Before the Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City Chiefs faced off on the gridiron, southern Brooklyn’s own fierce competition was already underway at the annual Chili Cookoff at Lock Yard.
The Feb. 9 event — a yearly tradition for the Fifth Avenue watering hole — brought together more than a dozen chefs who stirred up their best batches of chili for the neighborhood’s tastiest Super Bowl Sunday tradition.
Competitors served up unique chili recipes to a panel of judges — Lock Yard chef Kenn McGoey, chef Edward Martinez, Tim King and Frank Tilelli, founder of the popular South BK Food and Drink group on Facebook. As always, judging was based on seven key criteria, including aroma, taste and color.
“This is the eighth one we’ve done, and it just keeps getting better and better every year,” Tilelli told Brooklyn Paper.
McGoey called the annual cookoff a perfect way to celebrate Super Bowl Sunday.
“I think it’s great, it gets people outdoors,” he said. “I think it’s a great way to start a community in the area.”
“This thing exists because John Voss brought this idea from Pennsylvania to Brooklyn eight years ago — very humble beginnings,” Lock Yard owner Chris Ghiorzi told the crowd before announcing this year’s winners. “I think most people just upended a can of Hormel chili and now, people are dropping out of the competition because it’s too stiff, so we’ve come a long way.”
The bar’s head chef said both organizers and competitors “put a lot of effort” into the annual culinary contest, so judges take it “very seriously.”
“But it’s a lot of fun at the same time,” McGoey said.
“We’re all from the food world,” he added — to which Tilelli chimed in: “These guys are the experts. I’m the every man.”
Martinez said Sunday’s winner was a unanimous decision.
“We judged independently and then compared notes,” McGoey said, “and everything fell into place.”
For David Capaldo, the cook behind chili #4, that meant taking home the win.
Hoisting the cook-off’s grand prize — an extra-hot trophy and an oversized chili cook-off key engraved with the names of past winners — Capaldo said, “I couldn’t be happier.”
Additional reporting by Arthur de Gaeta
