Morningstar Reformed Church is holding a chili cookoff at Columbia Baptist Church on the afternoon of February 20. Please join us for an afternoon of food and fellowship, and bring the whole family; we will have a couple of bounce houses for the younger kids, and horseshoes and cornhole for the adults, casual play with no strict rules. Below is everything you need to know, whether you plan to cook or just want to hang out and enjoy the chili, the music, the games, and the fellowship.

How to enter

• Anyone who lives in Columbia County can enter one pot, and you don’t need to be a member of Morningstar to cook.
• Text CHILI to (386) 200-5395 by Saturday, February 6, and you’re in. That one text is the whole sign-up, so there’s no sheet to find and no email to send.
• We’ll text you right back with a short form to finish your entry, and the week of the cookoff we’ll send the details and a reminder or two so nothing sneaks up on you.
• If your plans change, text CHILIOUT to the same number and we’ll take you off the list and stop the reminders, no explanation needed. Texting CHILI again before February 6 puts you right back in.
• We label every pot with a number instead of a name, so the voting stays about the chili and not about who made it.

What to bring

• Bring your chili hot and ready to serve at 3:00, in a slow cooker that holds four to six quarts, which is plenty for everyone to get a taste.
• Pack your own ladle and an extension cord of at least 15 feet, because we won’t have spares to hand out.
• Set a card beside your pot with your chili’s name, its heat (mild, medium, or hot), and anything a taster ought to know about, such as nuts, shellfish, or no beans, so people know what they’re getting into.
• We’ll have the tasting cups, spoons, napkins, crackers, a topping table, the ballots, and a clean-up crew ready, so the rest is covered.
• One small favor: look over your list before you leave the house, because we won’t have spare cookers, ladles, or cords, and we’d hate for your chili to sit out the afternoon over a forgotten cord.

How we pick a winner

• Every taster, kids included, gets one dried bean to drop in the jar beside the pot they liked best.
• Kids vote in their own jar for the Kids’ Choice, so they get a winner of their own.
• We close the jars at 4:30, two volunteers count the beans, and at 4:45 we announce both winners.
• First place takes home the title of Columbia County’s best chili and a full year of bragging rights.

Kids and the bounce houses

• The bounce houses are open from 3:00 to 5:45 for kids ages three to eight, within whatever height and age limits the rental company sets that day.
• A parent or legal guardian stays at the cookoff for as long as their child does, so someone who knows them is always close by.
• One of our Morningstar adults will be at the entrance of each bounce house the whole time it’s open.
• Kids go in with socks on and shoes off, without food or drink, and the younger and older kids take turns in separate rounds so everybody gets a safe bounce.
• If the wind picks up or rain starts, we’ll close the bounce houses, because we’d rather do that than take a chance with your kids.

The day at a glance

If you have a question before then, text the church at (386) 200-5395 and someone from Morningstar will text you back.