Garlic and Castles

My friend Scotty is the best. He, our friend Joe and myself did the most fun thing on Saturday. We went to the Garlic Festival up in Saugerties, New York. If you've never been, you must put it on your calendar for next year.

When you first get there, there are lots of booths with homemade items, like pottery, jewelry and soap, etc.. But truth be told, a little pricey and I don't need more crap in my house than I already have.

So onto the food. THE FOOD WAS AMAZING. Everything we ate was garlic, garlic garlic and very well seasoned. Excellent.

The first thing we did was take some beano, knowing what we were in for with all the eating....I don't think I have to detail this fact....you all know.

The first food stop was mushrooms sauteed with garlic, herbs (and very little oil). They were awesome. Then on to the garlic bratwurst. And people were soooo nice there. I'm walking along with my little sandwich and this lovely older black woman stops me and says....You must have fried garlic on that sandwich and plops some of her garlic in my sandwich and some in Scotty's sandwich. DELICIOUS. We decided right then and there....Must get our own fried garlic.

Next was a garlic shooter. Yes, I said garlic shooter. Garlic and lemon. Scotty and I clinked our little plastic glasses and shot it back.

We had garlic and potato soup which was more of a chowder in these GIANT bread bowls. The bread they gave us made Au bon Pain's bread bowls look like a tiny roll. Couldn't eat all the bread, but the soup with a little of the bread scooped up and into our mouths...Awesome.

Of course we did get our roasted fried garlic. It was awesome. We also got some fried pickles. Yep, they were good. They didn't have the sauteed artichokes ready so we missed that. Must do that next year. But this cart had the best sign ever. AND I think all establishments should have this sign up and follow through:

"UNATTENDED CHILDREN WILL BE GIVEN AN ESPRESSO AND A PUPPY"

That will teach parents to parent their child and keep an eye on them.

All in all, the kids at the festival were very well behaved. Maybe it's just NYC parents who don't know how to control their kids. I don't know. But we are not here to chat about that. Back to the food.

The Garlic Pizza was awesome. We had coconut shrimp and crab cakes that were awesome and we topped all this off with....wait for it.....Garlic Gelato. It was delicious. Not overwhelmed with garlic, with a slight carmel taste. Gently sweet. Delicious. Really enjoyed.

Now there was also lots of fresh garlic to buy, too. There was garlic in decorative weaves, and things and just plain garlic. I bought some Roja and some Music garlic. I've already made one thing with some. I mixed the two. I fried them out in some grape leave oil with some spinach and spices and then wrapped that in layers of phyllo dough with some brie cheese inside. Delicious. (I made this when I returned on Sunday)

So we stayed overnight in Hudson, New York so we could go to Olana, which is a state historic site that was designed by Frederic Edwin Church in the 19th century. He was an artist who was with the Hudson River School of Art. Mr. Church apparently was originally going to create a home that was more victorian, but after taking his wife to a trip to the Middle East got reinspired and came back and made this home very middle eastern. You must go see it. It's fabulous and there is so much history. And the views from the castle are incredible. Here is the website if you want to know more: www.olana.org.

Anyway, that's all for now. If I can, later I will try to post some pictures.

Have a great day all!