Second Annual Foodbuzz Blogger Festival – Gala Dinner

I recently flew to San Francisco – one of my very favorite domestic cities – to attend the 2nd Annual Foodbuzz Fest (here’s last year’s write-up).  Follow along for the next two weeks as I recap my weekend trip! 

The main event – dinner at the Ferry Building on Saturday evening – was predicated by a flurry of getting ready.  At the last minute of me packing on Thursday evening for this weekend festival, I’d noticed that this event was listed as a “gala dinner” – now, I have limited experience attending galas, but I do know that in NYC, when you say gala, it means black tie.  Dressy.  Evening dresses, perhaps even evening gowns.  Granted, I have evening gowns, though none that would travel particularly well just for a weekend, and I was not going to pack one of them only to be way overdressed (even though they are so freakin’ heavy that they hide every bit of flab in my tummy and just make me look awesome!).  So I opted to roll up a few of my little black dresses and ask a few questions when I arrived… (I did Tweet this question, but no one answered me in time, so I just made up my own mind- a real challenge for a girl who just turned 30.) 

As a result, there was a large array of outfits in attendance at the event.  There were jeans, casual outfits, and a few on the high range of crazytown dressy, where I did NOT want to be, but most people seemed to have come to the same conclusion as me: dress somewhere in the middle, slightly dressy, and you’ll be fine.  This policy works in many occasions, since, as a woman, it’s always appropriate to wear an around-knee-length dress to dinner.  My one lament is my inability to really rock the stilettos I own; I can’t walk very far in them at all, so I wore flats and really detested how squat my legs looked.  I know – this is a food blog, and you want to know what we ate, not what we wore, but this was a general complaint about the titling and lack of clarity surrounding this event – if there was a dress code – or even NO dress code, with a name like ‘gala dinner’ – I’d have liked a little more explanation.  That’s all. 

The first hors d’oeuvres I sampled was the herb polenta cup – Cypress Grove chevre and provencal vegetables (pretend I put the accent and the little hook where they’re meant to go).  I wasn’t a fan. 

Next were the zucchini and parmesan madeleines with crimson cured salmon and lemon pepper creme.  (Again, pretend that accent mark is there.) 

Overwhelmingly blah.  I was getting tipsy fast here – the cater waiters were coming around with food in very limited quantities, while the makeshift bar that had been set up was more than generous with its pours.  Hmm…

Potato crusted Rosie organic chicken croquette drizzled with truffle honey next floated by me. 

Super crispy on the outside, with a

very tender inside, despite clearly being all white meat, this was perfect for munching.  Too bad the plate kept going… never to be seen again. 

Protesting the lack thereof at this point, Blondie and I expressed our hunger by arranging some of the decorative pebbles at the tables scattered around for people to mingle around (and, presumably, take photographs of whatever they munched upon) into the word above.  There are pictures of these very same pebbles arranged into another four letter word that starts with the letter F, but I won’t go there…

The last platter I took a super blurry photo of: hoisin beef and scallion rolls: tender grilled hoisin-marinated beef, thinly sliced and rolled around matchsticks of scallions.  Umm… I know I took one, and I know I ate it, but none of that stood out whatsover.  It was overcooked beef rolled around… something vaguely vegetal and blah.  Another blah.

There were also supposedly gougeres with gruyere fondue floating around, but I couldn’t find them and some Tweets alerted me to the fact that they were disappearing fast, hard to get ahold of some to taste, and… also not that great (that, or perhaps that was simply a condolence Tweet when I lamented my missing out on them!).  Ah well. 

We were subsequently ushered into the main hall (upper level) of the Ferry Building for the main event: a three course meal with wine pairings from Bonny Doon Vineyard. 

As Andrea of HighLowDrinkFood Tweeted, it almost felt like we were at a wedding, with the tables spread out across the great hall.  I lucked out and sat with some of the coolest, most laidback people at the Fest – ie, they shared my sense of snark and sarcasm about the whole event.  We had a really good time making fun of people, I mean, talking about food. 

Though we were consistently the last table served, despite not being at either end of the hall, I made up for it by telling the delightfully agreeable wine server to “keep it coming” and she obliged happily.  My glass did not go empty, and I managed to consume multiple glasses of the wines for each course… made all the easier since Bonny Doon had chosen some really easy to drink bottles for the night.  Our first course, roasted golden beet tart, arrived and I dug in. 

I have such good light!  Why?  Because Jesse of Beer & Nosh kindly switched seats with me.  Well, he said it was hotter’n’a’mofo at his spotlit-seat, and offered it up, and I shrugged and took it since I’m always cold.  In any case, I pretty much devoured my first course – the beets were wonderfully sweet – and then asked, “Am I just drunk or is this really good?”  I received mixed answers – most people said it was pretty good, though not quite as great as I seemed to find it – and one or two people said it was only alright. 

