Gastrofest 2019 was pretty great. It was a lively day so the weather was definitely on our side. It was nice to see a mix of vendors that aren't normally at these events, new blood! Lived the green aspects and encouragement to bring utensils, etc. All the food was yummy and I got to see lots of friends! Great event in Jax. Keep it up. read more

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Hello beautiful city! With sunshine and breeze and cute fur babies walking around everywhere and delicious local food trucks and locally produced items this event was a hit! Location- right behind the mosh museum, by the river and friendship fountain. Vibe- outside, chill, jazz music playing, fur babies everywhere, organic locally produced products, nice open breeze. Great for social time. I was able to walk around and spot the homemade lemonade and honey stand locally sourced. The yogurts and ice cream was produced and churned everything was homemade. It was pretty packed with stands from restaurants like black sheep and Ethiopian, Brazilian and all kinds of food trucks were around. I loved seeing the chickens being fed greens by the children and the pet food truck tripped me out. I thought it was the cutest thing. I would've liked to see more different stands and different products this year but still it was an amazing time. I was able to spin the wheel for donations to the local kids in need and I won 3 tickets for golf and a wasabi neck chain from the anime convention. It was definitely all in great fun! read more

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Long overdue recap of Jax's best foodie festival. First off, Gastrofest takes place in Hemming Park in the middle of March. It's a perfect time of year for an outdoor festival. One you can actually walk around, mingle, sample, and not feel like you're going to suffer from a stroke. They truly make the focus of the event what we all long for: delicious food. The best part? The participating businesses sell small samples of their dishes, only for a few bucks a piece. Which allows you to indulge in a vast variety of restaurants without breaking the bank, or filling up too quickly. The absolute stand out was the Short Rib Mac n' Cheese, courtesy of Perfect Pear Catering. Like, so incredible, that nearly four months later, I still have midnight fantasies about the mind-altering flavors! Other restaurants like Il Desco, Orsay, and Blue Bamboo displayed great dishes as well. Same to all the other restaurants, too. And, the craft beer scene was on point this year. Kudos to Coppertail (Tampa) for stealing my hoppy palette. The only major qualm I had with Gastrofest was that it wasn't clear which restaurants would be present during each time slot. I attended the first half of the festival, but at 3pm, new restaurants set up shop. Not only wasn't I able to try any of their dishes, they didn't make it known in their promotion that the fest was essentially divided into two parts. Although the future of Hemming Park festivals is up in the air, Gastrofest knows how to please the masses. A great, foodie fest indeed! read more

Gastrofest - Short Rib Mac n' Cheese from Perfect Pear Catering was too legit to quit! - Festivals Near Me - Jacksonville, Florida

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GastroFarce! Thank God it was a beautiful day - one star strictly for the weather - another star for location. Execution - zero I haven't attended in the past & I wish I had. If this year was in any way representative of former years I'd have to really take any of my friend's endorsements with severe suspicion I've been to other events put on by the same group, but will do so with great caution in the future There were only a handful of restaurants represented & a smattering of food trucks. Entertainment was sparse & well worth the price of admission :) I hope they go back to the original format next year - if not - I'll spend my time elsewhere! read more

This side of JAX is so wonderful for a festival. The views of our beautiful city are breath taking. The festival was laid out nicely circled around the fountain. Various kinds of vendors were found not just food. The music was great but wished seating was better as it was full every time I stopped for lack of space. Their was not as much food booths as I wished they had and Long lines at the few kept me from trying alot of the food offerings but the one they had looked great. I was in and out within 2 hours and located great parking so it was a enjoyable time spent on a beautiful day. read more

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Gastrofest was fun. I actually looked to see what was happening and came to one of the talks they were having - Kailo Nutrition. Worth the hour of my time. I loved seeing the different kinds of vegan or gluten free alternatives. Ate some delicious food at El Mariachi Loco. Their Mexikale salad was in point! They had pupua that was like an arepa with a slaw and tomato sauce on top. Ended the day with a cookies and cream ice pop and slice of cake. They had food, music, how to's, beer, people watching, and more. I loved seeing my friend Maira there too. read more

Gastrofest - There was an El Mariachi Loco spot Omg.Top: they called it pupua? I would call an arepa. Bottom: Mexikale salad. Supper yummy. - Festivals Near Me - Jacksonville, Florida

