The opportunity to sample more than a pound of local macaroni and cheese varieties has finally arrived.
After sell-out crowds at the inaugural Indianapolis festival, Return of the Mac Fest is going on the road with its first stop Sunday in Bloomington at the Monroe County Convention Center.
More than 20 local chefs will bring their versions of the classic comfort food to compete for the crowd favorite award and the coveted Golden Noodle Award.
A panel of high-profile foodies determine who will take home the award, according to the festival’s website. The judges taste each dish and make notes on the balance, appearance, texture, overall flavor and creativity.
The crowd favorite is voted on using the Yelp app during the festival. Participants will have unlimited sampling for two hours.
Bloomington-area restaurants include Nick’s English Hut, Upland Brewing Company, BuffaLouie’s at the Gables, the Tap Brewery and Craft Beer Bar, Uptown Cafe, Bloomingfoods, Mother Bear’s Pizza, Topo’s 403, Great White Smoke BBQ, King Dough, Red Frazier Bison, Big Woods Brewing, Feast, No Coast Reserve, ClusterTruck, Carson’s BBQ, Ivy Tech Culinary Program, The Kroger Bistro of Bloomington and others, according to the website.
Chef Drew Wagner from the new Bloomington kitchen of ClusterTruck said he has been preparing a special version of their popular buffalo chicken macaroni and cheese for the festival.
“We’ve got a cult following on our mac and cheese already,” vice president of marketing for ClusterTruck Travis Hall said.
It’s the most re-ordered item on their menu.
ClusterTruck chefs participated in the January festival in Indianapolis. Many chefs did crazy, creative dishes, Hall said, which made ClusterTruck chefs decide to bring what’s already on their menu to give tasters something accessible all the time.
Unlike many other food festivals, the chefs are paid for their ingredients, co-founder of the festival Josh Baker said. This encourages more creativity and a wider variety of samples. Local restaurants don’t always have the budget to spend on events, he said, and the founders wanted the participation of small, mom-and-pop restaurants.
The festival was born out of a silly idea tossed around for more than a year between Baker, owner of MOKB Presents, and R.J. Wall from Chef’s Night Off. They noticed it wasn’t something anyone had really done before and decided just to go for it.
The festival also tries to give back to the local community, Baker said. A portion of the proceeds from Sunday’s event will be donated to the City of Bloomington Animal Care and Control. Leftover food is donated to homeless shelters.
Bloomington was the first choice for the festival repeat because a lot of the people who missed out on the Indianapolis event were from the Bloomington area, Baker said.
“College students like mac and cheese,” Baker said.
The Indianapolis festival switched venues twice to find more space but still sold out. Baker said the organizers were somewhat shocked at the response to the Indianapolis festival.
The festival will continue its Midwest tour in Noblesville, Indiana, Louisville, Kentucky and a second showing in Indianapolis, with more cities to be announced.
Macaroni and cheese is one thing that unifies all different types of people, Baker said.
“It’s a very approachable food,” he said. “It’s not one of those pretentious food-like things.”
