It was inevitable.
The inaugural Seattle Street Food Festival last year has turned every Northwest foodie into a ‘walking food festival fanatic’. With over 80,000 people shuffling their way from one food truck to another, the festival has become a creative business tactic to get an entire community to revel in a ‘glutton-ish’ kind of way.
Obviously, Seattleites love to eat, drink, and be merry, given the number of festivals held every year in this City of Goodwill. But the Street Food Festival virtually invaded the festival scene last year and now there’s no stopping it becoming an annual Seattle attraction looked forward to both by locals and tourists from around the globe.
It all started three years ago when the Mobile Food Rodeo was first introduced to this rainy, coastal city. Entrepreneur Ryan Reiter decided to expand the showcase of street food and, in July 2013, launched the first Seattle Street Food Festival as a two-day event. To describe last year’s festival as a rousing success, with 100 food trucks and over 200 small business owners participating, is an understatement. It was huge, and many food gluttons and connoisseurs praised the event as a bold and noble idea.
The 2014 Seattle Street Food Festival promises to be even bolder and more exciting. To be held on the 8th and 9th of August at Capitol Hill, this year’s festival features the same culinary choices – from flavorful masterpieces to bizarre concoctions – that awed everyone, including the most rigid food critics. The same flagrantly designed food trucks will serve the hottest menus from Now Make Me a Sandwich, The Barking Frog Mobile and the much revered Narwhal. Revelers will also be treated to a cacophony of drinks and beverages in this year’s Beer Garden that will also feature live entertainment through the night.
Besides showcasing the best, most unique flavors Seattle has to offer, the festival will again open wonderful opportunities for small businesses in Seattle to launch their unique products and services. Like last year’s Urban Craft Fair, this year’s Urban Craft Uprising will feature a wide variety of hand-crafted goods, from jewelry, bags, and accessories, to children’s toys, housewares, and much more. Over 100 vendors are expected to sign up to this arts and crafts market that usually opens days before the festival.
The best part is the organizer of the festival, Piranha Blonde Interactive, is keeping with the tradition of offering this event for free, with no fees charged to the general public. And they’ve done this through getting sponsorships from companies who have seen in this event a most lucrative way to attract customers and at the same time be able to reach out and help small entrepreneurs.
No doubt, in this year’s Street Food Festival, you can expect the same kind of feverish excitement and fun that Seattleites are in the habit of demonstrating even on rainy day (and in this part of the world, that’s six rainy days in a week!).
Heather is a writer, photographer and explorer of the world with bylines in Archaeology Magazine, Porthole Cruise Magazine, Taste & Travel, amongst others. She is addicted to pen, paper, hotels, organisation and hippos. In addition to Travel Gluttons, you can find her over at Cloggie Central. 
