Local restaurants are revving up for the 35th annual Chester County Restaurant Festival scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 21 in West Chester. The festival kicks off at noon.
Keith Kurowski, director of the West Chester Parks and Recreation Department, said the festival not only promotes local restaurants and bars, but businesses en masse. He’s proud that the "event is going national." One reason for this is that QVC will be broadcasting live starting at noon with In The Kitchen with David on the Historic Court House Steps. QVC will also air live cooking demonstrations.
Some venders look forward to introducing attendees to epicurean delights not common to the region. Rob Mitchell, of The Cow and the Curd, will bring a taste of Wisconsin to the fair. Their big draw is the battered fried cheese curd. As attested in the restaurant's online video, a cheese curd is "not a mozzarella stick or a cheese ball." Playfully, Rob describes them as being examples that mimic the nursery rhyme "Little Miss Muffet," citing the lines 'eating her curds and whey.'
Visitors to the mobile food truck will get to buy cheddar wheels where the curds and the whey have been separated. For the staff, the days leading up to the festival are filled with meetings where they decide how many crewmembers are required, determining product quantity and readying equipment.
Preparations are in full swing for other establishments as well. James Cappello of the Ram's Head Bar & Grill said that work has begun months in advance. A restaurant known for its pub-style atmosphere and ambiance, featured items will include filet mignon cheese steaks and bacon deviled eggs.
For Dan Cellucci of Roots Cafe, a promoter of organic ingredients, the festival is a chance to bring a "little bit of everything" to the restaurant scene. Weeks go into planning the menu, and at least two days are spent cooking and preparing the fare almost nonstop. Until the day of the festival, staff members will be preparing such dishes as bison chili and portabella tacos where five buckets of portabellas are marinated in oil, soy, ginger and cinnamon. Visitors can also look forward to Vietnamese pork shoulder sandwiches where the meat will have been braised for six hours in garlic, salt, rosemary and thyme, among other spices.
Iron Hill Brewery is also gearing up for the event. "We're really excited," manager Nicole Ruggieri said. While most of their menu is being kept a secret, she did say that they would serve up grilled sausage sandwiches as well as the Bavarian pretzel with stone ground mustard. This is a condiment where a stone mill grounds the mustard seeds to create a rich texture. The restaurant will also offer a taste of what it dishes up at Oktoberfest.
Over all, there will be more than 65 vendors, restaurants and caterers represented, as well as a bevy of arts and crafts booths. A beer and wine garden can be found on Gay and Church Street.
For many of the vendors, the resounding sentiment is to urge those in the area to buy local and to support venues and establishments in the community. It's also a family-friendly event meant to draw people together.
No matter an individual's palate, the restaurant festival will strive to prove that there is a restaurant to whet every appetite, and that they're all here in Chester County.
For more information, visit http://chestercountyrestaurantfestival.com/
About Erin Moonyeen Haley
After graduating from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia with a degree in Writing for Film and Television, Erin made the cross-country road trip to Los Angeles where she worked nights at Disneyland before landing assistant gigs at agencies and various production companies. After five years, she decided on a career change and returned to the East Coast, enrolling in West Chester University to earn a Masters in English. Now, she is going on to earn her teaching certificate to teach English in the high school classroom. Throughout all of these years, she's been able to keep her resume eclectic, interning at the Cannes Film Festival, studying art history in Florence, Italy, volunteering for Habitat for Humanity and writing freelance articles for such websites as EHow.com, garden guides.com and suite101.com. In the end, writing, traveling, and teaching remain her ultimate passions.
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