REGISTER TODAY FOR THE FIRST AREA INTERNATIONAL CHILI SOCIETY COOKOFF IN BLUFFTON, SC

Bluffton, SC, Jan­u­ary 24, 2012–Mark your cal­en­dar and reg­is­ter TODAY to par­tic­i­pate in the First Annual RED APRON CHILI COOKOFF, the first sanc­tioned chili cookoff to be held in Hilton Head/Bluffton SC on Sat­ur­day, Feb­ru­ary 25.  This first annual event will be held at Tanger 2 Out­let Cen­ter Hilton Head.

The RED APRON CHILI COOKOFF will ben­e­fit Bluffton Self Help, Inc. a United Way Agency and is named to rep­re­sent the Bluffton Self Help, Inc red apron logo.  This first year event has open­ings for more than 20 cooks in each of the four plus “People’s Choice” where the spec­ta­tors pick a win­ner.  The sanc­tioned cat­e­gories are The Com­pet­i­tive Red, The Chili Verde, Salsa and the Home­style Chili Cookoff.

The COMPETITIVE RED sanc­tioned chili cookoff fol­lows the rules of the ICS and is defined as any kind of meat or com­bi­na­tion of meats, cooked with red chili pep­pers, var­i­ous spices and other ingre­di­ents, with the excep­tion of BEANS and PASTA which are STRICTLY FORBIDDEN.

The CHILI VERDE sanc­tioned chili cookoff fol­lows the rules of the ICS and is defined as any kind of meat or com­bi­na­tion of meats, cooked with green chili pep­pers, var­i­ous spices and other ingre­di­ents, with the excep­tion of BEANS and PASTA which are STRICTLY FORBIDDEN.

In the SALSA cat­e­gory the salsa must be home­made by the con­tes­tant whose name with ICS num­ber appears on the Con­tes­tant appli­ca­tion.  It may be brought to the site that day or it may be pre­pared at the Cookoff.

The HOMESTYLE Chili Cookoff (THE NEW CATEGORY) is defined as the cook’s favorite com­bi­na­tion of ingre­di­ents result­ing in a dish sea­soned with chili pep­pers and spices.  There is no restric­tion or require­ments as to the ingre­di­ents, but the entry must be home­made and have chili pep­per flavor.

All sanc­tioned events fea­ture cook­ing on site while spec­ta­tors watch and each cook must make 32 ounces of chili for judg­ing.  Spec­ta­tors will have the oppor­tu­nity to taste the “People’s Choice” entries, pre­pared on site or brought to the cookoff, while the cooks pre­pare their offi­cial entries for the four dif­fer­ent cat­e­gories.  Cooks par­tic­i­pat­ing in the four cat­e­gories have the option to bring an extra pot of chili with beans to also enter the “People’s Choice” unsanc­tioned com­pe­ti­tion.  Judges will be selected from local celebrity chefs and personalities.

Cooks inter­ested in enter­ing only the “People’s Choice” cat­e­gory and not the sanc­tioned cat­e­gories (Red Tra­di­tional, Chili Verde, Salsa and Home­style) can do so.  The “People’s Choice” cat­e­gory will be voted on by the spec­ta­tors and fea­tures local restau­rants.  For more infor­ma­tion on this cat­e­gory, con­tact Lili Cole­man at Bluffton Self Help.

The four sanc­tioned cat­e­gories, sanc­tioned by the Inter­na­tional Chili Soci­ety (ICS) fol­low all the rules and reg­u­la­tions set by ICS and cooks (both ama­teur and pro­fes­sional) must be mem­bers or join the Chili Soci­ety prior to the cookoff.  The ICS is the offi­cial orga­ni­za­tion that sanc­tions chili cookoffs. These events are world­wide and ben­e­fit char­i­ties or non­profit orga­ni­za­tions. All win­ners of ICS sanc­tioned cookoffs qual­ify to com­pete for cash prizes and awards at the World’s Cham­pi­onship Chili Cookoff. The ICS is one of the largest food contests/festival orga­ni­za­tions in the world. Their sole pur­pose is to pro­mote, develop and improve the prepa­ra­tion and appre­ci­a­tion of true chili and to deter­mine each year the World’s Cham­pion Chili through offi­cially sanc­tioned and reg­u­lated com­pet­i­tive cookoffs.

The cooks in all the cat­e­gories are pro­vided space to cook and are required to sup­ply their own tent and cook­ing equip­ment includ­ing a one-pound propane stove, plus fol­low all the rules and reg­u­la­tions out­lined by ICS.  There is no access to elec­tric­ity on the cook­ing sites and a lim­ited water supply.

