TUESDAY - July 1, 2008

Southwest Regional and New Mexico State

Well, the Southwest Regional and New Mexico State Championship Chili Cookoffs are in the books. What a great weekend. Bianca Mitchell and her staff at the Sky City Casino in Acoma, NM do a great job with these cookoffs. Super prize money, beautiful, authentic Acoma pottery for the prizes, you couldn't ask for much better. This year the weather was, for the most part, more cooperative and not as hot. But about 6 pm on Saturday, we got hit with a massive dust storm. Those of us still out in the cooking area enjoying each others company, some "Italian ginger ale" and some good cigars were able to get most of the tents down before major damage occurred, although one local woman lost her tent and George Lott of Colorado has to replace a part or two. The storm did clear out the humidity, and Sunday was extra pleasant, dry with a slight intermittent breeze. Winners on Saturday at the revived Southwest Regional were:

Salsa - 8 cooks

3rd Place - Harold Timber-NM

2nd Place - Millie Chavez-NM

1st Place - Ryan Salvador-NM

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Chili Verde - 7 cooks

3rd Place - Al Henry-CO

2nd Place - Barbara Herrin-TX

1st Place - George Lott-CO

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Red Chili - 20 Cooks

3rd Place - Jim Rasey-CA

2nd Place - Mike Rook-CO(His 5th 2^nd place in 14 days)

1st Place - George Lott-CO

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Sunday, we started everyone an hour earlier and lost a bunch of the local cooks, only to have more locals replace them. Pete Caimi carried out a threat from Saturday and showed up in a nice white panama hat and shorts, showing off legs even whiter! Pete and Nicole came over from Nevada again to help this year and let me tell you, no one works harder in the judging area than these two. I could not Chief judge these events without their help. Bob and Kathy Plager came down from Colorado after chief judging the Triple in Cripple last weekend and were instrumental in how smooth the judging area went. My hat is off to these 4 individuals. We had to scramble a bit to get our salsa and verde numbers where they needed to be and worked with our times so people could run to a store on the next reservation to get meat and supplies, but we got to 7 for both of those categories. The winners of the New Mexico State were

Salsa - 7 cooks

3rd Place - Harold Timber-NM

2nd Place - Barry Steinberg-CA

1st Place - Barbara Herrin-TX

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Chili Verde - 7 cooks

3rd Place - Al Henry-CO

2nd Place - Arleta Bond-CO

1st Place - Barbara Herrin-TX

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Red Chili - 12 Cooks

3rd Place - Louis Gonzales-TX

2nd Place - Edwina Mora-NM

1st Place - Bill Ray-CA (His first weekend cooking in NM)

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Old Miner's Days Regional

BIG BEAR LAKE, CA
JULY 19, 2008
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I KNOW THIS IS LAST MINUTE, BUT HERE GOES!!!
Big Bear Lake, CA - In the San Bernardino Mnts.
Relief from the HEAT!!!! Yeah!!!
Mark your calendars, sorry for the late notice!
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All three catagories: Red, Green, Salsa
All World Qualifiers!
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Old Miners Cookoff
Chairman: Mark Gaines, Tom Benson
Chief Judge: Mark Sweeney
Head Scorekeeper: Val Gereghty/Doni Gordon
MC: Mike Austin
(Yep: We are all back for another one! Does that tell you cooks and judges anything!!!!)
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Set up: 9AM Cooks meeting 10AM

Red $35 + membership
Green $20 + membership
Salsa $10 + membership
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Prizes:

Red: 1st-$500 Green: 1st -150 Salsa- $50
2nd-$300 2nd-100
3rd- $100 3rd- 50
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Please contact Mark Sweeney, Doni Gordon, Mark Gaines or myself or just go to the web site and sign up! Again, sorry for how late this is but we do hope to see everyone in the beautiful mountains of Big Bear! I would also like to extend an invitation to anyone who would like to judge to come on up! Would love to see you! And please don't forget the Calcutta on Friday.
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Val Gereghty

928-486-4099

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