Despite the rain on the horizon, this was a great event. I arrived just as things were getting started and there were pros and cons with such an early arrival. I had little difficulty finding parking, which was a good thing but unfortunately, some of the vendors weren't quite ready and others hadn't even arrived yet to set up! The advertisements suggested that all of the vendors would have "tasting" items but some restaurants - and food trucks - must've missed that memo. For the ones who did have sample items, the portion sizes varied, but most were worth the $2-3. I tried the following items: Nomi's Cheese Bar - Fried brie cheese ball ($3) Abtrakt - Chicken sisig taco tasting ($2) Pear Market - Coca-cola pulled brisket, chive cornbread, housemade pickle ($3) and jalapeno lemonade ($1) Bistro Aix - Bacon braised short rib and polenta cake ($3) Bono's/Pastiche - Pulled pork slider ($3) Congaree & Penn - Strawberry key lime soda ($1) Since this was my first year, I have nothing to compare it to, but I think I prefer paying for what I want rather than the set price, as was apparently the case last year. I don't think I could've eaten $45 worth of food, unless I spent the entire day there and was prepared to sleep the following day! Perhaps offering an "all-inclusive" option and an a la carte option would appeal to everyone. Kudos to the organizers! read more

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A festival all about Food!?!? Yes! Yes! Yes! GastroFest isn't just about food but that is the main attraction! It also highlights the beauty of Jax ( Loved the new location at Friendship Fountain), being Good to the environment ( be green), and trying all the foods! Loved the concept of having all the food vendors have small plates for sale for around $2-5 each that way you can walk around and try different places! So smart, I love sampling a bunch of different things! We tried BlkSheep they had a fried chicken slider which was tasty, then we headed over to Ibex Ethiopian and got the chicken plate...oh so good!! It was a sampler plate of quite a few items, each tasting better then the last! I will say for $11 it was a very skimpy plate, but it definitely sparked my taste buds to go to the restaurant to try a full meal! They had a whole row of beer and drinks tents, we got a drink from Manifest and they put the stank on it! Lol, it was strong!! They also had a band playing right next to the river, it was such a nice day out!! I loved it and look forward to going next year! Pro tip is bring cash, a bunch of $1 and $5!! read more

Loved this event! And I have to admit I was quite hesitant when I first started hearing rumblings when i was in the early planning stages. Was Jacksonville ready for such a festival? We most certainly were!! All the local favorites were there and the rotating vendors throughout the day, definitely kept it interesting and made it an all day affair. We ducked out of the heat for a bit and enjoyed the Gospel of Beer seminar and the Bold Bean Coffee cuppings being offered at Down the Rabbit Hole. I tried so much this fine River City had to offer. 29 South, Moxie, Black Sheep, Corner Taco, Jalapeno Truck, Orsay, and so many more. I waddled back to my car at the end of the day with a happy belly. Ran into so many people throughout the day and the weather honestly could not have been better! Can't wait to see this event come back. read more

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I've been looking forward to Gastrofest since I contributed to their IndieGoGo campaign late last year and it definitely stood up to my high expectations. I was only there for a few hours but managed to have a glass (well, cup) of wine from San Sebastian Winery, an empanada sampler from the Cat's Meow, insanely good cheese stuffed fried green tomatoes from 29 South, a super tasty crab cake with miso from Catering by Liz, Fresh Jax's avocado beet salad, Taverna's Israeli salad with tzatziki sauce, and Ceviche Jax's Peruvian ceviche. They had tons of food and drink options (any time of food you could imagine plus beer, wine, and mixed drinks) plus workshops, panels, and booths showcasing groups from the UF agricultural extension to the Jax Young Voters Coalition. Most of the negatives about the day (the Skyway can be confusing, it was super hot, a creepy dude trying to chat me up) were not things the organizers could fix. That said, there are a few things that could be done better in the future. The biggest problem I had was that quite a few of the food vendors only had a tiny sign with what they were serving. That meant if there was a line (and there was a line at most spots), you basically had to get in line without knowing what you were getting in line for. Other places had sandwich boards, which helped a lot. Overall, this was an amazing first year event. I'm already ready for next year! read more

