The Humble Gourmand

Bright, warm day? Check. Healthy slate of vendors proffering samples, tastes, and sips? Check. Live entertainment featuring reality-TV culinary talent? Check.

National Harbor’s second annual food and wine festival had all of the above, and the HG’s Peter, Patrick, and I were glad to be part of the fray. The afternoon of June 6 found us wandering from booth to booth, waiting in our fair share of lines for the more in-demand samples. (As you’d expect, some were worth the wait and others were not.)

In the “worth it” category included old-fashioned caramel cake, fantastically tasty crackers, and a cranberry/rosemary/pecan crostini from Rustic Bakery, which sells locally via Cowgirl Creamery.

Though you can buy the products in most grocery stores these days, the Cabot cheese and Fage yogurt stands were a particular highlight. Fage offered generous scoops of skim, 2%, or 10% (full-fat) yogurt with honey or fruit. (We went for the 10% and were given an approving nod from the yogurt folks.) At first glance, we didn’t Cabot’s one-bite paninis were much to be excited about, but the Vermont cheddar-green apple-prosciutto-caramelized onion panini turned out to be just about the most delicious thing I’d had all day. The basic cheese panini, with cheddar and mozzarella, was no slouch either.

Enough about the food — time for the reality-TV celebrity photos.

Top Chef Season 5 contestants Carla Hall and Ariane Duarte demo’d some easy summer recipes and chatted with an engaged crowd, but as Peter and Patrick sagely observed, the whole thing appeared to be more of a chance for foodie-TV-watchers to see Hall and Duarte in person. No one was paying much attention to the cooking. (Crowd impressions: they seem genuinely nice and look exactly like they do on TV.)

The last stop on National Harbor’s pier was a makeshift biergarden, with Belga Cafe‘s Bart Vandaele holding court, shouting encouragement to the masses along the lines of, “In Belgium, we don’t wait in lines! Come right up!”

Vandaele told us that he’s now the brand ambassador for Stella in the US, which might just be the greatest job I can think of at the moment.

The Hoeegarden, Stella Artois, and Leffe flowed freely. It was a great way to cap our visit.

To see the rest of the photo set, head here.

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