Cooking is a specialty for mother-daughter duo Julie Bote and Carrie Sanders.

“We always love cooking,” Bote said. “When my girls were little and they were homeschooled, if I didn’t feel well or something, my daughters could whip up a roast and have supper ready. They always really enjoyed doing that.”

On Aug. 21, Bote and Sanders got to demonstrate their cooking talents at the First Annual Old Threshers Show Dutch Oven cooking contest at the Montgomery County Fairgrounds. After spending three hours cooking country pork ribs, buttermilk zucchini cornbread and bourbon peach scratch cake, the duo – which was known as All Good Things – walked out of the fairgrounds with four first-place finishes.

“I was shocked,” said Sanders, a former Wellsville resident who now lives in Bolivar. “I didn’t think that we were going to win.”

Bote and Sanders won first prize in the entree, bread and dessert divisions and shared the first-place award in sportsmanship with the Bextermillers, who got second in bread and dessert. They won a grand total of $200. Participants earn $50 for first place in each category.

“It’s just a thrill,” said Bote, who lives in New Florence and owns a welding business. “Most of all, just being able to cook with my daughter is a fond memory for us. It’s something that’s been important in our family. We cooked together during all of our holidays. It’s special.”

Three other teams competed in the contest. After judging was completed, numerous people got to enjoy a sample of the food items that also included beef stroganoff, enchilada pie, bacon cheese cornbread, pineapple upside down cake and zucchini cake.

Pat Korman, the coordinator of the contest, said she enjoyed the food.

“It’s delicious,” Korman said.

Korman decided to have a Dutch oven cooking contest this year after demonstrating at the Old Threshers Show for over 10 years.

“I thought this would be interesting,” Korman said. “I always wanted to go to one to see how it works, but the opportunity never came up because they’re usually out of state in Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. There were some in Arkansas and maybe Tennessee, but nothing really close. Since my arthritis has been working on me, it’s hard for me to ramrod about 6 or 8 kids and do all of this Dutch oven stuff. So I decided if I can do a contest, maybe I won't have to do the cooking. Let them do it.”

Korman said the Dutch oven is an important part of American history. Threshing crews were fed many meals out in the field from Dutch ovens. Also, Paul Revere is credited for designing the lids and adding the legs to the pots.

“It was very important during the Civil War and the pioneers coming west,” Korman said. “The last thing they would throw out of their covered wagon would be the Dutch oven. It has been handed down in wills on who would get the Dutch oven. Lewis and Clark took it on their trip to the Louisiana Purchase.”

Sanders said she hopes more teams will participate in the contest next year.

“I talked to so many people who said, “I have Dutch ovens. I want to do it. I was inspired,’” she said. “I’m glad that we inspired some people to come back. So maybe next year, we’ll have 10 or more teams and we can have a lot of competition, which will make it harder on us.”