It may well be that only on St. Thomas would mad dogs and Englishmen find themselves in the company of thousands of normally normal folks out in the noonday sun — at the hottest time of the year, consuming copious quantities of steamy, spicy chili, no less.
That's the annual Texas Society of the Virgin Islands Chili Cookoff for ya.
The phenomenon manifests itself for the 15th time on Sunday, Sept. 12, on Sapphire Beach. If you've never been to one, here comes a virtual verbal tour. If you've gone before, there's nothing more you need to know; either you wouldn't miss it for all the oil in Texas, or they'd have to hogtie you to get you back.
There are three aspects to the event: the morning preparation of the chili in competition for prizes, the eating of same by the throngs that surge onto the sand around noon (or shortly thereafter, if they expect to find much more than a dollop at the bottom of the pots), and the family fun and games that go on all afternoon.
Chili tastes, served up in little plastic cups, are a mere 25 cents (unchanged in 15 years!), but the average patron will consume at least half a dozen of them, plus an appropriate amount of chilled beer, water or soft drinks to counteract the effects. There will be live music on a stage and beach games all afternoon, with the ever-present option of taking a dunk in the sea to cool off.
The cooking part is regulated by the rules of the Chili Appreciation Society International (CASI), which specify, among other things, that you can't use "filler" such as beans, rice, hominy or (for those of the Cincinnati school) spaghetti. What's being judged is hand-cut or coarse- ground beef in the secret savory sauce of the cook's creation. (Once the judging's over, everybody's actually encouraged to throw in the beans and whatnot to make the "pot o red" go farther for the hungry hordes.)
Cooks can assemble from 6 a.m. onward. Each entry must provide its own cooking stove and fuel, table(s) and chair(s), preparation and cooking utensils, raw meat, seasonings and, if taking part in the separate "showmanship" competition, adornments and props.
There's a fee of $25 per cook, and for teams a head cook must be designated as liaison with the chili judging panel. That person and a companion get invited to the equivalent of a "captains' meeting" the night before the cookoff, to dine, draw site assignments, go over rules and regs and get psyched up for the next day's doings.
The chili judges will begin tasting shortly after high noon to determine who will represent the "Virgin Pod" (one of 186 member pods in CASI) at the international society's annual chili cookoff in November in Terlingua, Texas. Later in the afternoon, another set of judges will rank the optional showmanship entries. There will be prizes for the top 10 chili concoctions and for the three best showmanship efforts.
A big part of the event's appeal is that its primary purpose is to raise funds to be donated to local service organizations. The major beneficiary for many years has been the Queen Louise Home for the Aged. Also on the receiving end this year will be the American Red Cross St. Thomas/St. John Chapter, Dial-A-Ride, Family Support Network, Kidscope, the St. Thomas Swimming Association, St. Thomas Rescue and the V.I. Institute of Performing Arts.
The 1999 sponsors are all back from previous cookoffs: Knight Quality Stations, Coors Light, CastleSprings, VitelCellular, American Airlines and Certified Angus Beef. That last one means that cooks have the option of acquiring maybe 20 to 40 pounds of beef for free — they just have to go pick it up once they're registered.
If there's a doyenne of chili cooking in the Virgin Islands, it's Georgeann "Pepper" Peters, who's been a part of the proceedings from the start. For this 15th event, she's putting together "a little side competition" among winners of past years.
Another thing that will be different this year, she notes, is not for fun at all: Randy Lusby, who was fatally shot at the Toad and Tart pub earlier this summer, was a cookoff committee stalwart, and as a tribute to him, there will be blue ribbons available to wear. A handful of individuals in the community have embraced lawlessness as a way of life, Peters says, but "there are over 50,000 people on St. Thomas who want the violence to stop."
Cookoff applications are accepted right up to Sunday morning, but to get the free beef and an invite to the Saturday night party, you'll need to pre-register. To arrange to get an application blank, call Peters at 776-3595 or 775-8011.
