Eat Real

It's our annual visit (starting last year) and thankfully, this year it was less crowded and the weather was a lot cooler. I love this festival. It's filled with workshops, performances, cooking shows and so much delicious food. Today, I tried everything from chicken masala filled naan wraps to Numi jasmine popsicles. Here's what today looked like.

SF Street Food Festival

It's festival season in San Francisco! Today, we headed out to the Eat Real festival in Oakland but, that's not what I'm going to talk about. Instead, here's a snapshot of our time at the SF Street Food festival that happened a few weeks ago. It's a great food festival, but not my favorite. MANY vendors were not equipped to feed the masses all day. The best places sold out super quick so I wasn't a happy camper getting there hours after it began. Highlights of the day, watching the Mr. eat Don Bugito's moth larvae tacos and food from the Kasa truck (twice).

Obon Time

It's that time of year. Time to visit an Obon festival near you and play some Bingo, eat Spam musubi or tempura, watch the Taiko drummers and win a goldfish. Or win 3 in my case.

My 3rd year in a row visiting the Mountain View Obon!

Street Food Phenomenon

It's been around forever, but how and why has it become a huge trend throughout California? Beats me, but guess I shouldn't complain and just get my grub on. These street vendors offer Korean tacos by Seoul on Wheels to chicken adobo by the Adobo Hobo and the list goes on. The trick with most of these trucks/ carts is they don't always have a set schedule of where they'll be serving their dishes which is why Twitter has come in handy for the masses. Lucky for me, I attended the Eat Real festival over the weekend in Oakland and had a chance to sample a few of these. Check out a few of the dishes we all tried...

Hip Hop in the Park

The sun was out for this free hip hop festival in Berkeley. It unites hip hop heads from all walks of life. No food at this festival, but you will find great music, graf artists doing their thing & b-boys and b-girls bustin' their skills on the linoleum. The Blue Scholars headlined the show and before this, I've never heard of them. Events like this are a great way to introduce new favorites into your life. I just finished downloading a bunch of Macklemore tracks too.

35th Annual Sunnyvale Art & Wine Festival

This past weekend, Sunnyvale held their 35th Annual Art & Wine Festival. Though I consider myself a Bay Area native, it was oddly my first time attending the famous festival. Better late than never! The sun and crowds were present which, in my eyes, always makes for a successful event.
Unlike many festivals in the Bay Area, parking was an ease. A (FREE) parking garage was conveniently located right before the main street closure. Upon arrival, we took a quick stroll past a few tents and decided we couldn't walk around empty-handed. An ATM was easy to find and we were on our way to the beer tent to indulge in a Firehouse Hefeweizen & Stella.

At first thought, paying $5 for a pint-glass in order to get a beer (in addition to $5 drink ticket = $10 total for beer/glass) was totally absurd and a complete rip off. But, after really thinking about it, I realized that it does saves time, money & the environment. Still expensive, but semi-worth it don't you think? Probably could've lowered the price of the glass just a tad.

In addition to food & drinks, the festival was fully equipped with artwork, jewelry, informational booths from local artists and companies. They
even had a few bands performing throughout. I'm glad we made it to the event - it was the perfect way to spend the afternoon outdoors.