The win­ner of the Com­pet­i­tive Red is guar­an­teed a spot in the South Car­olina Chili Cham­pi­onship to be held in Bel­ton, SC in April and if less than 20 cooks par­tic­i­pate, the Last Chance Chili Cookoff in 2012.  If more than 20 cooks enter the com­pe­ti­tion, the win­ner is eli­gi­ble to com­pete in the World’s Cham­pi­onship Chili Cookoff.  The World’s Cham­pi­onship Chili Cookoff is to be held on Magic Island in Charleston, West Vir­ginia on Octo­ber 5–7, 2012.

If ten or more cooks par­tic­i­pate in the Chili Verde and Salsa cat­e­gories, the win­ner pro­gresses on to the World’s Cham­pi­onship Chili Cookoff as well. Ten or more in the Home­style cat­e­gory will qual­ify the win­ner to com­pete in the ICS World’s Cham­pi­onship Home­style Chili Cookoff.

The offi­cial hotel for this event is the Hilton Gar­den Inn located off High­way 278 in Bluffton across from the Tanger II out­lets.  A spe­cial rate has been set for this event.

The cost to enter the cookoff is $35 per cook­ing team per cat­e­gory, plus any ICS mem­ber­ship fees.

Spon­sors to date include Bluffton Today and Island Packet.  Addi­tional spon­sor­ships are available.

For more infor­ma­tion about the cookoff and to par­tic­i­pate con­tact Lili Cole­man at Bluffton Self Help, Inc., on line at lili@blufftonselfhelp.org or call Bluffton Self Help at 843–757-8000.  Reg­is­tra­tion will also be avail­able at Blufftonselfhelp.org.

BLUFFTON SELF HELP, INC.

Bluffton Self Help, Inc. is a non­profit orga­ni­za­tion in Bluffton, SC and was founded in 1987.  The mis­sion of the orga­ni­za­tion is to help those indi­vid­u­als in the greater Bluffton area who are in need of short-term, doc­u­mented finan­cial assis­tance and to also pro­vide them with the most fun­da­men­tal needs, such as FREE food and cloth­ing, while urg­ing them to become more self-reliant.  In the past year the agency has assisted over 22,000 clients.

UNITED WAY OF THE LOWCOUNTRY

United Way of the Low­coun­try cam­paign con­tri­bu­tions fund 32 part­ner agen­cies and 42 pro­grams in Beau­fort and Jasper coun­ties. Those part­ner agen­cies focus on one or more of United Way’s pri­or­i­ties to achieve bet­ter HEALTH, EDUCATION, SHELTER, NUTRITION and INCOME in Beau­fort and Jasper counties. ###

It’s been a year of excit­ing firsts at Bluffton Self Help.

The group bought a new build­ing soon after hir­ing exec­u­tive direc­tor Lili Coleman.

Founder Ida Mar­tin, who launched the orga­ni­za­tion from her garage in 1987, received a Pres­i­den­tial Cit­i­zens Medal — and a hug — from Pres­i­dent Barack Obama.

But some things haven’t changed since the non­profit agency relo­cated this month to Sheri­dan Park, in a space six times the size of its for­mer headquarters.

Bluffton Self Help is on pace to break records for the sec­ond con­sec­u­tive year for the num­ber of peo­ple it pro­vides with food, cloth­ing and finan­cial assistance.

The largest increase in need has been gro­ceries, with 29 per­cent more peo­ple receiv­ing food from Jan­u­ary through Octo­ber com­pared to the same time last year, for a total of 11,056 peo­ple, accord­ing to board pres­i­dent Peter Bromley.

The demand has been so great that the group now dis­trib­utes food twice on Wednes­days — once in the morn­ings, as it tra­di­tion­ally has, and again from 4 to 6 p.m. That’s in addi­tion to its other reg­u­lar food days on Tues­day and Thurs­day morn­ings. More than 150 peo­ple might ask for the food deliv­ered by Sec­ond Help­ings on a typ­i­cal day.

“We dis­cov­ered some work­ers couldn’t stand in line in the morn­ings, but they still needed to put food on the table,” Cole­man said of adding the Wednes­day after­noon slot.

The need for emer­gency finan­cial assis­tance increased by 10 per­cent, to 793 peo­ple, for the first 10 months of the year over last year. About 6,244 peo­ple have received cloth­ing from the orga­ni­za­tion, an increase of 16 per­cent from the same time last year, Brom­ley said.

“There were some con­cerns when we moved to a new loca­tion that peo­ple might have a hard time find­ing us,” Brom­ley said. “We closed our doors in the old build­ing on a Fri­day, opened up in a new build­ing on a Mon­day and haven’t skipped a beat.”

The group plans to launch projects in the new build­ing aimed at mak­ing peo­ple who need its help more self-reliant. Cole­man said Bluffton Self Help is in talks with The Deep Well Project — a Hilton Head Island-based, non­profit social ser­vices agency — to offer classes and pro­grams rang­ing from nutri­tion to using coupons.

