THAT is true competition.
Needless to say, I CRUSHED them. By how many tallies, do you ask? Well, let’s see….the sheet’s right here….just a minute….I think if I added correctly…..wait for it, wait for it……
35 votes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Of course, you also have to know that the person who came in second place (or… FIRST loser, really) had…..8 votes. EIGHT. Yeah. It’s like they weren’t even trying. So sad.
So, there you have it. I am putting my picture in our company newsletter (because they made the woeful mistake of making me the editor) and I have officially won a $25 gift card for Barnes and Noble. Naturally, I intend to use it for purchasing more cookbooks.
Of course, my recipe will also be published in our new cookbook for the company under the auspicious title of WINNING RECIPES. It will be FIRST in the table of contents for this section because I have decided to assign the order by chef’s first name, alphabetical, and mine comes a few letters before those of our dearly missed, snot-nosed, fever-fallen Chaplain. So there.
Thank you all for your support. It’s been a long day and I’m deservedly drunk on my own ego.
*To read Part I of this tale, please see the post entitled Fairness is a Crock (Pot)
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