15th Annual Hot Luck & Fiery Foods Exhibition :: April 1 & 2, 2011
“Hot Luck”
Friday 7 pm – ???
A great gathering of spicy people with hot tastebuds!! Admission is a fiery covered dish and recipes to hand out to other “chile-heads.”
Fiery Foods Exhibition Saturday, noon – 6 pm
Chile growers, sauce makers, spicy food purveyors exhibiting their wares for tasting and sale!! Free admission! Featuring:
Music and Salsa
Join in the big salsa competition! Live music by Greg Zeisemer & Kriss Luckett from 6 pm – 9 p.m. on Saturday.
Expo participants
- Paradise Cove Catering
- Kenny’s Farmhouse Cheeses
- Paradise Cove Catering
- Marion’s Greenhouse
- Capshew Cellars Vinegars
- Madison Fudge Factory
- FW Outdoor Food Company Co.
- Dattilo’s Produce
- The Chile Woman
The details
People who love to eat and cook with hot peppers will find an expanded marketplace at the 15th Annual Hot Luck and Fiery Foods Exhibition in Historic Downtown Madison, Indiana.
Hot Luck and Fiery Foods Exhibition is held on the first weekend of April each year at the Thomas Family Winery, and attracts visitors from several states and even a few foreign countries. The event has a loyal following of ChileHeads who come to cook for the popular Friday night Hot Luck dinner and to buy supplies for their home creations.
“We want this to be more than an exhibition,” said Thomas Family Winery Co-Proprietor Steve Thomas. “We want to create a true hot food marketplace with a wide variety of foods, food tools and supplies.”
The event features three new vendors for 2011.
Capshew Cellars Vinegar will offer a variety of herbal and hot pepper vinegars. “Bob and Maureen have been making quality amateur wines, ciders and beers for years- their commercial vinegars are a natural extension of their wonderful talents” said Thomas.
Dattilo Fruit Company, a well known produce market in Madison, has been a trusted leader in the produce industry for over 80 years. They come to the Hot Luck and Fiery Foods Exhibition with a selection of the finest peppers- dried and fresh, fruit and vegetables available.
Kenny’s Farm House Cheeses of central Kentucky will be at Hot Luck with a selection of cheese made with Old World, handmade techniques. Last year, they produced 70,000 pounds of cheese in varieties including Cheddar, Colby, Jack, Asiago, Swiss and Havarti, as well as outstanding pepper-infused cheeses.
The new vendors at Hot Luck and Fiery Foods offer a hint of why Steve and Elizabeth want the event to become more of a marketplace. “One of the things we see is that the hot pepper market has grown so much that essence of the market has changed,’ Thomas said, “In the past, people mostly bought hot pepper products. Now they make and cook with homemade products. We need to provide support for what people are doing now. We need to offer ingredients and give them methods to make their home cooking more fun.”
One way the Thomas Family Winery is helping people expand their hot food opportunities is at the Hot Luck dinner held Friday night. The entire production area of the winery is lined with dozens of tables filled with hot dishes of every imaginable variety. There are recipes from around the world, including South America, the Caribbean, Asia, Africa and the American South and Southwest.
The hot food cooks do take pity on their non-ChileHead friends, and provide some dishes for the long buffet without the heat. “When all our wonderful cooks recover from the Friday night food binge, they can come back on Saturday to obtain ingredients for their home cooking adventures,” Thomas added. “They don’t have to stop working with food because then they can enter the salsa contest on Saturday.”
The 15th annual Hot Luck and Fiery Foods Expo will be held on Friday and Saturday, April 1 & 2, at the Thomas Family Winery is located at 208 East Second Street in Historic Downtown Madison, Indiana.
The event features offers guests the opportunity to sample salsas, sauces, purchase dried and fresh spices, hot breads, chili powder, vinegars and pepper plants. Saturday Hours are from 12 Noon until 6:00 p.m., however the winery will remain open until at least 10:00 p.m. Music on Saturday will be provided by Greg Ziesemer and Kriss Luckett. Ziesemer and Luckett developed their sound as an acoustic duo playing contemporary Americana music. “I call it music from the soul,” said Ziesemer.
Entries in the homemade salsa contest need to be received by 1:00 pm on Saturday. The category awards of “Most Innovative,” “Most Traditional,” and “Best Overall” will be awarded. The coveted “Sombrero Grande” will be presented to the grand prizewinner around 6 pm. Prizes are guaranteed to be wacky.
For more information, call 812-273-3755, or 800- 948-8466. For more information about the winery, follow us on Facebook, or visit the website at http:// www.thomasfamilywinery.us
For photos from past Hot Lucks visit our family photo scrapbook…