At Saturday’s Gumbo Cook-off, Warren County Fire Coordinator Jerry Briggs described the county’s sausage and chicken gumbo in one sentence: “This is the winner; city-county.”

He wasn’t wrong. Those who tasted the county’s gumbo voted it, to quote one cook-off official, “overwhelmingly” the winner. The city’s gumbo, alas, was non-existent. On Monday, the plaque will be presented to the Warren County Board of Supervisors.

The story of the city-county gumbo cook-off goes back to 2019 when South Ward Alderman Alex Monsour challenged the county to a gumbo cook-off during the Carnaval de Mardi Gras Cook-Off. The city won that year, taking a plaque and bragging rights.

When Monsour issued the challenge for the 2022 cook-off, the county remained silent until a few days before the Carnaval when Board of Supervisors President Kelle Barfield said the county had assembled a team composed of road department employees and Emergency Management and the county fire service to cook its pot of gumbo.

Saturday afternoon, the county’s pot was bubbling with gumbo. The city? Not so much.

Monsour, the city’s chief cook, said a mistake ruined the gumbo, which resulted in the city’s defeat.

“I made a big mistake and I want to apologize to the public,” Monsour said. “I had a mishap; something happened and it gave it a bad taste and I just couldn’t serve it. I congratulate the county on winning.”

“It’s a tie,” District 1 Supervisor Ed Herring said. “They got it (the plaque) that first year, so it’s a tie. We’re embedded now; we have to continue on to break the tie. We did really good. We had a great time and good fellowship and it was great to see everyone back out.”

Herring said the plaque will be hung in the lobby of the Board of Supervisors building.

“When you come in the office it’s the first thing you see,” he said. “We put it on a big wall because we intend to have many more beside it.”