The Soup Festival Added A New Award Category Just For Her
The Nashville Slow Sip Soup Fest has handed out trophies for Best Taste, Best Presentation, and Best Original Recipe since 1998. After Danielle’s debut appearance, they quietly added a fourth category called ‘Overall Outstanding Contribution to the Event.’ The award has been given out exactly once. Her tomato-roasted pepper blend was called ‘deeply satisfying’ by the panel, and the event photographer noted he had used up three memory cards, which was unusual given that he was only supposed to be covering the soup.
Her Judges’ Feedback Forms Were Almost Entirely Off Topic
Most soup competition feedback forms have space for comments about flavor, consistency, aroma, and aftertaste. At the East Coast Ladle Championship, contestants receive two pages of written feedback from the judging panel. When Renée collected hers, she found that only one of the five judges had addressed the soup. The other four had filled the entire page with commentary that the event director described as ‘enthusiastic but outside the scope of the evaluation criteria.’ She still won first place.
The Volunteer Judges For Her Category Were Oversubscribed By 300 Percent
Judging volunteer spots for regional soup competitions rarely fill up before the registration deadline. For the year Anika entered the Phoenix Desert Heat Soup Challenge, the volunteer judge application for her specific category — lamb and lentil — received more applications than the rest of the event combined. The organizers had to implement a lottery system. Eleven of the twelve rejected applicants showed up anyway and stood near the tasting table. Her soup won. The crowd applauded for four minutes.
