Fair-Goers, Chili Cooks, Judges Get Their Fill

Years ago, Howard and Judy Choate of Lompoc used to actually eat the chili they made for chili cook-offs. But that was many pounds of beef, tomatoes and beans ago.

Stirring their caldron of spicy red stuff Saturday at the Ventura County Fair before the cook-off, they grimaced at the thought of consuming a bowl. More than a decade of competition-style chili preparation has given them a taste for other dishes, they said.

“At home--well, you know, we eat chicken and hamburger,” Howard Choate said.

In addition to the chili cook-off, Saturday’s fair featured the band War, arm-wrestling contests, show horses and a rodeo.

Fair spokeswoman Teri Raley said that by Friday evening, 208,698 people had attended the event since it opened 1 1/2 weeks ago, slightly more than the 206,369 who had attended by the same point last year.

“People tell us it’s the nicest fair yet, the cleanest and the prettiest,” she said.

The Choates’ Buck ‘N’ Bull Chili booth was one of 14 in the International Chili Society’s district competition, held on a grassy square at the fair from noon to 4 p.m. The winning dish--which turned out to be one called “Amorosa Chili,” created by Harry DeWitt of Santa Barbara--will go on to May’s state championships in Orange County.

At first glance, the chili cook-off might seem light-hearted cooking fun. Many contestants, however, spend their weekends driving from one spicy competition to another, some traveling as far as Arizona and New Mexico to hawk their brew. This is serious business, they say.

“This is my rest and relaxation,” Bill Green muttered as he scooped some of his creation, “Combat Chili,” into the judges’ official white Styrofoam cups. “Can’t you tell how relaxed I am?”

Green’s weekday job is directing a schizophrenia research center at Camarillo State Hospital. Entering chili cook-offs used to be his weekend obsession, he said, but he’s since calmed down. “I’m more relaxed about it than I used to be,” he said.

Fair-goers could do some judging of their own, purchasing samples for 50 cents each and turning in their opinions of the fair’s best chili for the people’s choice award.

“Yeah, the chili’s pretty good here,” said Ralph Mercado of Moorpark, himself a frequent cook-off participant who skipped this competition. Mercado said he considers himself a tough judge. “You can tell they spent some time in the preparation of it.”

Mercado defined good chili as one that “doesn’t burn (your throat) until after” because the cook used fresh vegetables and spices.

Cathy Dye, also of Moorpark, said she and her husband and two daughters were hardly professional judges of chili. But they knew what they liked.

“Those two young guys were definitely the best,” she said, gesturing to the “Margaritaville” booth staffed by Percy Gutierrez of Agoura and Steve Deveux of Simi Valley. “It wasn’t really spicy.”

But of another one, she said: “That chili tastes like somebody dumped an ashtray on it.”

Proceeds from the competition will go to the Special Olympics. Last year, $500 was raised.

Two hours after the chili competition began, the fair’s rodeo got under way with a crowd of hundreds standing to the strains of the National Anthem and the spectacle of a horse and rider, bedecked in sparkly red, white and blue, slowly rotating on a raised platform.

Although that pair stood still as a statue, rodeo participants and their beasts proved predictably wilder. Bucking broncos kicked up a storm as modern-day cowboys rode astride like rag dolls. Bewildered calves trotted from their steel cages into the dusty rodeo ring, only to be wrestled to the ground by more of the same horse-riding cowboys.

From the stands came the cheers of adult spectators and the delighted squeals of children.

“It’s surprising to me that people are still doing this,” said Michele Kitko of Echo Park, who brought her nephew, Kaician Kitko, 5, to the fair. “I had to explain to Kaician that these people aren’t actors, that they are real cowboys.”

She shook her head. “This is so far from my life, from the big cities and one-hour traffic jams.”

A few bleacher benches up from the Kitkos, Carmen Ortiz of Fillmore regarded the scene skeptically. She never used to come to rodeos, she said. “I thought it was kind of abusive of the animals.”

But on Saturday, her son’s godfather was roping steers in the competition, so she determined to change her attitude, she said.

“Everybody should do what they like, I guess,” she said. “The animals will survive.”