FoodB

We had some sad news last week. Jenn's uncle, Dick, passed away in his sleep. I only met the guy a few times but he was one of those people that you can just tell loves life.

One thing that Dick loved to do was to participate in Chili cookoff's. He died a week before he was set to cook in this years Tustin Chili Cookoff and one of his sons, Bill, decided to compete in his place. So Jenn and I decided to head over to offer help and support as well as celebrating her uncles memory.

Personally, I have never eaten chili. I watched a lot of cartoons as a child and always associated chili with smoke coming out of your ears about 5 seconds before your head explodes. That's a pretty lasting memory and since it wasn't really on my families dinner rotation, I just never had it. When I started to expand the foods that I would eat, chili still remained one of those things that I just tended to avoid because I really needed to try good chili and I just didn't have any good recommendations on what to try.

What better place to try that a chili cookoff? You only get a sample and if you don't like it, you can always just move on to the next booth. Of all the chili that I tasted, I really enjoyed the sample from Roderick's restaurant in Tustin. They made theirs with black beans and tri-tip and the flavor was really good. We are going to have to try out the rest of the restaurant one of these days.

On a happy note, Billy's chili ended up winning the main event. That's a pretty impressive feat considering that it was his first cookoff and the beer was flowing pretty heavily. They also took second place in the fan's choice which you would win by getting the most people to sample your chili. All in all we had a great time and I'm sure that Dick would have been proud of the outcome.