Filed under: projects | Tags: chili cook-off, found objects, Ologie, Sustainabowl
Last week at work we had a chili cook-off. Sounds pretty straightforward, right? Well, if you know anyone who works at Ologie, you know that nothing can ever be done half-assed. It’s usually pretty over the top and our Top Pot event was no exception. I’m talking about themes such as a Longaberger Bee tailgate, a funeral for the deceased chili, a woodsy cabin setup, and a classic elementary school cafeteria/lunch lady counter (all complete with stellar acting by my talented coworkers).
My team came up with the theme of “Sustainabowl”. The idea behind it being that as many of our ingredients as possible would come from local vendors and, hopefully, they would be in-kind so that we could hold onto as much of our $100 budget as possible to then donate whatever was left to the Mid-Ohio Foodbank. In terms of our décor, we wanted everything to look very rustic. Our table was made up of found objects and our backdrops were made by hand (my hands, to be exact). Here are some pictures of what we were able to produce.

Sustainabowl: Chili for the greater good. Our table was made of two sawhorses and a couple of old shutters.

I made our "wallpaper" out of old newspapers and painted a tree motif onto it. I used my woodburner to burn our "mission statement" into a piece of plywood.

Table tents (designed by one of my teammates) explained where we got our food and what our plan was for our budget.
I’m pretty proud of us. While we didn’t win the overall competition, we won the “best culinary experience” category and were able to donate almost $92 to the MFB. Good job, team!