In between courses, Andrea made the excellent suggestion of taking a picture of the ladies at our table.  Top, l-r, Lauren of Healthy Delicious, Andrea of High/Low Food/Drink, then Blondie of Blondie & Brownie, and of course, me.  I swear I’m not red from drinking too much (I actually don’t turn red; I turn super pale with splotches of color across my face, it’s really quite attractive)… but that Kool-Aid smile certainly is from drinking enough to remain toasty-toasty. 

Here’s my attempt at taking a picture to show off the grandeur of the hall.  FAIL big time, but you sort of can see the lights and the pretty scene. 

Our next course finally arrived: seared scallops with Bonny Doon Vineyard verjus beurre blanc, and as I Tweeted nearly immediately: I need the recipe for the incredible beurre blanc here.  I mean, rich but light, sweet, and it’s butter.  Of course I loved it.  But the real surprise of this dish – for me at least – were the scallops.  I’m not a huge fan of scallops – I eat them when they’re around, but I don’t seek them out and I certainly tend to overlook them for other parts of a dish.  But these were cooked with a crust on the outside, with an almost raw center, medium rare.  Hello, this may be why I don’t really find myself fond of scallops; they’re always woefully fully cooked, and thus, a bit dense.  These were milky-sweet, tender, and simply amazing.  I ate each piece slowly, savoring the beurre blanc and the delicateness of the scallops, complemented so well by the beurre blanc.  /happysigh

And then something amazing happened: I found a new friend!  Somewhere in my drunken Tweeting, I said something that the adorable Naomi of GastroGnome found funny, and she Tweeted back to me… and somehow managed to find me in a huge hall of 350ish drunk, Tweeting, photographing food bloggers.  And she hugged me!  And we took this adorable photo!  Proof positive that I was drunk.  I hate when people I don’t know/have just met decide they want to hug me.  I look pretty hapy in the picture, though, so I’ll hazard the guess that I wasn’t actually plotting ways to take the knife on the table and stab her.  Unfortunately, I lost her soon after and was unable to hang out with her further… though anyone who appreciates my twisted, quirky sense of humor is an automatic friend.  (Even my closest friends sometimes don’t get me.) 

This beautiful plate proved to me a few things: how important good lighting is (it’s a bit overexposed, yes?), and how just turning the plate can result in a much more amazing angle (the other way resulted in horribly dark pictures with ugly shadows), though in this case, that means you’re unable to see the butternut squash puree that lay on the other side of the plate from the local wild mushrooms.  In any case, the rosemary and garlic infused rack of lamb was exceedingly tender, and I inhaled this dish as well.  The meat was scented with garlic, not so much rosemary – good for me, since I don’t tend to favor tree herbs – and lovely.  The mushrooms were aiite. 

And because I’m a dork, I took a picture of Blondie taking a picture of her dish, as Jesse took a picture of her taking a picture of it as well.  I love meta-meta-meta photos! 

The final end to the meal came with this tarta de alemdnras with oranges.  I know I ate it, and I know I ate most of it, which means I liked it enough to keep eating, but I honestly don’t remember much of it except that the meal was ending, I was trying to say goodbye to people as they filtered out, and the scavenger hunt was starting… and that we were on our way to a hotel bar after this.  Having consumed easily more than a bottle and a half of wine (closer to two, actually), I was really excited about everything, and it’s a shock that I recall the food as well as I do.  Well, I remember the dishes that were standouts, but that’s how meals usually are: anything that is less than amazing gets forgotten quickly…  Scallops, lamb chop, please come live with me. 

For completness’ sake, the list of wines, in order of courses with which they were paired:

2009 Bonny Doon Vineyard Ca’del Solo Albarino – Biodynamic estate varietal
2007 Bonny Doon Vineyard Le Cigare Blanc
2006 Bonny Doon Vineyard Le Cigare Volant
2008 Bonny Doon Vineyard Vinferno

I recall liking the first two the best, but that’s no surprise, as they were whites that weren’t overly sweet. 

Overall, in my opinion, this event was much better than last year’s dinner.  While I understand last year’s overarching message of community and encouraging community, having family-style service in an unheated warehouse was really uncomfortable, especially given the dim light and everyone attempting to photograph everything.  This year’s dinner was much more food-blogger-friendly, ironically, and it seems that Foodbuzz took into account all the feedback they received last year with regards to the location and the meal layout.  This year totally wins.  🙂

Thanks again to Foodbuzz – as a Featured Publisher, the entire event was free.