TodayCooking up black bean humor
Spill the Beans soup cooks add a dash of humor for Sept. 27 event
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Article RatingDoug Rowe’s Aunt Sue laughed when her nephew told her he was cooking up black bean soup for Shippensburg’s Sept. 27 Spill the Beans contest.
Dawn Sites struggles to stifle her laughter when sharing her black bean-making skills.
The good humor is appropriate for the outdoor party that marks autumn’s arrival in Shippensburg.
Rowe and Sites are newcomers to the Spill the Beans soup kitchen.
“My Aunt Sue laughed, because she knows I don’t cook,” says Rowe, who captains the Members 1st credit union’s team. “My strategy is to get a lot of tips from her. She makes great chili and other soups.”
While Aunt Sue is Rowe’s ace-in-the hole, he’s still looking for a fourth team member to round out the Members 1st entry — hopefully someone “who knows what they’re doing.”
Sites can’t stop laughing because there’s so much to know about black beans and she knows so little of it, despite her position as the Gannon Associates team.
She says her team members make soup at home and bringing it to the office to sample. Sites says their goal is to compare the products, incorporate the best flavors and come up with a tasty stew.
Wells says she simmered a flavorful batch of soup in her first try.
“My soup went really well, except I used white chicken and made a white broth,” Sites says. “I didn’t know black beans bleed, so by the time it got to the office the chicken was all purple. I told everyone it was really good, but to close their eyes when they ate it.”
Spill the Beans began in 2005. Duaine Collier, one of the event founders, saw the friendly soup-making competition as a way to raise money for charity and help draw Shippensburg University students and local residents closer together.
Collier says he thinks that effort is working. Soup by university groups is a staple every year. Emily Danielson, SU Director of Greek Affairs, says there are a handful of student soup teams again this year.
What has definitely come out of Spill the Beans is a chance to follow heavenly aromas to a variety of pots filled with diverse and tasty concoctions.
Trudy Collier says the Spill the Beans group continues to refine the event in an effort to fuel public response.
She admits the charitable cook-off has not exploded with growth but clings to the fact that Spill the Beans is still in its infancy.
“We’re still trying to find out what makes it go,” she says.
Wine and beer have been dropped as menu items, and a Little Miss Bean Queen contest looks like it’s on the ropes this year because of a shortage of entries.
Davis says if there’s an unexpected late rush of Little Miss candidates, the event could be revived.
