Foodie's Dream Saturday

Well on Saturday, I woke up around 8:30-9:00am because I had major plans for the day! A friend of mine invited me to the "Hometown-Homegrown" food expo presented by GoodTaste! Pittsburgh which was down at the Heinz History Center.  Food expo's are quickly becoming my new obsession and this one was loads of fun.  I showered, chugged a glass of water, and ate a Clif bar on the way to the expo. 

Floor one wasn't too crazy hoppen', it had the sign in area, but what really caught my eye was a cookbook exchange!!! Me to cookbooks = moth to flame. I quickly ransacked the area looking for some good finds. While they had a pretty decent selection, I didn't find  anything that caught my eye, I already have way more cookbooks than appropriate so I exercised some self control here. 

They also had some smoothie samples going on, I stayed away from the passion peel as I was kindly informed by the staff that it had mango in it. 

I tried to take a picture to capture the pure chaos of the situation, this clearly doesn't do it justice. It seriously was full of old people and people with children (and their gigantic stupid strollers).  Definitely not my cup of tea, but there were so many food vendors there that I didn't care!! If you've ever been to CostCo, it was like that only times a thousand. I really can't stand crowds haha. That's the only downfall to food expos for me I guess. 

They had some super good peirogies going on, I had one and it was cheese and potato, delicious!  I never got the craze Pittsburghers have for the little things but now I fully understand.  I'm pretty sure these were supplied by Polish Pierogi Company. 

Some locally made dips by BL Sour Cream, I got the buffalo flavored kind. Yum!

A local restaurant was showing off their goodies, Home Cooked by Donna, wow were these collard greens awesome! The sweet potatoes were decent, not my fav though. 

I thought the Kaleido Kone Creamery had such a beautiful, elegant setting, plus it was ice cream so I was super jazzed!

CAKE BATTER ICE CREAM!!!!! So creamy and delicious

This is the second time I've had the opportunity to try SITO's foods and again, lots of delicious, healthy Mediterranean goodness such as stuffed grape leaves, lifits, etc. They also had an awesome fresh salad and their signature dressing for sale. I love mah veggies!  It's seriously such a pop of fresh, amazing veggies in every bite.

Up next was the Original Oyster House table, they had crab cakes and chips for samples and yum!! I liked it alot, I'll definitely have to make a stop downtown sometime and eat there! 

By far the biggest and best sample!! 

Beano's sauce display was pretty cute! I loved all their samples too! Good thing they're available at Giant Eagle.  Their specialty flavors are also available at Whole Foods I was told. 

When I saw this stand at the expo, I could have done backflips up the aisles (as if there was a square inch to do so). I absolutely love and adore Olio Fresca, they have the best olive oils and vinegars I have ever tasted.  I got another bottle of the dark cherry vinegar and would have gotten another white truffle oil but they were out! I'm not surprised, that truffle oil is heavenly. 

After we perused around the vendors, we had some time to kill before the cookie table contest so we went back down to re-check out the cookbook exchange and grab a drink. 

I grabbed a Naked Green Machine smoothie, quite delicious but an awful lot of carbohydrates for 1 bottle (seriously who doesn't drink the whole thing even though it says 2 servings? get real)

An interesting blend of stuff, it sounds terrible but tastes super yummy! 

I scored a book at the cookbook exchange after all, called "The Clueless Vegetarian" I haven't had time to look through it yet, but the reviews on Amazon seem promising. 

At the end of the day we popped in to scope out the virtual cookie table contest.. does anyone recognize the guy 2nd from the left? Because I sure did! Well actually, I thought I recognized him and when I asked who it was  I was super excited that I did indeed know the man. 

It's QED Cooks Chris Fennimore!! Wee!! 

My stash from the expo: 

BBQ Stus sauces (mustard and original) 

Gryphon Tea Company Lady Grey Tea- it smells intoxicating

Soergel Orchards reusable bag

Olio Fresca's vinegar 

The Clueless Vegetarian cookbook 

Whew, and the day was only half over!