This house is made out of grapefruits, lemons and all sorts of citrus. Look crazy? Well there are countless of them made each year at the annual LEMON FESTIVAL in Menton, a small city in the Southeast of France.

Crazy, right?

Popularity: 4% [?]

(Photo courtesy of stock.xchng)

Oktoberfest is here.

Has been since the 22nd, actually.

A two-week festival, attended by over six million people, all for drinking awesome beer, eating amazing (and heart-cloggingly delicious) food, listening to jammin’ local music, and talking with your friends. Young casualties of alcoholic excess strewn about so frequently the locals call them “beer corpses,” even the local politicians slumming with the common man by tapping the ceremonial First Keg.

It’s like the Irish condensed their social habits into a two week period and learned a different language.

Someday I will be a wealthy imports/exports baron (possibly friends with Art Vandelay) and I will go to these festivals of joyous excess whenever I want. In the meantime…I’ll write articles about them.

-Jim still holds a grudge about the cider, though

Popularity: 3% [?]

From catfish to oxtail, Chicago has no shame. City vendors will fry just about anything to serve up one of the greasiest festivals known to man. But that doesn’t stop me from going, every year.

Depending on where you’re from, you may or may not be familiar with the annual summer food fest in Chicago nicknamed the “Taste.” If you’re not, just like you might imagine, it’s quite literally a taste of Chicago’s cuisine (do NOT take this to mean that grease is all Chicago has to offer, it is by no means an exhaustive collection of Chicago’s fine dining). More specifically, it’s a 10-day event that hosts almost 60 restaurant vendors throughout Chicagoland. Each station has a “taste portion” for 3 tickets (approximately $2) to allow for more accessible sampling.

Anyway, yesterday was the last day and I made it there in the nick of time. I sort of make it my duty to try and go annually, so that I can feel like I’ve done my job as a Chicagoan. This year I made myself extra proud because I braved the 92-degree heat! (I drank a TON of water.)

But let’s be honest, I eat the same food every year. So I guess I’m not really “tasting” much, just showing my support. Give or take a couple of variances, each year my stomach has to deal with at least one Indian samosa from Arya Bhavan, one pierogi from Kasia’s, a slice of deep dish from one of the many pizza places (this year it was Bacino’s pizza of Lincoln Park), and the ever delicious Original Rainbow Cone (an aggregate cup of pistachio, cherry, orange sherbert, Palmer and chocolate ice cream.) But don’t think this year’s list stopped right there. Those were just the staples. I also sampled a famous Billy Goat hamburger, a fried chicken wing, a frozen banana, beef on a stick, and….that may be it.

Oh no, wait. I was pleasantly surprised to see a new item that piqued my interest: Chocolate-Dipped Ginger Saffron Cookies from Vermilion, but in all honesty, they weren’t as good as they sounded. The cookie was a bit dryer than I would have liked.

(Yes, I have it displayed in the grass, there aren’t too many other seats at the Taste.)

All in all, the gorging fest met my expectations. 41 food tickets (a friend and I split!) and a full stomach, for the most part, later, I did not go home disappointed.

-Hillary, wishing “Hey Sushi” would come back to the Taste and serve their delicious fried green-tea ice cream
Editor, Recipe4Living

Popularity: 2% [?]