Documenting Adventures and Food and Stuff : Santa Cruz Clam Chowder Cook-Off!

We did it! We competed in our first cooking competition!

The Santa Cruz clam chowder is quite an event. Over 70 teams competed trying to dish out either the best Boston or Manhattan clam chowder. Teams go way out decorating booths, making costumes, ringing cow bells - the works. We probably put off planning a costume and booth theme a little too long. We had a ton of great suggestions but late Thursday night we decided on (based on easiness and expense factors) "Clam Heaven", making us clam angels. We perfected our chowder recipe after consulting with several chefs and cooks, cooking up almost 4 gallons of Boston clam chowder. It tasted amazing! In just under an hour we ran out of chowder! Several people even came back for 2nd and in a couple cases 3rd tastes. We didn't win but we had a blast. We also got 23 votes for best chowder - not bad for our first time.

Someone wrote "The Best 2013" on one of their votes!

What we learned: In order to really compete, you probably need to cook at least 7-10 gallons of chowder. The public gets only 5 tastes out of 75, so the more people you can get to try your chowder, the more likely you are to get votes. We'll definitely do this again.