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Indiana grown products highlighted in Colts Best Tailgate Recipe Contest

The 2019 Colts Best Tailgate Recipe contest highlighted the delicious foods produced by farmers across the state. The contest is presented by Indiana Corn Marketing Council and the Indiana Soybean Alliance.

Dan Cole, of Madison, Indiana, won this year’s contest with his recipe “Uncle Dan’s Schnackburgers with spicy fried corn.”

“Both are family recipes,” he says. “Times were tough, and my brother Sam would make burgers and put eggs and crackers and other things in them to stretch the recipe and feed more people. I took that recipe and ran with it and made it what they are today with fresh bacon and mushrooms.”

The recipe for the fried corn was inspired by his grandmother

“My grandmother would make fried corn a lot,” he says. “So, I had southern Indiana-grown sweet corn and fried it with jalapeno, bell pepper, red onion, and bacon grease. My grandmother used to use butter, but I like the pork fat aspect of it.”

Kyle Etheridge of Fort Wayne received runner-up with his recipe for Heartland Chili.

“It’s called heartland chili because a lot of the ingredients are grown right here in Indiana,” he says. “I used an 80/20 black Angus beef raised here in Indiana and I tried to use a lot of red gold products. I also made a sweet corn salsa to incorporate some Hoosier elements and of course the secret element is a Sun King Octoberfest from right here in Indianapolis.”

Thousands of football fans, Sunday chefs and Hoosier farmers submitted recipes to the Colts in recent months. The recipes by Cole and Etheridge were included in the Colts Tailgate Recipe Cookbooklet.

Indiana Corn Marketing Council board members Jeff Gormong and J.R. Roesner led a panel of judges who reviewed the recipes for presentation, the use of Indiana-grown products, food quality, taste, and creativity.

The cookbooklet also features recipes from Indiana Soybean Alliance board members David Rodibaugh, Denise Scarborough, Anngie Steinbarger and ICMC board members David Ring, and Kelly Whiteman Snipes.