Food Highlights: Broad Appetit Food Festival

My extra long weekend (I took Friday off) felt like a lifetime of moving, and I was caught somewhere between GET EVERYTHING DONE and I QUIT the entire time. I don't remember moving ever feeling this endless. Our(!) new apartment is only about a mile from our old places, so Garland and I had the "luxury" of being able to make multiple trips and move gradually. In hindsight, I wish we had just hired a truck and movers and been done in one day...instead of three.

Now, here we are living together. In our half-unpacked apartment. I know the "whoa, we're really doing this" thoughts and comments will continue for a few more weeks. But amongst the clutter and stress (I can barely handle the amount of boxes!), I'm really loving this transition into the new normal :)

About a month ago, I realized that our move was going to coincide with something very important to me: Broad Appetit. It's only my favorite festival and the event that officially made me fall in love with Richmond 2 years ago. I begged Garland that we take a break from the moving situation to go and eat some crazy food. Also, there's beer a.k.a. the ultimate bribe.

There are way too many great restaurants represented to list, and not to mention to pick from! In total, there are about 70 local restaurants and they were all serving at least one $3 plate. Our final selections were...

Deep-fried candied bacon powdered sugar, The Broadberry --- We can check bacon off of Garland's ongoing "deep fried foods" list. We split a skewer, but I wish we'd gotten two because these were so good! Smokey and not too sweet...and definitely not something I'd made at home. The Broadberry is a new restaurant, but mostly marketed as a venue for bands so probably not somewhere we'll dine in the future.



Braised beef sandwich with provolone, stone-ground mustard and pickles, Lucy's --- My coworkers and I dined at this restaurant for lunch a few weeks ago, so I knew whatever they had would be delicious and locally sourced. They had small plates of two dishes on their standard menu: Baxter's Beef sandwich (made with beed from Monrovia Farm) and Non "Spaghetti and Meatballs" (artichoke, spinach & avocado “meatballs” over spaghetti squash and pomodoro sauce). It was a difficult choice, but we went with the beef---convinced by the house-made pickles. The beef was so tender and flavorful. LOVE!



S'mores with toasted homemade marshmallows and marshmallow ice cream, Shindigz --- Yeah, yeah I know it's sugar but this really was our favorite plate of the day! The serving size was awesome--any larger would've been too rich--and the s'mores flavors were perfectly balanced. One bite and Garland demanded that we go to their (desserts only) cafe for dinner one night! ...of course!





Spring rolls with pork and local veggies, Patina --- This is a restaurant I'd never heard of and learned that it's in Short Pump and focuses on locally sourced food as well. This was our last plate of the day and, really, I was supremely full from the s'mores and should've ended there. But I got these on a final whim. I was disappointed to find out these were heavy on the pork; it felt like I was eating a wrapped sausage link with a few veggies worked in. They were also pretty oily, so any semblance of a healthy plate was largely negated. I'd classify them as good, local bar food and definitely worth the $3. I'd probably venture out to their restaurant to try some more items off their menu.