Brentwood Cornfest 2008

You might be wondering - why isn't there any corn above given that this was about an event called Cornfest? That's what I was wondering too when we got there. Sure, there were tons of people, lots of events/entertainment, and plenty of things for sale. But in typical food festival fashion, I was expecting a lot of the food to revolve around the namesake produce, perhaps in the form of corn soup, corn salad, or maybe some corn-based snacks.

Instead, there really weren't many corn options available. Sure, one could get grilled ears of corn and some sweet kettle popcorn too, but not much else that was corn-based (and no, corn dogs didn't count in my book!). The rest of the food stalls were selling standard fairgrounds-type grub, be it sno-cones, sausages, or nachos. The garlic fries that we got at this one stand were cold and unappetizing too.

Now, the grilled corn that I did get was quite a delight with its fabulously tender and delicately sweet kernels. But having to pay a $10/person admission fee (and $5 parking) was a bit of a letdown given what we had seen. I'm sure it was a fun event, especially for locals catching up with each other, but I was a bit bummed after having made such a long trek up there. Hopefully there will be more vendors with corn-centered offerings in the future.

On a side note, it was quite interesting to see this Chelada drink there, which was a mixture of Budweiser, Clamato, salt, and lemon. Clearly this was a play off a proper michelada, even if I'd never had it with Clamato before. It was much thinner in consistency than I was expecting, but all went down well.