A 325 gallon vat of chili, chickpea mascots, live music and more feature at this weekend’s National Lentil Festival in Pullman

The National Lentil Festival may be the only place in the world where a person can get a high-five from a chickpea mascot, slurp up a bowl of lentil chili straight from a 325-gallon cauldron, and peruse 100 vendors selling anything and everything related to legumes.

Celebrating its 35th anniversary, the National Lentil Festival this Saturday at Reaney Park in Pullman typically garners around 20,000 visitors each year.

Alexis Foran, the festival director, said the show kicks off at 7:30 a.m. at the Heritage Depot, where 210 participants will sprint, jog, jaunt or walk the Tase T. Lentil 5k Fun Run.

After that, at 9 a.m., the sports tournaments begin. The adult softball competition, which has about 50 people spread across four teams, and the 3-on-3 youth basketball tournament, which has 48 teams and 200 participants, are open for the public to watch. Similar to Hoopfest, the 3-on-3 tournament guarantees a minimum of three games, but after two losses, that’s it. There’s also a pickleball and tennis tournament going on during this time.

At 11 a.m., the grand parade begins. With nearly 70 participants, including representatives from Washington State University Athletics, the parade this year will showcase marching bands from several local schools promenading the streets.

“It’s just the fact that this is an event that celebrates our community’s culture, our agricultural roots and the history of our growers in the area,” Foran said. “It celebrates that Americana heartbeat that we have with our farming community and the connection that we have, so it ties in perfectly with welcoming back our WSU Cougs.”

A little bit after noon is when the music starts. Bluegrass, indie rock and blues music from seven different artists will resound through the event until closing time at 10 p.m. The five-piece bluegrass band from San Francisco called the Brothers Comatose, which has approximately 380,650 monthly listeners on Spotify, is the final act. Their set starts at 8:45 p.m.

There’s also an area for kids to learn to juggle, to get a balloon animal, to get their face painted, to learn from the science tent and more, via the Lil Lentil Land. With all these activities available for myriad ages, Foran lovingly calls the National Lentil Festival the biggest party on the Palouse since 1989.

“I think the most beautiful part of the event would be at 5 p.m. when we serve lentil chili that’s grown from locally sourced lentils out of the world’s largest chili vat, and we serve it for free to the entire community,” Foran said. “We serve about 6,000 bowls of chili, and the entire community just sits down and breaks bread together.”

With the help of the Community Action Center, any leftover lentil chili will be donated to a food bank, senior citizens unable to attend the event and the Cougar food pantry on WSU’s campus.

Unfortunately, the title of world’s largest bowl of chili no longer belongs to the National Lentil Festival in Pullman. That honor is now reserved for the Spirit of Texas Festival in College Station, Texas, where chefs created a little over 575 gallons of chili con carne in 2017. When it comes to lentil chili specifically, however, Pullman still reigns supreme.

While the chili isn’t available until around dinnertime, for Allyssa Sheppard, the executive chef of catering services at WSU, the work begins at 7 a.m. sharp. Sheppard came to Pullman in 2010 for school, and has stayed in the area ever since because of the quiet, open landscape of Eastern Washington.

Since Sheppard has enjoyed the giant bowl of chili at the festival in years past, she admitted to being fairly nervous to take on the mantle of chief chili curator when the job was offered to her last year.

From 7 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Saturday, Sheppard and her team of two cycle through three 50-gallon steam-jacketed kettles until they have enough lentil chili to fill the extremely large 325-gallon cauldron.

Some 400 pounds of lentils, 60 pounds of onions, 60 pounds of red bell peppers, 60 pounds of green bell peppers and about 20 pounds of special Mexican chocolate go into making the famous chili.

“I went to the lentil fest after (making it last year),” Sheppard said. “I walked around, and I was like, every single person here is eating something that I cooked this morning. It was very surreal.”

Along with the music and other festivities, the National Lentil Festival will also honor a pair of pulse farmers who have spent nearly 50 years in the agricultural arena.

Russ Zenner, 79, and his wife, Kathy, 77, are third-generation farmers from Genesee, Idaho, who first took over their family farm in 1970. The couple met in high school and have been married for 60 years. Russ Zenner said in the past he has served in leadership positions on the Pea and Lentil Commission, before it became USA Pulses.

In addition to serving on the Pea and Lentil Commission, Russ Zenner served as charter president of the Pacific Northwest Direct Seed Association for several years. He described his time at the Pacific Northwest Direct Seed Association as based around promoting no tillage on farmland and advocating for more regenerative farming practices.

“Our goal is to be regenerating this topsoil with our cropping system activities, and that’s a lot of my extra volunteer time, not only with the pea and lentil industry, but promoting environmental stewardship on the cropland in this region,” Russ Zenner said.

Kathy Zenner, as her husband put it, is a major player in her own right. She serves as chair of the Latah County Arts and Culture Commission where most of her role consists of advising the county on how arts and culture can be integrated into future planning and development. Kathy Zenner also serves as president of the Genesee Education Board.

Today, the Zenner Family Farm is run by Russ’s cousin Clint Zenner and his wife, Alicia Zenner. Russ Zenner used to farm on about 3,000 acres of land before his cousin took over. Since taking over, Clint Zenner has added more acreage from older farmers wanting to sell their land.

For Russ and Kathy Zenner, now that they’re able to enjoy retirement, Russ Zenner said they’re in “full-time screw around mode,” a phrase the couple heard from one of their grandsons when they asked him what he wanted to do when he grew up. 

After all the time the Zenners have spent in the agriculture industry, Russ Zenner said it’s rewarding for him and his wife to be recognized as “The Lentil Family of the Year.” His hope for Saturday is that people have fun and feel inclined to buy and eat more pulse-based foods, particularly hummus.

Russ Zenner’s son and daughter-in-law, Chris Zenner and Janine Zacca Zenner, own a company called Zacca Hummus. With five different flavors now available in several select grocery stores, including Fred Meyer, all the chickpeas used to make Zacca Hummus come from the Zenner Family Farm.

Janine Zenner is of Lebanese descent, and when she showed her friends some of the hummus she made, they began pestering her to start a business. So that’s exactly what she and her husband did. Since Zacca Hummus’s inception in 2012, the company has only risen in popularity.

More than likely, there will be hummus of all sorts for people to enjoy at the National Lentil Festival this Saturday. Between the floats for the parade, the music, the mascots and the 325-gallon vat of chili, attendees this weekend will quite literally have plenty on their plate.

“I would say that the general atmosphere from sunup to sundown is just energetic,” Foran said. “It’s community. I mean, you see smiling faces, you see neighbors, families and friends gathering in the park, enjoying a peak summer evening before it turns to fall.”

Editor’s note: Russ and Kathy Zenner heard the phrase “full-time screw around mode” from their grandson upon asking him about his future career. This story was changed on Aug. 15, 2025, to correct that information, as well as the spelling of Kathy Zenner’s first name.