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Color me impressed. If this is their first time organizing a Gastrofest, then the movers and shakers of this event are phenomenal. Although I've dined at many of these fine establishments, there were several that I wasn't aware of and I definitely plan on checking out their restaurant. Beer tents? No line. NICE. Seating? Easy peasy. Rotating vendors? Genius, because it makes purchasing the $45 bands worth the cost and keeps you there all day if you're so inclined. Variety of events related to the culinary arts? Yes, I'm a Nerd and thought the lectures were pretty interesting (although perhaps they could've made an announcement in between musical sets to let people know). Although no one controls the weather, it was nice, especially in the shade. At a festival, expect lines. If you're not down with that then festivals aren't your bag baby. I myself never waited more than 15 minutes. In the case of Orsay, I walked right up. Bistro Aix, 5 minutes max. Cerviche was my 15 minute wait but it was well well well worth it. We were there 11-9. Enjoyed meeting all kinds of people and seeing neighbors and friends enjoying Hemming Park. Standing ovation for the grit and tenacity of the people who made this event happen. Kudos to the volunteers (my son was among them) who contributed their time and also to the food loving public who made the Gastrofest a success. read more

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Love that Jacksonville is finally working towards bringing people downtown again! Hemming Plaza is a good location but parking is a challenge and it's kind of small for what they are trying to do. It's a shame that the first Baptist Church, who has several large parking garages downtown couldn't be bothered to open them up for this function or any other function that they are not directly involved in. This leads people to park willy-nilly all over downtown when you can find somewhere to park. This particular function was pretty well attended so unfortunately that meant it was crowded and people were kind of stuffed into hemming Plaza. The lines for the three food trucks I saw exceeded 20 minutes and had probably 25 to 30 people in each line. The food tasting stands were likewise overloaded. I tried grilled pork belly with watermelon and pickled onions from Sbraga. It was OK. The pork was dry despite the fact that it was surrounded by a lot of fat, I don't know how they manage that but I think probably they grilled it too long. It tasted like it had not been marinated at all, it actually tasted like it well-done piece of ham with the fat attached. That sucks because I really wanted to like it. Pork belly when done correctly is great. This was seven dollars and I got six small cubes of pork each probably 0.5" x 0.5" x 0.75 of an inch . Apparently they were bound and determined to make money off of this event wish I guess I can't blame them I also try the grilled corn on a stick Mexican style. It was tasty, the dip with that they put it into was a little bit dick and seem to be mayonnaise-based. It was half of a small piece of corn, three dollars is pretty expensive for that. All in all if the food at the location is the same as the stand I probably won't be going there. The Mexican food truck that is at a lot of these events was also there and they were good but also not great. Four tiny tacos and a quesadilla, and order of jalapeño poppers and a couple drinks came to over $50. I was really disappointed with the jalapeño poppers because they were literally taken out of the Cisco bags and thrown into the fryer, seven poppers for seven dollars. SMH. Do you believe that they used for the tacos was dry and overcooked and pretty tasteless I don't know if they were cutting some extra on the flyer or what but I thought it was better than this the last time Three dollars for a bottle of Mexican soda is also kind of steep but I get it, it's an event. They also charged me $1.50 for adding guacamole. They literally gave me a 2 ounce ramekin that was not even full. Sigh. We got a churro as well and that was 250, it was pretty good but I also think that it was prefabricated been ordered from a food distributor. No sauce. Just churro. Quesadilla at $12 was pretty tasty but it's hard to justify $12 for a quesadilla when you have to stand up to eat it next to the truck. It took them about 20 minutes to complete my order. I know it was busy. There was not enough seating for the amount of people that arrived and people were literally smashed and trying to walk around. Great idea but probably the wrong venue. Next year they should do it at Metro Park. Easy parking and plenty of room! read more

