by TM Petaccia

The Charlotte StrEATs Neighborhood Cookoff is designed to showcase Queen City’s best culinary community and the chef representing it. In the end, the city wasn’t involved at all. The towns of Belmont and Concord edged out their Charlotte counterparts — with Awo Amenumey of Eh’vivi taking the trophy to our neighbor to the north, besting chef Anthony Denning of Another Food Truck.

The Charlotte StrEATs Festival wrapped up Charlotte SHOUT Sunday with a daylong celebration of local food, beverages, and select crafts — featuring a cooking demonstration by national celebrity chef, author, and philanthropist Aarón Sánchez, as well as local cooking and cocktail demonstrations, with the Neighborhood Cook-off taking the spotlight for most of the afternoon.

Four chefs made the semifinals Sunday, after a virtual round of public voting held prior to the Festival. The semifinals were judged by chef and food personality Heidi Billotto, Johnson & Wales assistant professor Denise de Jesus, and Michael Bowling, chef and general manager of Carolina Farm Trust Distribution Center — emceed by WBTV’s QC Life host Kristen Miranda.

The first round pitted Amenumey against chef Courtney Evans of Leah & Louise, representing North Charlotte. Evans’ dish was a catfish and collard greens takoyaki, using local Southern ingredients to prepare the Japanese dish, which typically uses octopus. Amenumey, representing Concord, prepared a Carolina-style barbecue suya goat with plantain flatbread and pickled onions. “Concord is a melting pot,” she said as she prepared her dish. Plantains and goats are used in both Latin and Ghanaian cultures.”

Amenumey narrowly beat Evans after extended deliberation.

The second semifinal was essentially a fried chicken sandwich battle. Denning, representing the town of Belmont offered up his Hot Chicken Smash (hot chicken grilled cheese) with fried onion rings to go up against the spicy chicken sliders (using Lance Pep-Chee crackers) of chef Matt Moore of Vinyl, representing South End. Voting here was closer than the first round, with Denning edging Moore by 0.2 points.

Both semifinal winners received a large basket of gourmet food selections from Neighborhood Cookoff sponsor Sysco.

For the final round, Amenumey and Denning created their same dishes, but with a slight twist. A surprise secret ingredient was added: black garlic, a pungent fermented form of the bulbous plant. Denning added the secret ingredient to his breading and basil ranch dressing, while Amenumey used black garlic in her plantain flatbread and barbecue sauce.

Sánchez emceed the final round, adding insights from his vast cooking competition experience. Final round judges were former White House chef Roberto Mendoza, Kris Reid, executive director of Piedmont Culinary Guild, and UP editor Kristen Wile.

When the final votes were tallied, Sánchez announced Amenumey as the winner. “Black garlic is extremely tricky,” said Mendoza to Amenumey after the announcement. “It can easily overpower. You used just the right amount. It was perfect.”

“It feels great to win,” Amenumey says of her victory. “It feels awesome to represent Concord. It was crazy, but I’m glad I got to represent my culture, infuse where I live now into what I’ve grown up cooking, and represent my culture through a different lens.”

“The win means more validation for me and what I’m doing with Eh’vivi — to continue to push Ghanaian food into the culinary food scene around Charlotte and beyond,” she says.