Award-Winning Mac + Cheese Festival Returns to Downtown Peterborough For Third Straight Year For All of October
/There are 21 Downtown Peterborough Businesses vying for the title in the third year of the Peterborough Downtown Business Improvement Area’s (DBIA) award-winning Mac + Cheese Festival, running all of October, announced at the Venture North Building on Wednesday morning.
Three mac and cheeses were sampled at the press conference: Heartburn City, Mind Your Carrots & Peas and Lactose Overload. Photo by David Tuan BUi.
The downtown businesses offer their mac and cheese dishes for all of October for take-out or dine-in. Classic macs, adventurous macs, handheld macs and even ‘mac-it-at-home’ options are available for this year’s festival.
The winning business will receive their bragging rights for the year, a hand-crafted trophy, the title of mac-and-cheese champion and a donation to Kawartha Food Share in their name.
New businesses entering the competition include The Vine, The Food Shop, The Pasta Shop and Sam’s Place Weinery.
Anyone can vote online for their favourite mac and cheese dishes throughout the month and use a Mac Map to locate which businesses are participating.
“We were so beyond proud to be chosen as the top mac of 2022, tying with Capra Toro for the winning prize,” said Amanda da Silva, The El(P) co-owner. “Being a newer business in downtown Peterborough, we’ve had such a blast participating in these foodie festivals. The culinary competition in this city sure is steep.”
The festival website has previous winning recipes and locally curated recipes for home chefs. Recipe cards include a hearty ‘local mac’ that utilizes local ingredients from The Ptbo Food Shop and recipes from previous champions: Sam’s Place and The El (P).
“Our Mac + Cheese Festival has been incredibly successful both locally and provincially and has even gone on to inspire other BIAs in the province to adopt similar events,” said Terry Guiel, DBIA executive director. “We won an award last year for ‘special events and promotions’ at the Ontario Business Improvement Area awards conference and our team is really proud of how these cheesy shenanigans continue to inspire not only local chefs but other cities in Ontario.”
At the press conference, three mac and cheeses were sampled at the event.
Heartburn City: Pickled jalapenos, hot sauce and crushed Hot Cheetos
Mind Your Peas & Carrots: Peas, carrots and hot dog slices
Lactose Overloard (winner): Havarti, mozzarella, marbled cheddar, Tex-Mex and queso
