Entering in our county fair... - Page 2

Citrine1 · ‎03-09-2010

We don't have county fairs where I live. It sounds like a lot of fun. Wishing you the best of luck with your entries!

mewsmomtoo · ‎03-05-2014

Best of luck to you! I don't have any particular talents, but my mom does it all. I have tried to get her to enter, but no luck. Wishing you much success & fun too!

sfnative · ‎03-10-2010

@Susan Louise wrote:
I used to enter in the Durham fair in CT for years,,,needlepoint, counted cross stitch, crocheting, knitting, cookies, and bread. I got lots of 1st place, a couple of 2nd place, and 2 'best in show'. This afghan was one of the ones that got that ribbon

Susan Louise,

Mega Kudos to your outstanding work of art! It surely qualifies for a spread in one of "Interweave's" publications. They do have annual competitions. Please keep your eyes open for one in which this beauty could be submitted.

Congratulations on all of your awards. Your work is truly excellent.

sfnative · ‎03-10-2010

I've had one of those careers, plus a competitive avocation which didn't allow much time for developing high ranking "goods" to be entered into a fair. However, we were on vacation for a week in Maui and the deadline for entries into the "non-yeast coffee cake" category was fast approaching. Thing was, this was San Francisco and each year they had a committee select the food categories to be entered and adjudicated. This particular year there were 12 categories only. Since I already had a hands-downs non-yeast coffee cake winner (in my booke), I figured "Why not."

352 coffee cakes were submitted. The judging panel included some of the highest profile chefs and pastry chefs in th U.S. at the time. Uh-Oh, I thought. Look - There's Alice Waters! Holy Cow. Those judges had to eat a small piece of each of those 352 coffee cakes and it took hours. Since I took the afternoon off from work, I was able to watch the entire event unfold and found it very interesting. There was one lady who came over and stood by me the entire time. She confided in me that she just knew her coffee cake would place well, as she had had the forethought to sprinkle instant coffee on top of her coffee cake (this being the "coffee" cake contest).

After about 4 hours, people and cakes started moving around. Cakes were placed here and there on different tables. Mine was the first to go and be placed on a table. "oh, dear," I told the lady beside me, "there goes my coffee cake. oh well." "No, no," she says, "You're in the money." I really didn't know what she was talking about. The table my cake as on ended up having 10 cakes on it. These were the top 10 coffee cakes. 3/4 of each cake remained, so one by one each cake was brought to the round judging table. The judges picked up the cake from the carboard round, looked at the bottom, took a piece of it between their fingers and squeezed it a bit, then kind of rolled it. Next they each took a more substantial bite than they did the first time around. I nearly fainted when told that my "German Quark Coffee Cake with Streusel and Mixed Berry Swirl" had won.

My hat's off to all who spend hundreds of hours in th needle arts (I'm still striving to make that perfect project) and/or spend countless hours in the kitchen creating wonderful comestables. You honor all women through the ages doing what you do. Let's make sure we pass this along to our children and our children's childrens. (My 38 y.o. daughter took up quilting 3 years ago. Yay!)