The best macaroni and cheese in Bloomington was crowned Sunday at the Return of the Mac Fest.
Ivy Tech Culinary Program’s smoky bleu quack and cheese won the judge’s choice, and Feast’s aged bacon garganelli won crowd favorite.
The runners up for the judge’s choice were Upland Brewing Company and Nick’s English Hut.
Minutes after being announced the winner, the chef instructors at Ivy Tech Community College Bloomington, Allen Edwards and Jennifer Ryan, were back serving samples of their winning recipe, this time with the Golden Noodle trophy on display.
The winning recipe was made from smoked duck, elbow macaroni, spicy bleu cheese and white cheddar cream sauce.
“It’s so great to serve people in Bloomington because they’re so open minded about food,” Ryan said.
Feast chefs Erika Yochum and Bobb Easterbrook did not hear the announcement of their win, but someone quickly ran back to their table to let them know.
Their recipe was made with cheddar cheese garganelli, chicken fat breadcrumbs, kimchi hot sauce, popcorn cheese sauce, shallot and fennel. They hand-made 6,000 pieces of pasta and cured the lamb bacon for more than a month.
“Bits of things from what we loved before, and we put them all together,” Yochum said.
Yochum said it was more exciting to win the people’s choice than the judges’ choice because their goal is to make the people happy.
Those in the crowd received a red plate and a fork-spoon combo utensil and loaded the plate with as many small cups of macaroni and cheese samples they could balance. The crowd favorite award was decided using votes tallied on the Yelp app. The tasters uploaded a picture of their favorite variety of macaroni and cheese to act as their vote.
A group of five friends found a spot on the wall and were sharing five plates of samples between them.
“It’s like a dream come true,” said Kierstin Thummel, Bloomington local and recent IU grad.
IU senior Jennie Sutor, sitting next to Thummel, said her favorite was split between Uptown Café’s menu recipe and the distinct Ivy Tech duck recipe.
“That threw me through a loop,” she said of the duck addition.
Edwards said turning people on to new food is why they do what they do. He said his favorite moment was a mother telling her teenage son the recipe had duck in it and him responding he wanted to try something new.
The duck was donated from Maple Leaf Farms, a duck farm in northern Indiana.
The duck had mixed responses in the crowd. Some people made faces of disapproval, but others were excited about the ingredient, he said.
“If you love duck, we love you,” Edwards said.
The chefs said they were extremely honored to have the Golden Noodle trophy and would consider building a special case at Ivy Tech just to display it.
The judges who awarded them the Golden Noodle award were hand-picked local “foodies” Marci Creps, features editor at the Herald-Times; Jolene Ketzenberger, editor at eatdrinkindy.com and host of Eat Drink Indy Radio on WFYI; community manager at Yelp Indy Brittany Smith; and Sam Brown, Indianapolis American Culinary Federation president. They sat together at a table littered with small samples of each macaroni and cheese from the 15 competitors. They deliberated with each other and filled out a scorecard ranking balance, appearance, texture, overall flavor and creativity.
“We are totally full,” Smith said.
Smith was also a judge at the Indianapolis festival, which sold-out. The Bloomington festival was more intimate, she said.
The next stops for the festival are Noblesville, Indiana; Louisville, Kentucky; and a second round in Indianapolis.
Dean Crane drove from Columbus, Indiana, with a friend for the Bloomington leg of the festival.
“Worth the drive because it’s mac and cheese,” he said. “How can you say no?”
