On Saturday, Sept. 12, I traded my usual role as editor of The San Luis Valley Beat for an Instant Pot and a ladle and entered the SLV Battle of the Bowls chili cook-off in Alamosa.

It was my first chili cook-off, and I went into it with pretty modest expectations. I wasn’t really thinking about winning. I wanted to take part, enjoy the afternoon, meet some people and see what they thought of my chili.

Battle of the Bowls was about more than chili, too. The event was held as a fundraiser benefiting the Care Camps Foundation, which helps give children with cancer and their families opportunities to experience specialized oncology camps.

A few hours after arriving, I found myself holding a first-place finish — and a $500 prize — for a pot of chili I had named Ranch Hand’s Red.

A Little San Luis Valley in the Pot

There was one thing about Ranch Hand’s Red that I deliberately didn’t tell people before they tasted it.

The chili was made with locally raised San Luis Valley yak.

I spent years working as a ranch hand at a yak ranch here in the Valley before retiring, so when I decided to enter the cook-off, using yak seemed like a natural choice.

But I also know that not everyone is familiar with yak meat. Tell someone what they’re about to eat before they try it and, sometimes, they’ve already decided whether they’re going to like it.

So I didn’t advertise it.

I simply called it Ranch Hand’s Red and let people judge what was in the bowl rather than what they thought about the name of the meat.

Apparently, they liked what was in the bowl.

Giving Credit Where It’s Due

I also want to be clear about something: I didn’t invent the chili recipe.

Ranch Hand’s Red started with Jeffrey Eisner’s Instant Pot Best Blue Ribbon Chili from Pressure Luck Cooking.

I made just two basic ingredient changes.

Instead of the ground beef called for in the original recipe, I used ground yak. And instead of kidney beans, I used pinto beans, which I’ve always preferred in chili.

Otherwise, I stayed remarkably close to the original recipe.

There is a bit of humor in entering something called Best Blue Ribbon Chili in my first chili cook-off and then actually winning.

Making It the Day Before

I also followed one piece of advice from the recipe that may have helped.

Jeffrey recommends making the chili ahead of time and letting the flavors develop before reheating it.

So I made my competition batch on Friday.

Because I needed enough for the cook-off, I doubled the recipe in my 8-quart Instant Pot. With that much chili in the pot, I added the drained and rinsed pinto beans after pressure cooking rather than putting them in before pressure cooking.

The chili was cooled and refrigerated overnight, then reheated Saturday morning before we left for the event.

My wife isn’t particularly fond of spicy food, so she became my unofficial heat tester. Her verdict was that it wasn’t too spicy, although it left a little lingering warmth after you ate it.

That was exactly what I was hoping for.

The flavor was where I wanted it. The consistency was where I wanted it. At that point, I decided to quit tinkering with it.

Sometimes knowing when to leave something alone may be as important as knowing what to put into it.

Then Came the Judging

We packed everything up and headed to Battle of the Bowls.

My wife came along and took pictures while I got to experience a San Luis Valley event from a completely different perspective than I’m accustomed to as editor of The Beat.

Instead of asking questions and taking notes, I was standing behind a pot of chili waiting to see what people thought.

And remember — they still didn’t know it was yak.

People tasted the different entries and made their choices.

Then the results were announced.

For a first-time chili cook-off contestant who had gone there simply hoping to participate and have a good afternoon, that was quite a surprise.

The $500 Went Back to Care Camps

First place came with a $500 cash prize.

But Battle of the Bowls wasn’t simply about finding the best chili. The afternoon was raising money for the Care Camps Foundation and the work it does for children with cancer and their families.

After receiving the prize, I decided to give the entire $500 back to the cause.

I hadn’t entered expecting to win anything. By that point, I already had far more than I expected when we arrived.

I had a first-place finish at my first chili cook-off, a good afternoon with some good people, plenty of memories and, of course, another San Luis Valley story to tell.

The $500 could do more good going back to the reason everyone had gathered there in the first place.

That was plenty for me.

Want to Try Ranch Hand’s Red?

Since people seemed to enjoy the chili, I figured some readers might want to know how to make it.

But I’m certainly not going to claim someone else’s recipe as my own.

Ranch Hand’s Red is my San Luis Valley variation of Jeffrey Eisner’s Instant Pot Best Blue Ribbon Chili from Pressure Luck Cooking.

I made two ingredient substitutions:

• Ground yak instead of ground beef
• Pinto beans instead of kidney beans

For the cook-off I doubled the recipe. Because I was making such a large batch in my 8-quart Instant Pot, I added the drained and rinsed pinto beans after pressure cooking.

Otherwise, I followed Jeffrey’s recipe.

You can find the original ingredient amounts, complete directions and Jeffrey’s cooking tips here:

And if you can’t get San Luis Valley yak, simply make it with the ground beef called for in the original recipe.

After Saturday’s results, I’m certainly not going to argue with a recipe that has Blue Ribbon right there in the name.

Sometimes You Become Part of the Story

One of the reasons I started The San Luis Valley Beat was to share the people, places, businesses, events and little stories that make this Valley such an interesting place to call home.

Most of the time, I’m standing on the outside telling those stories.

This weekend, I got to be part of one.

I went to my first chili cook-off hoping people might enjoy what I made.

I came home with a first-place finish — and the satisfaction of knowing the prize money was going right back to help the cause the cook-off was there to support.