Our friends at Edible Orlando and Walt Disney World really know how to throw a great food party. The third annual Field to Feast event on Saturday was a terrific blend of bucolic and bacchanal as more than 200 guests roamed through an open-air pavilion sampling food, wine and cocktails proffered by some of Central Florida’s finest.
The event was in Mount Dora, or a suburb of Mount Dora, if that’s possible, at Long & Scott Farms, one of the names frequently referenced on the menus of restaurants touting farm to table cuisine. At F2F, the table is at the farm, and the chefs do the cooking and serving at stations set up around the perimeter of the pavilion. Large bales of rolled hay served as standing tables (though there were some conventional ones provided, too). Guests wandered from one station to the other, enjoying music provided by a band and the perfect weather as a full moon arose over the corn fields.
The event rasised more than $26,000 for the Second Harvest Kids Cafe project. This is just one of the best food events of the year, and I can think of only one way to make it better: Let guests pitch a tent on the grounds so they can just crawl in after enjoying all the food and drink and not have to face a long drive back to civilization. That Steak and Egg Skillet from the Event Operations crew would have been wonderful the next morning. Just saying.
Crowd favorite — mine, too — was the stuffed quail from Victoria & Albert’s. Chef Scott Hunnel was there personally serving the guests, assisted by sous chef Tom Hill and Hunnel’s wife, Marianne.
Brian Piasecki was there serving a California Grill version of spicy Shrimp & Grits. Piasecki was mum about the news that would break the next day about his new appointment at Disney.
The Artist Pointers served at Corn-milk Custard with kombu (kelp), caviar and colorful flower petals.
Disney’s Contemporary Bakery wowed everyone with a dessert of Strawberry Chortcake with rhubarb chantilly and a plastic tube shooter filled with St. Germain elderberry liqueur. Would have had another one if I didn’t have to drive home!
It wasn’t only Disney folks at the event. The guys from Winter Park Distilling Company were pouring some of their premium wares. And Rhys Galwak had some charcuterie from Swine & Sons.
This would have been so nice to wake up to.