NILES — Outdoor festivities at the Hunter Ice Festival might chill some to the bone, but the event’s chili crawl is meant to warm attendees right up.

The $5 event will run — or crawl, rather — from noon to 3 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 19 starting at the UltraCamp welcome center, 123 E. Main St., but the competition is already heating up.

Three participants and frequent trophy winners happen to own business two doors down from one another. They have entered the chili crawl since its inception in 2005, before their businesses became brick and mortar.

El Amigo Pepe, 226 E. Main St., will send out its head chefs and owners, José and Ana Mendez, with a pot of their chili recipe that has won them awards time and again. Jim’s Smokin’ Café at the Paris Soda Company, 220 E. Main St., will send its owner, Jim Morris, to the event with a sweet chili recipe he has never entered before.

Morris hopes the change-up will tantalize attendees’ tastebuds enough to vote for him in the people’s choice awards. When top chili-makers are announced at 4 p.m., Morris hopes he comes out on top.

The restaurant owner has won numerous awards before, but he has not yet taken first.

That award has gone to El Amigo Pepe a number of times since the Mendezes first entered the competition in 2005. It is for good reason, Morris said. Their spicy chili hits well.

Gabriela Morlaes, daughter of José and Ana Mendez, could not share the specific ingredients behind El Amigo Pepe’s recipe, but she did share the restaurant’s connection to the Hunter Ice Festival while her parents cooked for a Thursday dinner rush.

When the Mendezes first entered the chili crawl in 2005, they were not familiar with what constituted a chili, Morales said. So, they made their own and won best original recipe.

The next year, they created a more traditional chili recipe, with a pinto bean and ground beef base, and spiced it up with tangier flavors.

“We do a spicier version than people around us,” Morales said. “That’s one of the things that a lot of the people that are trying say they are looking for.”

They have varied the recipe little since. Now, trophies from 2005 to 2018 line a high shelf above a freezer full of popsicles.

Two doors down, Morris’ trophies sit atop a high shelf above his bar, where customers can look at them while eating their buffet pickings and drinking malts.

While the Mendezes will add spice to their five gallons of chili for the event, Morris plans to add sweetness.

About every year since the crawl began, Morris has varied his chili recipe. Last year’s was a verde chili with pork. It was popular, Morris said, but a bit too out of the ordinary to be the people’s choice.

He thinks a sweet brisket chili may please the palletes of everyday people more.

Some may already be familiar with it. While El Amigo Pepe only makes its chili occasionally, Morris sells this year’s variety at his restaurant.

He made clear that the chili walk is not a cutthroat competition, despite his wanting to win.

In fact, he appreciates more competition. He enjoys seeing new people enter the contest each year with unique recipes.

“It’s just fun,” he said. “It brings people downtown. It brings people into buildings they don’t normally go into.”

Jim’s Smokin’ Café will have other presences at the Hunter Ice Festival, too. He is one of the businesses to have an ice sculpture out front as part of a larger slew of sculputures set up across town.

His business’ will be a usable smoker, which he intends to use to smoke foods such as cheese.

The restaurant will also offer a supper club featuring a South Bend vegan chef. Registration for the event will be shared on the business’ Facebook page.