Chili cookoff

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A “chili cookoff” is a social event, similar to a barbecue, in which competitors prepare their own particular recipe for chili con carne and submit it for taste testing. A cookoff may be an informal gathering with the simple goal of sharing recipes and enjoying food, or it may be a large-scale event with an official panel of judges and substantial prizes for winners.

The Chili Appreciation Society International (CASI) sanctions over 550 cookoffs annually that raise over $1,000,000.00 for charity. Corporate CASI, which has the function of sanctioning all of these cookoffs, doing the necessary work to tabulate cookoff results, and putting on the annual Terlingua International Chili Championship, has an annual income of approximately $250,000.00. Out of this annual income around $60,000.00 goes to charity. The CASI is a 501(c)(3) corporation.

The International Chili Society (ICS) organizes chili cookoffs as fundraisers. Its annual cookoffs are on a grand scale, with regional qualifying events that attract tens of thousands of participants and a "World Championship" cookoff held in October. The ICS has raised millions of dollars for charity[1] while still awarding hundreds of thousands of dollars to winners.

As early as 1970, many communities have hosted non-ICS cookoffs, leading to a competing "World Championship" cookoff in Terlingua, Texas.

Notable cookoffs include:

the Chilympiad in San Marcos, Texas (for men only)
the Hell Hath No Fury Like A Woman Scorned cookoff in Luckenbach, Texas
the Chili Appreciation Society International Chili Championship in Terlingua, Texas
the Frank X. Tolbert/Wick Fowler World Chili Championships in Terlingua, Texas