While April, according to T. S. Eliot, is “the cruelest month,” surely March is the most changeable, in our part of the world. In 2026 its first half has already brought us 80-degree days and 20-degree nights. At least a couple of Ulster County ice cream parlors have just opened for the season, while some of us still view this as prime time for leaving the slow cooker out on the counter for the brewing of big batches of soups and stews…and, lest we forget, chili.
Are there people who will eat chili all year ‘round? Of course. Restaurants that pride themselves on their secret in-house chili recipe don’t normally take it off the menu in summertime. Still, it cannot be denied that there’s something about a cold, raw day that makes a steaming bowlful especially satisfying. And if you’re serving it outdoors, that spicy aroma is practically guaranteed to lure hungry folks from blocks around.
On the theory that people crave chili most in midwinter, and in an effort to stimulate foot traffic in New Paltz’s outdoor Water Street Market during the slow season, the annual Local Ingredient Chili Challenge was staged for years in mid-January. It was lucky that it was so in 2020, since social gatherings became potentially deadly only a couple of months later. The event skipped a year in 2021, as the dangers of COVID lingered on. But when it was revived in 2022, it was pushed ahead to mid-March, and has remained there ever since.
This year, the Chili Challenge is taking place in actual springtime, one day after the Vernal Equinox: on Saturday, March 21 from noon to 3 p.m. The timing means that we could get just about any sort of weather. Organizer Theresa Fall isn’t fazed, however it goes.
“I have a feeling it’ll be in the 40s or 50s,” Fall told HV1. “It’s been a cold winter, so I’m okay with a warm day. They’ll show up either way. People like their outdoor activities, and it’s been a rough winter.”
She speaks truth: The Local Ingredient Chili Challenge is one of New Paltz’s most popular wintertime events. Turnout is nearly always heavy enough that anyone arriving during the last hour is practically guaranteed to be disappointed because several of the contestants’ vats of chili have run out. Word gets around fast which ones are this year’s outstanding offerings.
Each vendor is required to post a complete list of ingredients at their station, to prove that they’ve complied with the contest rules of using a minimum of five that are locally sourced. This transparency is a boon to people who have food allergies/sensitivities, are vegan, keep kosher/halal or otherwise avoid certain ingredients. And it enables attendees to scope out what’s on offer before they even start spending their $2-a-sample tasting tickets.
Entrants are eligible to win prizes — brightly painted wooden cutting boards — in five categories: Most Creative, Best Professional, Best Vegetarian, People’s Choice and Blinded by the Bite, the latter being a blind tasting first introduced last year. A former sixth category, Best Home Chef, has been eliminated this year due to an ever-shrinking pool of entrants. “It was hard for people to get insurance,” Fall explains. “They have to use a commercial kitchen that’s Board of Health-approved, and even then they have to pay for insurance coverage. So it’s just businesses this year.”
As of the weekend preceding the event, nine contestants had signed up, some of them entering more than one chili recipe. “At least three, probably four” will be vegetarian or vegan options, according to Fall. Four of this year’s entrants are new to the Challenge: Apizza, Rino’s Pizza, the High Falls Food Co-op and The Village Grind. Lagusta’s is returning after a multiyear hiatus. The remainder are Jar’d Wine Pub, Mohonk Mountain House, Mudd Puddle Café and The Parish Restaurant. Perennial contender the New Paltz Fire Department is “not making chili this year, because no one was available, but they made a generous $250 donation,” Fall reports.
The money raised at the Chili Challenge is donated to the non-denominational Food Pantry at St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church in New Paltz, where Fall’s mother Marcy Fall was a volunteer for many years. Theresa organizes the event every year in her mother’s honor. She notes that the need this year is greater than ever: “Food insecurity is the highest it’s been in a long time, with SNAP benefits changing.”
Judges for the 17th annual Local Ingredient Chili Challenge will be the same as last year: Joan Fall, Theresa’s sister; local chef/bartender Patricia Lowden, formerly of Gardiner Mercantile; and Jason Bover, moderator of the Ulster Eateries Unfiltered group on Facebook.
Admission to the Chili Challenge is free. Tasting tickets will be sold beginning at noon on Saturday at the ground-level south entrance of the Water Street Market, where the contestants’ tables will be arrayed around the perimeter of the plaza. To reduce single-use plastic waste, attendees are encouraged to bring their own spoons from home — “even their own vessel, if they can,” says Fall, “the appropriate size for a two-ounce sample.”
Join the family! 
