Foodbuzz Festival Tasting Pavilion

A slightly overwhelming day and a half of food, wine, and networking would sum up my view of the 2nd Annual Foodbuzz Festival. Not meant in a bad way at all, but I feel like it went by in a blip, almost like it never happened. Luckily, 350 bloggers caught it on camera, so we will always remember that it did

One of the highlights of the Foodbuzz Festival for me is the tasting pavilion. Held in the same place as last year, the San Francisco Metreon, the pavilion offered all sorts of food, wine, and beer samples, in addition to cooking demos from the various Foodbuzz sponsor contests.

I made my way over to the Metreon with Elina, Elizabeth, Janetha, Elise, and Holly.

Every single Foodbuzz Festival attendee was starving at this point and itching to taste, but we behaved as the patient bloggers that we are and spent some time milling around the foyer and outdoor patio areas while we waited to stampede. . .  I mean patiently enter into the tasting area.

Festival staff handed us a wine glass as we entered, and then Elina and I decided to head straight for the back of the room, a decision that proved to be successful, and one I often utilize in big wine tastings. While the crowd clogged up the first tables, we sampled our first few dishes.

Shrimp cocktail from a restaurant in Oakland whose name escapes me.  The shrimp was great, but the sauce was a little too sweet.

The Alaska Seafood fish taco station was our next stop. We were some of the first people in line, and was I ever glad later on when the line was a few dozen long.

The best part about the Alaska Seafood taco bar? Obviously the toppings! I loaded my salmon taco with jicama, guacamole, corn salsa, and hot sauce. And then I chowed down!

Next I moved on to the Foodzie area where I sampled some kickin’ spicy pistachio toffee.

Some totally gooey and sweet dough balls from Annie the Baker

And spicy pickled vegetables of all sorts from Pick-A-Peck. The pickled asparagus was my favorite, and while the people staffing the table told me some great uses for these pickled veggies, I am not sure I would make it past eating them all straight from the jar. Yum!

I warmed my body and soothed my soul with Tyler Florence’s butternut squash and apple soup.

And enjoyed dessert and beer in one in a Bison Chocolate Stout.

We learned about real, high quality (and pretty!) sprinkles from Ticings.

And finally spent some time soaking up the warm November San Francisco sun with new and old friends on the Metreon’s outdoor patio space. You may recognize Chels and Sues from We Are Not Martha and of course, Elina from both Healthy and Sane and the new blog, Russian Bites.

I actually failed to photograph my favorite taste of the day, the Chanterelle mushroom soup from Americano. Sweet, savory, warm, frothy, this soup was simply perfect, though not photogenic. I overheard the chef saying that the soup had Madeira wine in it, and I am now plotting a mushroom soup making lab to see if I can recreate it.

The Foodbuzz Festival tasting pavilion is filled with magnificent delights, and this is simply a recap of my favorites. Once again, the Foodbuzz staff and their vendor sponsors outdid themselves with the display of decadence that they put together.

I have so many posts to go, and today I am enjoying one last day of wine tasting in the Dry Creek Valley and Russian River Valley. Not having a full time job will come in handy, at least for this week so I can catch up on blog posts!

What was the most delicious thing you tasted this weekend?