We recently attended the Tacos and Tequila Festival in San Diego as media. Their offering of unlimited tacos, craft beer and tequila samples was too good to turn down. We saw a lot of happy people at the event.
Especially the hop, skip, and jump guy from one of the breweries! Is it surprising to see people posing for the camera when there's alcohol involved? Never. =)
We enjoyed the Latin Food Fest in San Diego last year and were pleased to be invited back for the Los Angeles grande tasting on March 21. Even though it's farther away, we knew there'd be many, if not all, new restaurants for us to sample! The sipping of spirits was also a plus.
The Los Angeles location was at Hangar 8, a 15000 facitity at the Santa Monica Airport. Paid parking lot ($10) and ticket pickup were to the right with the event to the left.
Entrance to the Latin Food Festival. It doesn't look all that big on the outside but there were additional booths, mainly the spirits, located in the back building.
We first got in the Stella Artois line for the purpose of collecting their cute glassware. I'm a fan of Belgium style beer so this one is nice and familiar. I also like their cider too.
While waiting for beer, Dennis picked up samples from the nearby Rosa Mexicano booth. The tableside guac was yummy but we needed more than two chips! The pink lemonade mixed drink was refreshing and light. The El Floridita booth had pork with a banana chip. The strands of meat were long which made it a bit chewier for us.
To the left of Stella was Coni'Seafood, serving raw shrimp marinated in jalapeno juice. There were definitely some hesitant looks as we took pictures. I finally gave it a shot and...
Inside the Cosmopolitan Hotel bar area, they were serving El Jimador, which actually did well in the competition in previous years. It's funny that once you learn about something, all of a sudden it's everywhere! I've been noticing this brand in the stores ever since last year...
The Spirits of Mexico Festival is in its 10th year of production with this being the 3rd year of participation for San Diego. We attended the Tequila Trail 2012 last year and had a blast!
To start, we picked up our tickets at will-call, which was located off San Diego Avenue and Twiggs Street. Just look for the big pop-up tents and workers, then pick up your will-call tickets or purchase them on the spot. Then you can take a look at the printed map and visit any of the locations in any order you please! On the back of the map was a list of restaurants and tequilas and we were pleased to see more than half of the tequilas were new to us! How exciting!
Continuing on with the Tequila Trail... (see part 1 here)
Barra Barra Saloon was the first place we hit that provided mini water bottles and I was so thirsty by this point! After a little 'healthy' liquid, we visited the alcoholic kind.
Welcome to Tequila Trail 2012, the kickoff of a week-long celebration of the "Spirits of Mexico" as well as a fundraiser for the Old Town Chamber of Commerce. Apparently, no other town in the US serves as much Tequila as San Diego! Doesn't that make you proud to be a San Diegan?
For our listening pleasure we heard familiar Mexican melodies from these talented ladies. Notice that spikey plant on the right? You'll see that later too!
The Spirits of Mexico Festival, North America’s largest and most prestigious tasting event for agave spirits, is returning to Old Town San Diego for its ninth year Sept. 9 – 16. It will be jam-packed with tasting receptions featuring more than 70 brands and over 200 varietals of rare and expensive tequilas, cocktail challenges, educational seminars led by master distillers, a comprehensive tasting competition and resultant awards ceremony, as well as plenty of authentic Mexican cuisine and entertainment including mariachis, live bands and stilt walkers.
