A South Carolina woman’s whimsical approach to food is helping her crack the insular world of cooking contests with such novel dishes as pecan-encrusted oysters over asiago cheese grits. And she’s taking home a lot more than blue ribbons and kitchen gadgets.
Candy McMenamin has won more than 105 prizes in the five years since she began competing around the country.
Her Wild Wild West Beef and Smoked Gouda Grits won her $10,000 at the National Beef Cook-off a few years back. Soon afterward, her sweet potato encrusted chicken earned her $10,000 in appliances at the first Simply Manischewitz kosher cooking contest. And nobody minded that she isn’t Jewish.
Cooking contests have long been part of American culture; think blue ribbons for the best pies at county fairs. But television shows and million dollar prizes have ramped up the culinary competition to the point where innovation and ingenuity really count.
McMenamin, who taste tests her creations on her husband and two children in this Columbia suburb, isn’t letting success go to her head. Cooking, she said, is a hobby that began growing on her in recent years as a way to “reinvent herself.”
“The boys had gotten older and I had more time and it’s something that I always enjoyed doing when I did have time,” she said. “It gave me something that’s mine to do — maybe mine to be proud of.”
But she isn’t taking herself or the cooking contests too seriously as she prepares for her next venture — a garlic cookoff in Gilroy, Calif.
Her advice?
“I’d say don’t be afraid to try different things and put different things together,” said McMenamin, who hopes to wow the judges with a stuffed quail recipe. “What’s the worst thing that could happen? You throw it out and order pizza.”
Image from Stock.xchng.
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