Only eight days are left to submit your favorite holiday-season recipes for the annual Leader Holiday Recipe Contest and a chance to win up to $300.
The contest is open to home cooks of any age from Jefferson County and Eureka. There are five categories: appetizer, soup, salad, side dish and dessert. Readers are welcome to submit a recipe in any or all the categories, up to a maximum of five entries per reader. The deadline to enter is 5 p.m. Friday, Nov. 11.
Judges will choose the top recipe in each category for a $50 cash prize. Then, those five recipes will be prepared and served at the Leader Holiday Dinner, set for Friday, Dec. 16, in the Field House at Jefferson College in Hillsboro. Diners that evening will vote for their favorite of the five dishes, and the overall winner will receive an additional $250.
Judges give extra weight to recipes that are handed down in families and have a history or a story behind them.
Recipes may be submitted by email at news@leaderpublications.biz; by mail at P.O. Box 159, Festus, 63028; or in person at 503 N. Second in Festus.
To be eligible for the contest, entries must include the following information:
■ The submitter’s full name and address.
■ A daytime telephone number.
■ Complete instructions for the recipe.
■ The category in which the recipe is submitted.
■ Any information about where the recipe came from and why it’s special.
The winning recipes and as many more as space permits will be published in a Holiday Recipe and Gift Guide special section in the Dec. 8 issue of the paper.
Since its inception in 2014, the dinner, a collaboration between the college and Leader Publications, has raised more than $15,000 for the Jefferson College Foundation. The money is typically used to send students to culinary competitions across the region.
Admission to the dinner will cost $25 or $40 for VIP tickets, which includes a pre-dinner reception. Villa Antonio is sponsoring the VIP hour, when guests will get a coupon for a few wine and beer tastings and one glass of their choice of beer or wine. To buy tickets online, go to https://bit.ly/Leader-Dinner-2022. For more information about the contest or the Holiday Dinner, call the Leader at 636-931-7560.