A pricey Taste of Bloomington

Ahh, The Taste of Bloomington …a day waited upon by many a Hoosier, including myself. This being my first Taste of Bloomington, I wanted to make sure that I got there early in order to be one of the first to enter the festivities. I figured that 2:30 would be early enough, but there was already a line when I arrived …after finding a parking spot, that is. Seeing the line excited me, \"this must really be worth it\", I thought. 3:00 arrived, and I was on my way to the food, but first I had to pay to get in. Yes, that\'s right, pay. I have lived in Chicago my whole life and not once has the Taste of Chicago cost anything, until you wanted to buy food, of course. And so, this $4 entry fee started my Taste of Bloomington. \nI was pretty warm after my walk from the car, so the first thing that I wanted was a drink. The Coke tent looked very inviting … $2 later, my boyfriend had a Coke, $2 more and I had a Lemonade. So two of us had spent $12 already and hadn\'t even tasted an ounce of Bloomington. I figured that I better start tasting some food. First stop, Gratzi. I tasted the cheese tortellini with a creamy sundried tomato sauce. I was a little hesitant about creamy pasta sitting in a warmer on a hot day, but I was very impressed. It\'s a difficult task to make such large amounts of food ahead of time and have them taste great, but I would go and order this for sure. The small taste that I enjoyed was $2, but I also received an added bonus; the visitors of the Gratzi tent received coupons for the restaurant. Aver\'s Pizza was the next spot. I was on an \"Italian kick\". It was also good, but I would have been much better off ordering a whole pizza and sitting on my deck because it would have cost a lot less. \nAfter two Italian trips, I decided to start on another genre of Bloomington food…dessert. Bruster\'s Ice Cream was wonderful and well worth the cash. Although this ice cream facility is a much further trip than The Chocolate Moose and Jiffy Treet, it is well worth it! \nPeterson\'s is a little Bloomington treasure that I did not know about before visiting their tent; it\'s hidden in a corner in the little shops on 10th street. Peterson\'s had drinks, sundaes, vegetarian lasagna, sandwiches and more. I chose to taste the cookies … they tasted just like mom\'s! This is a place that I am definitely going to visit more often, even if it is just for a cup of coffee; the workers were the friendliest I encountered.\nAfter visiting two dessert vendors in a row, I was definitely full, so my boyfriend and I sat and listened to some Crooked County. After an hour or so of listening to what I would call \"not my type of music,\" we decided to get up and walk around. After talking at the Nick\'s tent with the extremely friendly workers, it was time for more food. This time, I decided to just walk up to a tent and try something. The Malibu Grill\'s \"Caramelized Salmon\" sounded gourmet, and it tasted alright, but I realized trying to eat gourmet at an outside tent fair does not work very well. I was way too full to taste anything else at this point, so to finish my Taste of Bloomington experience, I just walked around to see what the rest of the Taste-goers were enjoying. Everyone really enjoyed the corn on the cob from Kilroy's Sports Bar, and the ribs from Colorado Steakhouse were also a favorite. Strawberry Slushies from Kilroy\'s were in most people\'s hands at the hottest times of the afternoon and, of course, the Beer/Wine Garden was always full of Hoosiers.\nNone of the food at the Taste was more than $3, but that does not mean that portions were large -- many were very small. It was now time for a nap and time for me to say goodbye to the Taste of Bloomington. To say it as politely as possible, I don\'t think that I would do it again. It is a much better deal to taste Bloomington at the Bloomington restaurants themselves, unless the waiter/waitress race is something that really floats your boat.