Feastival 2012

Photos From The Night! http://www.perrettiphotography.com/Feastival_2012/index.html


The 2012 Feastival was my first. I’ve heard a lot of buzz about the event and I knew this was something for me. It brought the best restaurants and chefs together to showcase their best dishes while raising money for the art scene. The Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe have been apart of the city for nearly 16 years. I know the Feastival will become a staple event in the city to continue support for the arts.

Pulling up to the event there were silver painted performers dancing on the top of the Feastival banner and Audi cars lined the front entrance for show. In the entryway of the Pier 9 venue was a huge flashy disco ball... This was going to be a good time.

The venue was packed to capacity with performing artists, food, drinks, and music. Having the list of restaurants before hand helped me navigate to the tables I was looking most forward too. First up was Nick Emli from Rittenhouse Tavern. I’ve had some of his dishes before, but there always really good. He made Rabbit and Fois Gras Croustillant with Concord Grape and Cocoa. Rich, sweet, delicious!

I tried close to 30 tables but I’m not going to write about them all, just the highlights of the night! I was really looking forward to Michael Klein’s daughter’s table; Miss Rachel’s Pantry which is a vegan cafe that does breakfast and lunch. Her dish was a lobster mushroom Mac N Cheese. The choice of macaroni was a big plus because it wasn’t a skimpy little thing. It was just a bite but would definitely be a hearty meal. R2L was always a restaurant I admired. It was probably the art deco of the restaurant and view but the food is very modern and Chef Stern does a nice job at it. Of course his choice of dish that night was a house made pretzel, smoked salmon, shaved red onion with mustard cream cheese. It wasn’t too salty and had a nice balance with the cream cheese. Probably the one dish I had that night that I keep talking about was Eric Ripert 10 Arts table. They served an amazing roasted pork belly, cream grits, with dashi sauce.  I wouldn’t expect anything less. I was getting thirsty by this point and wanted a glass of wine but I wanted to see what Franklin Mortgage was making. I was there once before and love the atmosphere and the sculpting of the drinks but I’m just too girly to handle them. The bartender at the event sold me on their Moko Collins which was actually very refreshing and served large.

Throughout the night performances were taking place and the music was keeping the crowd moving. My fellow friend photographer JJ was there photographing guests and chefs and producing a live feed of photos on a big screen. There were auctions happening and announcements by some local celebs like Ed Rendell. Also Amstel Light one of the large sponsors had a couple photo booths set up for people to have their photo taken.

Other than the food that night the dinnerware it was presented on was so unique and pretty. Verterra who is a new company, specially to the Philadelphia food scene is a compostable dinnerware that is created from only fallen leaves. There are no concerns about plastics, glues, lacquers, veneers or any toxins to leach into foods. I was speaking with the marketing director after the event and he was very impressed and excited about the Philadelphia Feastival and the food scene as a whole. Being located in New York it’s hard to get to Philly but there is a lot of potential here for them, and can bridge the two cities together.

The event as a whole had a lot of great perks beyond the food. I’m already looking forward to next year and the attendees.