The World Championship Gumbo Cook Off is an institution in Acadiana. This year, the Greater Iberia Chamber of Commerce will be celebrating the 32nd anniversary of this event held each year on the second weekend in October.

The event, which began with less than a dozen teams cooking out of the back of their pickup trucks, still takes place in downtown New Iberia on historic Main Street, the first Main Street in Louisiana to be awarded the coveted Great American Main Street Award.

The heart of the event is located in Bouligny Plaza, named for Sir Francis Bouligny who founded and named New Iberia.

The World Championship Gumbo cookoff is a free, non-ticketed event to attend and enjoy free music from a variety of bands over the two-day event.

No ice chests are allowed and only tickets needed are for food and drinks.

This event benefits the Greater Iberia Chamber of Commerce. It started as a way to pay off the mortgage on the Chamber office and continues today to support the operations of the Chamber. This allows the chamber to keep

memberships at a fee that is affordable to its members and helps the chamber provide the education, training and networking opportunities throughout the year.

Presenting Sponsor is Savoie’s Sausage and Food Products. As of June 13, other confirmed sponsors are Super1Foods, Musson Patout Automotive, Iberia Medical Center, Louisiana Direct Seafood, and Cleco.

For more information on how to become a sponsor contact Thomas Falgout, President/CEO of the Chamber at thomas@iberiachamber.org or call 337-364-1836.

SUNDAY

The flagship activity of the weekend is the “Battle of the Rouxs” held on Sunday. About 80 teams participate, making gumbo from the roux up.

Teams begin cooking around 6 a.m. Each booth entry must make at least 60 quarts of gumbo. There is an amateur division in which participants may make either seafood, chicken and sausage, or mélange gumbo and a professional division which competes in either the seafood or non-seafood category.

Serving to the general population begins at 11 a.m.

While the crowd enjoys the best gumbo in the world, approximately 75 judges from a cross-section of the local community and professionals from the food and beverage industry rate the gumbos based on taste, aroma, appearance, balance of flavor in the roux, etc.

Winners are announced around 3:30 p.m.

Just for fun, Sunday’s event also includes booth competitions for best decorations, theme, skit performance, etc. The booth theme is “Board Games” such as Monopoly, Sorry, CandyLand, etc.

SATURDAY

Saturday’s activities include a 5K run hosted by our local young professionals’ organizations, live music from lunch time until 7:30 p.m. Booth participants have the option of cooking on Saturday.

Booths will cook on Saturday; they may cook anything but gumbo. A sampling of Saturday’s fare will include dishes such as —jambalaya, bread pudding, jalapeno chicken on a stick, boudin, cracklins, fried shrimp, shrimp stew, corn and crab bisque, alligator sliders, etc.

Additionally, within the teams participating in the actual gumbo cook off, quite a few of them participate in the “Meanest Beans” competition, a red beans cookoff on Saturday.

Several years ago, in an effort to help perpetuate and preserve our unique Cajun/Creole culture, we added a youth competition component to the event. Youth teams are between the ages of 9 and 17.

Each youth team has a designated adult mentor who oversees the safety of the teams. Youth teams must prepare at least five gallons of gumbo and are allowed to use jar or precooked roux. They begin cooking at noon on Saturday and are judged around 3 p.m.

A cooking demonstration and tasting, which was very well received, was added to the Saturday afternoon festivities. The activity will be repeated this year and will again include drink pairings, an appetizer, a gumbo, and a fabulous dessert. This event is sponsored by Louisiana Direct Seafood.

Cooking teams looking to cook need to contact Kelly Roark, VP of Operations at the Chamber by email kelly@iberiachamber.org or phone 337-364-1836.