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Jungle Jim’s Weekend of Fire X – 10 Years of Heating Up the Midwest

weekend-of-fire-x-10-2016

Are you serious? Jungle Jim’s Weekend of Fire fiery foods show is already turning 10 years old? Outrageous!

The venerable Weekend of Fire (or WOF for short) is an expo that will always remain special to me. Why? It was one of the first hot sauce festivals of any kind that I’ve attended. Unlike more “national”, larger-scale events like the Fiery Foods Show in Albuquerque, New Mexico or ZestFest in the Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas area, the WOF felt a little more like “home” in its more centrally-located digs in Fairfield, Ohio, inside of the Cincinnati metro area. During the first several years of the WOF, the Jungle Jim’s staff graciously let us fiery foods bloggers have our own booth (which we’ve used for various purposes, from being a “hub” to plug in and charge our electronic devices to raising money for charities) at the show. Us bloggers have been able to give massive amounts of input into the show, including the schedule structure and eating contests. We’ve recorded chilehead round table podcast episodes there on the premises. The WOF’s venue is the Oscar Event Center, which is technically a part of Jungle Jim’s International Market, one of the greatest supermarket experiences in the world. Last, but not least, the WOF has often coincided with the unaffiliated CaJohn’s Open Houses 90 minutes northeast in Columbus, Ohio, itself a lighter, fun excursion for hardcore chileheads.

And now…this li’l ol’ show has been going on for ten years? Where in the world has the time gone?

Anyway, this year’s Weekend of Fire marks a return of the Roberts clan to the event. We’ll be hitting most, if not all, of both days it is open – Saturday, October 1st and Sunday, October 2nd. If you happen to see any of us wondering about the show floor, feel free to stop and say “hi!”

If you are looking for any reason to attend, let me give you a few:

There are plenty of fun eating contests to participate in or just watch (merely witnessing eager contestants scarfing down large quantities of scorching hot buffalo wings, hot dogs, pie, pizza, and more while sweating and turning lobster-red is a blast in and of itself). A full schedule of food battles can be found at…

SauceFest LLC Announces Postponement of Festival

saucefest-houston-txGourmet Food and Music Festival Postponed Until 2017

Houston, TX | August 1, 2016:

SauceFest LLC (“SauceFest”) regrets to announce that the gourmet food and music festival’s inaugural run has been postponed until the fall of 2017. The event was originally scheduled to take place October 22-23, 2016 on the streets of East Downtown Houston. The festival is now tentatively scheduled for October 2017.

To ensure that SauceFest 2017 brings the heat, iBurn® is working with Houston’s own Pegstar Concerts to deliver a music lineup that only Pegstar can deliver. The 2-day festival will also feature gourmet food products with heat levels ranging from mild to the world’s hottest, craft beer and liquor brands, local restaurants, cooking demonstrations, and eating…

2016 Oxnard Salsa Festival

oxnard-salsa-festival 20162016 Oxnard Salsa Festival
23rd Annual Festival

Celebrating Salsa – The Food, the Music & the Dance!
July 30-31, 2016
Plaza Park, Downtown Oxnard
11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Free Admission and Parking

Oxnard, CA – Get ready to spice things up during the 23rd Annual Oxnard Salsa Festival!  One of Oxnard’s signature events, the Oxnard Salsa Festival celebrates salsa food, music and dance on July 30-31, 2016 at Plaza Park, Fifth and “B” Streets, in historic downtown Oxnard.

Presented by the Oxnard Downtowners, the annual event features spicy food and hot entertainment, attracting an estimated 45,000 salsa lovers to the City of Oxnard for the two-day action-packed…

Summer Fest – One Weekend, Three Festivals

sun-prairie-wisconsin-summer-feast-bacon-brew-bbq-festThe ultimate festival for food lovers, families & craft beer enthusiasts in Wisconsin.

The Summer Feast is a 3-day celebration from June 24-26th in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin (near Madison), featuring specialty cuisines, craft beers and music. Each day, Chefs focus on different flavors which makes each day of the festival unique. There are activities for kids and adults, live music, Junior Chef Competitions and much more. The Friday & Sunday events offer free admission, are family-friendly and allow for multiple food choices at affordable prices. Saturday is for adults 21 and up and is an All-You Can Eat & Drink Festival which requires an advance ticket purchase. Enjoy three of the most unique food festivals, all in one location, all in one weekend…

Hot Sauce Festival Season Heats Up in 2016

new-hot-sauce-festivals

Just when you think things couldn’t get any hotter, think again.

More fiery foods events are being set ablaze all of the U.S. this year. And while more events does not necessarily equal satisfaction and success on all levels, there are a handful of events – including a pair of new expos – that have an excellent chance of elevating the chilehead community to another exciting level. Why, you might ask? Because they are produced or co-produced by none other than Steve Seabury himself, the man behind the hugely successful New York City Hot Sauce Expo.

Both returning for a second go-around are the California Hot Sauce Expo and the NJ Taco Festival.

The California Hot Sauce Expo, scheduled for July 16th and 17th, is similar in a lot of ways to the kick-ass NYC event in its formatting, with vendors galore and spicy eating contest, just instead hosted in sunny Long Beach, CA as opposed to the cool, crisp Brooklyn streets.

The NJ Taco Festival, while alike in a…

Weekend of Fire 2012 Diary and Photos

weekend-of-fire-2012-wof-johnny-mclaughlin

Another Weekend of Fire is in the record books. While there are always things that can be improved (more on that later), I feel the experience overall was a positive one for virtually all parties involved.

My own journey began on Friday afternoon. Shortly after my two boys came home from school, my youngest son, Kevin, and I hit the highway eastbound and down towards Cincinnati. It was rainy all day in Missouri, so I was hoping for a little break in the wet weather. We had no such luck, as torrential downpours followed us all the way through Illinois and Indiana. Right after we crossed the Ohio border, the rain slowed and ceased completely within 30 seconds. Kevin and I made our way to the familiar confines of the Holiday Inn Express in Fairfield (where we were sharing a room with Al “Buddah” Goldenberg of I Love It Spicy, just down the road from Jungle Jim’s International Market, and crashed.

Saturday

Our morning began with breakfast and a trip to the Jungle Jim’s store. 12-year-old Kevin was enthralled by the shear enormity and selection of the place. I stocked up on a few hot sauce items not sold at the Weekend of Fire Show in the Oscar Event Center upstairs, dashed out to my truck to grab my laptop bag, and went into the show. It was still T-minus one hour before showtime, so Kevin and I had ample opportunity to stroll around and view all the booths as they were being set up for the day and got to meet some of the vendors, both old friends and new exhibitors to the show…