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World Cheese Dip Championship
The World Cheese Dip Championship (WCDC) is an annual one-day event held in Little Rock (Pulaski County) in October. The event, which debuted in 2010, celebrates cheese dip, hailed by the event’s organizers as an important food contribution from the state of Arkansas. The WCDC is open to amateur and professional cooks.
The most common form of cheese dip celebrated at the WCDC was made popular in Arkansas in 1935 by the Texan-born restauranteur Blackie Donnelly. Already the original owner of the Mexico Chiquito restaurant in Kilgore, Texas, Donnelly helped instill enthusiasm for cheese dip among Arkansan diners from the Hot Springs (Garland County) and Little Rock locations of his burgeoning southwestern-themed franchise. Although earlier cheese-based Mexican dishes such as queso chihuahua feature melted cheese as a topping for tortillas, Donnelly’s method substituted processed yellow American cheese for fresh white Mexican queso, which yielded a liquescent form of cheese that was designed to stay melted longer; paired with warm tortilla chips, the dish soon proved irresistible to many Arkansan diners. In the decades that followed, the popularity of cheese dip in Arkansas grew and it ultimately became ubiquitous throughout Mexican American restaurants in the United States.
In 2009, following the production of the short documentary film exploring the cultural history of cheese dip In Queso Fever, its director, cheese dip enthusiast Nick Rogers, was approached by the Harmony Health Clinic (HHC), a nonprofit medical and dental clinic in Little Rock, to be an event coordinator for the inaugural World Cheese Dip Championship. The HHC was designated a beneficiary of the WCDC under the nonprofit umbrella the Southern Cheese Dip Academy; the organizations began jointly operating the festival. The event quickly gained corporate sponsorship from Velveeta and Ro-Tel, whose pasteurized cheese product and canned diced tomatoes, respectively, were well represented among the cheese dips present at the first WCDC.
Through blind tastings, a panel of judges determines the winning cheese dips and assigns winning entrants the titles of Big Dipper, in both amateur and professional categories. Attendees may also vote for their own favorites, with winners designated People’s Choice Champions. The first professional winners of the WCDC were the restaurants Dizzy’s and Stoby’s, in first and second places. Past prizes have included trophies, WCDC merchandise, and monetary awards.
Shortly before the inaugural WCDC in 2010, food historian Kat Robinson speculated that it was the sheer variety of available cheese dips offered that would promise a good attendance for the event: “By having it open to everyone, we might get some really neat things out there.” Her observation proved prescient, as twenty-three different cheese dips were entered into the contest the first year, with the popular yellow variety representing only a small fraction of the dips entered. Despite numerous variations incorporating a range of novel ingredients, however, a perennial top contender seems to be the type of simple yellow cheese dip originally made by Donnelly.
For additional information:
Pettit, Emma. “Contest Adds to Cheese Dip Legend.” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 29, 2017, pp. 1B, 4B. Online at https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2017/oct/29/contest-adds-cheese-dip-legend/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
Robinson, Kat. “Cheese Dip Count Down.” Tie Dye Travels with Kat Robinson, September 28, 2010. https://www.tiedyetravels.com/2010/09/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
———. “Who Has the Best Cheese Dip?” Arkansas Times, September 24, 2011. https://arktimes.com/rock-candy/2011/09/24/who-has-the-best-cheese-dip (accessed October 10, 2024).
Rogers, Nick, director. In Queso Fever: A Movie about Cheese Dip. Vimeo. http://vimeo.com/6608438 (accessed October 10, 2024).
Turnage, Clara. “Championship One Cheesy Affair.” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 6, 2019, pp. 1B, 4B. Online at https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2019/oct/06/championship-one-cheesy-affair-20191006-1/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
Watson, Spencer. “Cheese Dip Hits the Big Time.” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 5, 2010. https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2010/oct/05/cheese-dip-hits-big-time/?print (accessed October 10, 2024).
Williams, L. Lamor. “Cheese-Dip Contest Suits Varied Tastes.” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 10, 2010. https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2010/oct/10/cheese-dip-contest-suits-varied-tastes-20101010/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
World Cheese Dip Championship. https://app.theauxilia.com/Event/cheesedip/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
World Cheese Dip Championship. Little Rock, Arkansas. https://www.littlerock.com/events/annual-festivals-events/world-cheese-dip-championship/ (accessed October 10, 2024).
William Tanner
University of Arkansas at Little Rock
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