I hit up DCA on Friday for the festival. I had mixed feelings this time. I encountered many issues at various booths. Here's a run down and my reviews:
Cheddar cheese soup in sourdough bread bowl at the Sourdough Booth was very good but I literally only got about 4 spoonfuls of soup and that was it. The bread was great but it was about 95% bread, 5% soup. Mine didn't have any bacon on top. Later I saw other people eating it that had bacon topping. I felt jipped. This item was $6. Worth more like $4.
Onion Lair: I wanted the braised beef on polenta. They were out of polenta. I had the dish minus the pole ta because I didn't want to wait 15 min. The beef was excessively salty. Like, salt was the only flavor. There was no sauce to speak of. Tasted like they braised the beef in ocean water. Super disappointed. Maybe the polenta helps balance the salt, but this was borderline inedible. I really love salty food so I choked it down but it was too salty even for me.
Lemon booth: The Meyer Lemon Blueberry Macaron is HUGE this year (which I welcome) and it was delicious. Totally worth $4.75
Artichoke Booth: I had the fried artichoke"carbonara". This was bad. Super soggy and room temperature (not even warm). Limp thin bacon bits on top, and the "carbonara" drizzle tasted like nothing more than ranch dressing. Super small portion too. Not worth it.
Mimosa Flight: This was $16. I estimate I got 5oz champagne in total. The rest was juice. Not the best value but a good way to try the flavors. Pear was great. Apricot tasted like cheap OJ, no discernable apricot flavor. Mango was second best but overly sweet. Champagne being used was Chandon which is a decent one. I would buy one of the single flavor mimosas which are $14. There is way more champagne in those. I saw them being poured.
L.A. Style: had the Korean BBQ beef kimchi tacos. These were pretty good. You get two street style tacos. Decent value. $7 These honestly tasted more Mexican than Korean due to lots of cilantro. The beef was good quality but only had a hint of soy sauce flavor and nothing more. The kimchi was very mild and not even noticeable. I would get these again.
Olive Booth: I had the Panna Cotta. It was very good and refreshing. However, there were dried cherries in the custard and it was weird. They messed with the texture of the dish. The cherry gelee on top was good, but the Madeline cookie garnish was soggy and spongy, not crisp and cakey like a Madeline is supposed to be.
Here is where I got really frustrated. I started hitting up booths around 11:45. I was with friends. We tried unsuccessfully to get alcoholic offerings at 4 booths. One was the Bacon Booths Signature Bloody Mary. They didn't have the ingredients to make it. The next was the lemon booth Blueberry Lemon Mule. Nope. Didn't have the stuff for that one either. The next was the Ace Space Blood Orange Cider from the Artichoke booth. We ordered and paid for that one ($9) and then they served us the $4 iced tea drink and were utterly confused when we said "not the tea, the Ace Cider". The severs had no clue. One had to exit the booth to look at a menu. Then they were opening all their doors and cabinets and said "we don't have an Ace hard cider." A manager came over and said it was on the way so we waited. He came back two minutes later and said they "couldn't find it in the storage area and may not have gotten the shipment." ***? He issues us refunds, but really? They had it listed, sold it to us, and then no one can find it? THEN I went to another booth that had Ace Perry (Pear) Cider and asked first if they had it. Yes. So I ordered it. The gal proceeds to tell me "It's a 5oz pour for $9. Do you still want it?" Uh, NO...Are they crazy? You can buy a 6 pack for $9. I would have paid $9 for a full 12 oz serving, but 5oz? Absolutely not. That is obscene. The gal said "yeah, we don't understand that one...We have been discussing it all morning...No one has actually gone ahead and bought it yet." I thanked her for letting me know. I then walked away and we went to the beer garden in Paradise Pier and enjoyed FULL POURS of beer for $8.50 or so. I also got a Spaten at the Paradise Garden Grill for $9. A full pour.
So, overall, I felt like the festival marketplaces were not super prepared today. A lot of the serving CMs seemed new and completely confused. Portion sizes were all over the place (judging by looking at what others had). Supply issues were everywhere. I kept overhearing "we are out of that right now." Going back next week and will see if things have improved.
