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5th annual Pasta Sauce-Off set for March 10

Fri, Feb 23rd 2018 07:00 am
The fifth annual Pasta Sauce-Off will take place from 3-7 p.m. Saturday, March 10, at the LaSalle Yacht Club, 73 S. 68th St., Niagara Falls.
Admission is free to the event, with $1 per tasting of pasta sauces, $5 for 8 tastings, or $10 to try them all.
The event will include:
•A variety of homemade pasta sauces. Vote for your favorite.
•50/50 raffle.
•Basket raffle.
•Grand prize drawing.
•Salad, bread.
•Bake sale.
Cooking for a Cure, officially sanctioned by Roswell Park Cancer Institute, is organizing the event with all proceeds benefit Courage of Carly Fund, which offers support programs to make life more manageable for children diagnosed with cancer and serious blood diseases.
Organizers are looking for:
1. Participants to make a pasta sauce and enter as a challenger.
2. Items to be donated for the basket raffle and auction.
3. Volunteers to work the event. Set up, sell raffle tickets, bus tables, clean up.
4. Patrons to attend the event.
Call Kim Nemeth at 481-3746 to sign up to be a pasta sauce challenger, to donate, or to volunteer. All donations are needed by March 5.
Cooking for a Cure was founded by two Islanders, Allyson Nemeth and Jessica Flash, in the winter of 2012 when the two classmates decided at a sleepover to make a difference in the world. They started the Cooking For Cancer Club at the age of 10 and set out to raise money for Carly's Club of Roswell Park and pediatric cancer research by organizing bake sales and going door to door. Their goal was simple to raise $1,000 that year.
That night at the sleepover, they made and sold bake goods to the neighbors. From there, they rallied their fellow classmates and friends to participate. They organized teams and developed a neighborhood rotation to sell their baked goods, realizing they could make more money if they sold to different locations. They also developed a business plan to participate in KidsBiz, a local business fair where children learn how to use business skills to make and sell products.
They donated a check to Roswell Park and Carly's Club of a $1,000, as they met their goal there first year. The second year, the girls wanted to raise $2,000 and to accomplish this they realized they needed to do more then just sell bake goods, they needed a larger event to reach this goal. After discussing several ideas, the girls settled on hosting a Pasta Sauce-Off. They first secured the event as an officially sanctioned event for Roswell Park. They then received an approval from the LaSalle Yacht Club to use their facility to host the event. The club donated its time, facility and pasta to the event. Next they went to area businesses and personally asked the owners for donations. They asked family and friends to donate and come out to the event. Word spread around our community and soon the girls were featured on Channel 7 news and in the Island Dispatch.
At school they inspired their new principal to allow them to promote the event at school, church, and on the school's website. They made announcements at school weekly about the event, sent home flyers, made posters, gave speeches, and developed a brand for the event.
When it came time to actually host the event, they had over 70 baskets, several silent auction items, 50/50 raffles and 12 pasta sauces to try. They smashed their goal of raising $2,000 by raising just over $5,000 at this event alone.
To date they have raised just over $18,000.

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