Cole­man also is an expert at help­ing clients apply for state ben­e­fits, Brom­ley said.

The orga­ni­za­tion has needs of its own. It is still pay­ing off the new build­ing, which was pur­chased with money from grants, foun­da­tions and a cap­i­tal cam­paign drive. It needs to raise another $170,000 to pay off ren­o­va­tions and begin a util­ity endow­ment, Brom­ley said.

Its great­est need is for vol­un­teers, espe­cially as it takes on a toy drive for chil­dren 17 and under in Beau­fort, Jasper and Hamp­ton coun­ties, Cole­man said.

Pro­tect­ing your iden­tity… by part­ner­ing with com­pa­nies like Shre­dex and Savan­nah Shred­ding to destroy, lit­er­ally, tons of your con­fi­den­tial doc­u­ments … so they don’t fall into the wrong hands…

ERASING your per­sonal infor­ma­tion from HUNDREDS OF USED COMPUTERS FOR REDISTRIBUTION by Goodwill…

WSAV, Shre­dex, Savan­nah Shred­ding, Chatham County, Bluffton Self-Help and Good­will are part­ner­ing to help pro­tect you from iden­tity theft by pro­vid­ing on-site shred­ders for sen­si­tive doc­u­ments. All paper shred­ded will be recy­cled. We will also be col­lect­ing elec­tron­ics. The shred­ding is a one day event.

We’ll also be col­lect­ing dona­tions for Hol­i­day Hope to make sure needy chil­dren in our area have toys for Christmas!!

Data Destruction/Recycling Event – Bluffton, SC

When: Sat 11/12/2011
Where: Bluffton Self-Help (new loca­tion)
3900 Sheri­dan Park Cir­cle
Bluffton, SC
Just off HWY 278 in Bluffton
Time: 9a-2p

Details:  Savan­nah Shred­ding will destroy all doc­u­ments and Good­will will take com­put­ers, electronics.

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WASHINGTON — She was dressed in her red suit. She had a full night’s sleep and a hearty break­fast. She had a calm dis­po­si­tion mask­ing a case of nerves.

The only thing Bluffton res­i­dent Ida Mar­tin didn’t have yet Thurs­day was her hug and the famous medal to go with it.

Even­tu­ally, the moment came. Her name was called. She walked slowly to the podium.

Pres­i­dent Barack Obama put his arm around her, just as she hoped he would.

A mil­i­tary aide read a state­ment out­lin­ing her accomplishments:

“When Ida Mar­tin real­ized the needs of work­ing fam­i­lies and senior cit­i­zens in her com­mu­nity were not being met, she took mat­ters into her own hands.”

And then she got the medal.

The founder of the non­profit Bluffton Self Help was one of 13 recip­i­ents cho­sen from 6,000 nom­i­nees from around the coun­try who have demon­strated exem­plary ser­vice to their coun­try or fel­low citizens.

Obama said the recip­i­ents of the Pres­i­den­tial Cit­i­zens Medal — the nation’s second-highest civil­ian honor — exem­pli­fied the story of the good Samar­i­tan. He cited the Rev. Mar­tin Luther King Jr.‘s last speech, in which King said the good Samar­i­tan would stop to help a man lying injured on the road, ask­ing him­self, “If I do not stop to help this man, what will hap­pen to him?”

“The 13 Amer­i­cans that we honor today have all faced in their own ways the moment that Dr. King described — that good Samar­i­tan moment when you see a neigh­bor in need and you have to ask your­self the ques­tion,” Obama said. “They could have made excuses for doing noth­ing. Instead, they chose to help.”

Martin’s orga­ni­za­tion aids peo­ple who need clothes, food or other assis­tance. She still helps out at Bluffton Self Help and sits on its board.

She said she nat­u­rally feels com­pelled to help those in need in her com­mu­nity. She was also excited about her trip to Wash­ing­ton, not­ing she planned to hug Obama, even if it broke pres­i­den­tial protocol.

Ear­lier that morn­ing before the cer­e­mony some­one com­mented on her calm demeanor.

“I’m as ner­vous as I can be,” she replied.

But she didn’t show any sign of it as she approached Obama on a stage in the East Room to accept the medal. And no pro­to­col was breached — Obama placed his arm around her shoulder.

“I’m thrilled about this day,” Mar­tin said when it was all over.

She said she has loved Obama since the first day he announced his cam­paign for presidency.

“I told my hus­band, ‘He is going to make it,’ ” she said. “He said, ‘Not in your time, maybe in your children’s time, but you will never have a black pres­i­dent.’ I said, ‘Oh yeah, it’s time. I can just see him walk­ing down. He’s the one.’ ”

On Thurs­day evening Mar­tin vis­ited the new King memo­r­ial on the National Mall and was sched­uled to return home today.