It finally happened and what an awesome turnout. I also had been looking forward to this event since I first heard about it during the committee's fundraising event at Blue Bamboo. My friends and I got there about 12 noon with plenty of parking around Hemming Park and the Parking Garage was still available for $5. I knew it was going to be hot so I opted for the garage and walked over. I was super excited to eat all day long and chill with my foodie peeps. I already had $25 worth of tasting tickets from their IndieGoGo campaign, but I went ahead and invested in a 4-star tasting pass for $45. With that band you can get all the tastings you want (where applicable) and use of the VIP bathrooms. I didn't partake in the bathrooms but a wrist-banded friend did and she said they were worth it over the porti-potties. Now where to begin with the food? In all, we got a blue cheese ball from Nomi's Cheese Bar, a handcrafted soda with mini chicken + waffles from Moxie, ceviche from Ceviche Jax, a crab cake from Catering by Liz, and Quinoa Salad from Fresh Jax, Fried Oyster Po'Boy from Bistro Aix, Carrot and Chickpea Hummus from Ovinte, a roast beef crostini from Funkadelic Food Truck, some parmasean fries and a Vanilla Shake from MShack, shrimp salad from Orsay, Nutella Meringue from Tres Leches, tasted part of a watermelon cupcake from Cupcakes 50 etc and a McKenzie Cider from the Beer Tent (cash only for that). The some of the lines were starting to get long so we paced ourselves and some tastings we purposely skipped over. We also sat in for some of the cooking demos from 13 Gypsies and tasted a Foie Bolonga something haha. That was pretty good. The most entertaining demo had to have been Chef Amadeus as he's seen our group around town and interacted with us lot while he was cooking. It turned out to be a beautiful day (with plenty of shade) for a foodie fest. I may go again next year as I see the potential in this event to be bigger. Good job Gastrofest team! read more

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My favorite part about gastro fest was definitely all the local craft breweries. To have green room, aardwolf, bold city and intuition all at the same place at once was definitely a little slice of heaven packed in to hemming park. There was a wide selection of some of the best restaurants from Jacksonville, a few food trucks, a band that just quite couldn't get it together (which definitely made it more fun), and a cute kids zone. My only complaint was that on the gastro fest website it said that the tastes would be from $1 to $3, which was definitely not the case since we spent $80 and we left still a little hungry. We tried the lamb gyro, jalepeno churros, spicy meatballs, shrimp sliders, seared wahoo and every item was delicious, but a super small potion for the price. I will definitely go back next year, but will not go starving as I did today since the lines are long and the portions are for someone who is 5 years old. read more

Was expecting more culinary offers specially from the gourmet cuisine restaurants and bistros present ( not many) at the fest. Instead it was more like fair ground food choices and vendors. Very disappointing. Venue should had been in a different park to acomódate more participants. Felt very crowded. read more

Great job goes out to the organizers. I stopped in today as I always do. I love it when these folks use Hemming Plaza for things like this. I really do like events downtown. Then to top it off it was a food thingy. I did like a lot of the restaurants that were there. From Bistro X, Taverna, Il Desco, Black Sheep, to name a few. There were also some cool venders with some art stuff and one of my favorite Congree n Penn farm with their rice and drink. The weather held off and it ended up being a perfect day for this event. I saw and met so many of my friends here as I normally do. They also had many speakers and that shared their knowledge of food and the way to prepare it. In all it was a great time and great weather. Till next year Y'all read more

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Great venue! Variety, variety, variety. We had a good but costly time. We started out with McKenzie hard cider ($5 per drink), then made the rounds to several of the food trucks and vendors. I enjoyed all 4 of the tastes I chose but, it quickly add up. Most tastes ranged between $3 to $15 based on portion sizes which, as I stated, quickly added up. We ended with another McKenzie hard cider. The weather was overcast and looked like it might rain but the sun decided to bless the event around 3:00, then it got hot in the plaza, even with the breeze blowing. There are lots of trees so it made things bareble. All in all I enjoyed myself. The event seemed to be well attended. I think next year they should have one price for admission and allow you to choose from several vendors then pay extra if you want additional tastes from others. Nothing should cost over $5 in my opinion. The a la Carte method was costly for a group of three. All I can say is SHARING IS CARING :) I would do it again though. read more

So well organized. I loved the fact that I did not have to stand in a long line for tickets. They had several booths and ticket sellers walking around in the park. My only complaint is that some of the vendors ran out of food early on. I am looking forward to more events like these! read more

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I am so glad I got to attend the Gastrofest this year! I truly enjoyed myself...If you can find candied bacon on a stick and deep fried brussel sprouts in one location, you're winning. Add in a bevy of local beers and liquors and you've found Nirvana. I couldn't stay long at the Gastrofest as I had a birthday party to attend, but for the time I was there, I was very pleased with the organization and efficiency. I do like the most cash transactions, I think that makes everything faster. Next year I plan on camping out and enjoying all of the festivities. read more

This is surprisingly well put together for an inaugural event. The food and drink vendors are outstanding (rotating vendors throughout the day is BRILLIANT!) and the entertainment is spot on. MOCA is open and has Ted talks playing in the theatre. The only thing I would change is couples or group pricing on the four and five-star passes. read more