Festival - The Hungry Nomad

2013 South Beach Wine and Food Festival Re-Cap (Miami, USA)

March 5, 2013 No Comments

5-IMG_8740 — Whole Foods Grand Tasting Village Entrance

The Food Network South Beach Wine and Food Festival presented by Food & Wine took place in Miami from February 21-24 bringing out celebrity chefs, foodies and winies (did I just make that up?) Any excuse to get me down to Miami and I’ll take it. The Festival opened this year with the Q hosted by Paula Deen and Sons at the Delano hotel. It was quite the affair with endless bottles of wine, trays of delicious finger foods and fire dancers. Yes, there were fire dancers! It continued through into the weekend with events such as the Swine and Wine, Wine Spectator’s Best of the Best, the Grand Tasting Village, Tribute Dinners, Red Hot Night by Target, an Indulgence Affair by Godiva, and much more.

The Festival also attracted many Food Network culinary celebrities including Emeril Lagasse, Nigella Lawson, Martha Stewart, Anthony Bourdain, Bobby Flay, Anne Burrell, Robert Irvine, Guy Fieri, Rocco DiSpirito and many others coming out to meet with fans through their book signings and provide live cooking demonstrations- all this taking place simultaneously while the Whole Foods Market Grand Tasting Village provided festival goers with endless wine and food tastings.

Some of my favorites included Sheila G’s Brownie Brittle, a create your own chocolate bar tent, mystery candy from Jelly Belly, a Barilla pasta tent where I learned how to professionally toss pasta (of course I spilled a few times before I got it right), and Ziggy Marley’s new line of ‘hemp rules’ organic seeds and coconut oils.

1-IMG_8761 — Barilla US Tent where I learned how to toss pasta

Food Truck, Philadelphia

2nd Annual Vendy Awards- Saturday, July 28th

July 27, 2012 No Comments

Tomorrow I’ll be attending, eating, photographing and interviewing food trucks at the Second Annual Vendy Awards held at University City. There, the city’s best food trucks nominated by patrons will compete for the Vendy’s title. The Philly Vendy’s benefits the Food Trust and is a branch of the Urban Justice Center’s Street Vendor Project. If you love food and food trucks then you should definitely make it out. The event will take place Saturday, July 28th from 3 to 7 pm at the Lot located at 39th and Market street. Tickets for the event includes all you can eat and drink (beer and wine). You can purchase it here for $55 in advance and $60 at the door.

Here are list of vendors that will be battling it out tomorrow:

Mardi Gras, New Orleans, Travel

Mardi Gras- the Most Wonderful Time of the Year in New Orleans

February 17, 2012 No Comments

If you looked at the tile of this post and thought that perhaps it was almost Christmas, you were wrong. Very wrong. For it is almost time for Mardi Gras, a time in New Orleans were magic happens. I mean who really looks forward to turkey dinner when you have the fabulous king cake to look foward to?

I will take a wild guess here and say that many of those reading this blog have never experienced carnival season or ‘mardi gras‘. Others don’t even know what it is. I had read about Mardi Gras in my high school french class and always wanted to come to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. Who knew that destiny would make New Orleans my home allowing me to experience this wonderful time of year first hand.

For many here, Mardi Gras season seems to be more important than any other holiday. That is because Mardi Gras brings with it weeks of music, parades, floats, parties, balls and playing dress up. (Any excuse will get your average N’awliner playing dress up). Many are part of ‘societies’ or ‘krewes’, have balls to prepare for, and most importantly ride in a ‘float’. Now not anyone can ride in a float…you have to earn your place in a krewe. The whole process and tradition is still a little cloudy to me but all in all in simple language modern day mardi gras season is an excuse to party day and night for one whole month (it seems like a month at least) leading up to fat tuesday and lent. Basically the average Christian is getting it all out of their system before lent. There are different parades everyday. And you have to attend all of them. Since each has its own creative theme and floats. Riding the floats are many in really beautiful outfits (other times not so much) throwing colorful beads and other goodies at those who yell loud enough and manage to make eye contact. I happen to have mastered the ‘googly eye’ and so was happy to have my neck full of beads by the end of each night (that and having a really tall fiance that can reach over everyone else). Everywhere you look you will see flashes of purple, green and gold. Purple being my favorite color you can imagine how happy this color scheme makes me.

The city shuts down for the duration of the mardi gras season. There are people running around the streets day and night in crazy costumes. And generally everyone is just happy. As happy as I have seen such a large group of people. I’ll be writing more about my mardi gras experience along with adding a bit of a historical context and explaining the traditions. I am also on a mission to eat my way through all the king cakes in town to find the best one. What is a king cake? A delicious treat to be found in most bakeries around this time of year. I’ve had many kingcakes in Europe although New Orleanians have added their own flare to it (as they do to all things) and splash it with purple, green and gold colored sugar and fill it up with delicious fillings including cream cheese, pralines, etc. Any suggestions as to the best King Cake in town? Do share your thoughts. (Also note: I collected the photos below from the wonderful world wide web. I will be adding my own collection shortly).