She plans to put her medal on promi­nent dis­play in her house. She has already been asked to show off her prize at Hard­eeville Ele­men­tary School, where her 8-year-old great-grandson, Belize, is a student.

“I want the world to know,” Mar­tin said.

SHFWire reporter Ari­ana Stone can be reached at stonea@shns.com or 202−326−9865.

Read more: http://www.islandpacket.com/2011/10/20/1835527/martin-gets-medal-and-hug-from.html#ixzz1bTkDu8ls

See the story and more pictures.…

From: The Island Packet

Ida Mar­tin has been prac­tic­ing her strut.

She demon­strated the walk Tues­day in her home in Bluffton. She’s going to stand up straight and walk with con­fi­dence and flair. Then she’s going to wait patiently for the pres­i­dent of the United States to extend his hand to her.

She’ll take it. And then, she’ll hug Barack Obama.

“I’m not going to ask for per­mis­sion because he might say no,” Mar­tin said.

The founder of Bluffton Self Help will meet Obama on Thurs­day when she accepts the Pres­i­den­tial Cit­i­zens Medal for her vol­un­teer work.

The award is given to Amer­i­cans who have “per­formed exem­plary deeds of ser­vice for their coun­try or fel­low cit­i­zens,” accord­ing to the White House website.

Mar­tin, 84, will join 12 other award recip­i­ents for a pri­vate cer­e­mony at the White House. The award is one of the high­est civil­ian hon­ors in the country.

Prac­tic­ing her walk is only one of sev­eral details that have been buzzing around Martin’s mind since she found out she won the award.

On Mon­day, she picked out the per­fect suit for the occa­sion — red with an ani­mal print blouse — at Don­caster. The store called and asked to donate the out­fit after news broke that she had won. She’s laid the suit on a chair in her home and can’t stop admir­ing it.

She’s picked the five guests to attend the cer­e­mony with her: Lili Cole­man, the exec­u­tive direc­tor of Bluffton Self Help; her daugh­ter Con­stance Atkins; her grand­daugh­ter Mike­sha Mid­dle­brook; her grand­daugh­ter Letisha Mar­tin; and her great-grandson Belize Kosoko.

The travel details have been smoothed out. She’ll arrive in Wash­ing­ton tonight and stay at the Wash­ing­ton Plaza Hotel. She’s not too wor­ried about being able to sleep the night before her big day.

Cole­man assured Mar­tin she has packed two Bluffton Self Help aprons to give as gifts to the Oba­mas. The bright red aprons have been embroi­dered with “pres­i­dent” and “first lady.”

Now, Mar­tin just has to remem­ber to pack her pearl ear­rings. She plans to wear them as a nod to first lady Michelle Obama, who is fre­quently pho­tographed in pearls.

As the day nears and more details fall into place, Mar­tin and those around her get more excited. Mar­tin said her friends and com­mu­nity mem­bers have con­grat­u­lated her all week. Many have asked to see the medal when she returns; she’s sched­uled to speak to some local schools about the experience.

“The adven­ture is really start­ing to unfold,” said Cole­man, who nom­i­nated Mar­tin for the award.

But for Mar­tin, who started the non­profit Bluffton Self Help in her garage in 1987 to give emer­gency assis­tance to those in need, it still doesn’t seem real.

“I don’t think it will hit me until I get there,” she said. “It’s like I’m in a dream.”

Fol­low reporter Rachel Heaton at twitter.com/HomeroomBft.

Related con­tent:

Bluffton Self Help founder wins Pres­i­den­tial Cit­i­zens Medal; Oct. 12, 2011

The Pres­i­den­tial Cit­i­zens Medal

Years after ‘retire­ment,’ Mar­tin still lend­ing hand to Bluffton com­mu­nity; Dec. 24, 2010

As some­one who sub­mit­ted a nom­i­na­tion for the 2011 Cit­i­zens Medal, we wanted you to be among the first to know that Pres­i­dent Obama has selected 13 recip­i­ents for this year’s award. The Cit­i­zens Medal is con­sid­ered our nation’s sec­ond high­est civil­ian honor, and is awarded to cit­i­zens who have per­formed exem­plary deeds of ser­vice for their coun­try or their fel­low cit­i­zens. Con­tinue Reading…

BLUFFTON, S.C. —

Infor­ma­tion from: The Beau­fort Gazette, http://www.beaufortgazette.com

Posted: Oct 14, 2011 3:54 PM EDT Updated: Oct 14, 2011 6:18 PM EDT

Ida Mar­tin has a very impor­tant question.