So I participated in a soup competition!

Last Sunday, I participated in a Soup Competition at La Citta Dell’Utopia. It’s something that I’ve always wanted to do ever since I first visited the place roughly two years ago, but I seemed to always had prior engagements until now. So this time round, I pounced at the opportunity!

By the way, La Citta Dell’Utopia is sort of community center, run by volunteers. And in my opinion, a good way to meet like minded people and pick up new skills like language, yoga, recycling, art and whatnots. I frequently go to another one called Insensinverso.

Anyway, I know I said preveiously that I wanted to make Soto Ayam, but considering that not a lot of Italians can take the spicyness that I am used to (moreoever, to find the right ingredients takes a quite a bit of money. I am cheapo frugal and don’t like to spend too much money on people I don’t know)

So a week before, I asked on facebook on what kind of Asian style soup that I could make. I got a lot of nice answers and I was really considering to make Jaz’s ABC soup. However, I found out that sweetcorn, one of the main ingredient wasn’t in season so I decided to make Chicken Soup instead. Sorry everyone! Please don’t think that I’ve taken you guys for granted.

And the day before was such a busy day, we were running around to get halal chicken and the rest of the ingredients, searching forever for parking just to make an appointment at the dentist and then rushing over to meet Alessandra and friends for the chocolate festival.

And then it was time to go home. As tired as I was, I went to prepare the soup straight away as I knew that it will take a much longer time than usual as it was a much larger batch compared to what I was used to. I think I went to bed at after midnight and I still have halfway to go before it’s finished.

But in the end, my beautiful soup! I was contemplating to not go and eat this all by myself, cause I liked it a lot! Hahaha!!!

By then, it was already past noon and Cart and I spent some time translating the recipe to Italian. Can you believe that it took half an hour! Phew!

Eventually we brought the big pot to La Citta and I met up with my friends at Insensinverso and we registered as a team. That’s Francesco registering for us.

I have to say that La Citta looks quite pretty now that it’s been restored. For the past two years, the top floor has been under renovation and now it’s used as a hostel and the entire building has been given a fresh coat of paint. The picture doesn’t do it justice. This place has to be seen in real life to see how charming it is.

They say that Garibaldi stayed in this building in some time in his life.

(You probably can’t read it in the picture above, but the team used a phrase from an annoyingly catchy song)

We had a bit of time to go before the soup event started, so Cart and I went to have a bit of lunch, then we lounged around, then we started to set up our tables and do some designs, and I popped over to see how the other tables were set up.

(By the way, Cart and I discovered a place nearby that sells super yummy fried pizza. It’s probably unhealthy, but they are so good …)

And here is my friend Giulia practising with her poi balls during her break. She looks so graceful.

Anyway, when the event started proper at 4pm, suddenly there was a whole swarm of people swooping in demanding to try the soups.

Oh gosh! It was so overwhelming!

It was hard to think straight, that I couldn’t have a proper chat with Anna, one of my friends who dropped by to give her support. All we managed to say to each other was, “Hi! How are you? Want to try some soup? Got to go, sorry!” Eek! Awkward! Haha!

Of course, we tried to cozy up with the judges so that we could get good scores! This was one of them by the way, look at how amused he looked due to the team’s antics! Hahaha!

(Hey, who’s that Cart talking to, looking so happy back there?)

I ladled up my last bit of soup in less than an hour and after that, I felt so exhausted that all I wanted to do was to just sit down. There was a lot of lively-live music going on, but “Non ce lo faccio” I really couldn’t make it and we waited for the results to be announced.

We didn’t win in the end. Shucks! I felt a little unsatisfied because of all the time that I spent and I am confident that it was tasty. Nevertheless I had a good experience anyway. If I were to do it again, I’d do a bit of changes though.

One of them being saving some soup for my team, I don’t think any one of them had a taste!

(I swear it wasn’t me that stuck the fork there in anger! My poor stickman!)

In any case, I’m glad that I finally participated in something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time. And now, that’s one thing to cross off my bucket list 🙂