Valley Greek Festival

Date: May 23, 2009

Location: Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Northridge

Distance from Home: 12 miles

Festival Fee: Free

Parking: Pretty much street parking in a mainly residential area (although on a major street).

I had heard from a variety of sources that the Greek Festival was one of the best festival offerings out there.  Whether the Valley Greek Festival was “THE” Greek Festival that seems to have everyone so smitten is unknown although I’m guessing that it wasn’t.  It was none-the-less with much anticipation that we set out on that afternoon on our way deeper into the Valley, this time with our friend and adopted son Vince along as guest festival patron.  Not knowing the church by name, when we approached St. Nicholas I was delighted to realize that it was a church I had admired in passing on a number of occasions.  I was even more thrilled when I learned that church tours were offered as part of the festival.

Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church…

Climbing the front steps we passed to the side of the church onto the festival grounds, which were a bit smaller than I had imagined and were, rightfully so, dominated by food booths.  There was also a large bandstand with an accompanying dance floor that was continuously filled with dancers – either older festival patrons who had been moved to their feet by the Greek music, or local dance students demonstrating the numerous dances they had learned.

Starting as usual with a quick walk through we passed by the main food area and back behind the church to the small collection of craft booths.  If I had one complaint about the festival it would likely have to be the size of this area, which was limited to about 8 or 10 tents.  While the food was a major draw, I would have liked to see more arts and crafts.  With very limited options we quickly passed through the tents offering packaged Greek foods, jewelry and clothing, Orthodox iconography, various Greek odds and ends, and one tent full of Russian stacking dolls with dogs portraits painted on them – all of which seemed to be looking directly at you leaving one feeling oddly unsettled walking through the tent.  I wonder now whether each layer had its own portrait.  One could also pick up blank dolls to create their own eerie dog portraits.  Thinking back, and hoping I didn’t miss them if they were there, I would like to have seen a set of dolls where each layer was a different Orthodox icon.

Why won’t they stop looking at me?…

Sampling the Food

With food being the main aspect of the festival, it’s difficult to leave this in its own little section, especially since we tried so much of it.  It was in the “crafts” section where we got our start, sampling a couple types of pastry.  While the baklava was calling, I figured it was an opportunity to branch out in the world of Greek pastries (as much as you can when they all seem to be variations on a theme) and started with the kataifi – “a shredded pastry stuffed with nuts, spices and sweet butter, browned in the oven and steeped in syrup”.  Try as I might to break out, in the end the theme won out and it tasted an awful lot like baklava, which is not a bad thing.  Vince was a little more successful in breaking away with the melomakarouna – a “honey delicacy with a bit of orange flavor and a touch of Cognac, dipped in honey and sprinkled with walnuts” – which was also very tasty.

Starting the festival, as we did, in the middle of the day, these pastries really just served as appetizers and we decided that it was time to head back to the main food area.  It was probably a good thing that we arrived at the festival with empty stomachs since everything looked so delicious and it was near impossible to limit our grazing to one or two items.  After a quick walkthrough we came to the logical conclusion that sharing was the way to go and split up to converge again with fried calamari (I later learned an unfortunate truth when I saw them wheeling around boxes of frozen Italian style calamari), loucanico (Greek sausage sautéed with orange rind and lemon juice and served with olives, bread, and feta cheese), and pork souvlaki (marinated and grilled pork skewers).  The latter was served with baguette slices dipped in pork juices declared to be so delicious that Vince wanted to drink that juice with a large boba straw that would allow him to suck up any random chunck of pork that happened to be floating by – so I suppose you could say that was pretty good.  Each of these were indeed, delicious, though the fried calamari was probably the most pedestrian of the bunch – likely due to its Italian heritage…for shame Greek festival.  Having ultimately only had a few bites of each dish we were all still a bit hungry so went back for more.  Courtney had to have some more of the loucanico while Vince and I opted to give the gyros a try.  Sadly, they were nothing to write home about and I wished that I had had some more pork instead.  Thus filled we set out to make the rounds to see if we had missed anything.

Can’t talk, eating…

It was then that some of the dancing demonstrations began out on the dance floor.  We gathered around and expecting adult dancers were tickled by the very young and extremely non-Greek children who took made their way through several dances all while being reminded to smile by a very enthusiastic teacher.  After a couple of age groups the stage was given back over to the older festival patrons.

Looking pretty swarthy to me…

Back in another corner of the grounds was the children’s entertainment section outfitted with your standard carnival games – knocking down the milk bottles, popping balloons with darts, etc.  I watched these and pondered the rationale behind rewarding children who win these games with the prize of a living goldfish.  Perhaps I am an old curmudgeon but there is a small part of me that thinks it is cruel to the parents to award children with something that will eventually die and leave them potentially heart broken. 

Electing not to saddle ourselves with a life we headed back over to the crafts section where a cooking demonstration was about to take place.  We milled about a bit, waiting for the demonstration to begin but ultimately jumped ship when we got a copy of the recipe simply because the tent was not designed for any sort of crowd and the demonstration was focused to a very narrow selection of people.

Having gone nearly half an hour without eating anything we figured that is was surely time for a little dessert.  Back into the food court we grabbed a further selection of pastries, further variations on the theme and all delicious but whose names now escape me, as well as a very small Greek coffee.  I was surprised to find that I enjoyed the coffee, not being one who usually drinks coffee – though I was less delighted by the layer of sludge that seemed to make up about half the contents of the cup.  All this was topped off by the marvelous loukoumathes or “Greek donuts”.  While Vince can have the pork juice, you could bathe me in the honey and cinnamon that smothered these heavenly fried dough balls.

Deep fried goodness…

Deciding to cut out while we could still move under our own power we started to make our way out, only to be reminded of the church tour.  Once again, having admired the church in passing I was excited to see the inside.  While I would hesitate to call it a tour (how much can you tour what is essentially one large room) it was an interesting audio presentation that briefly described the history of the Eastern Orthodox religion and offered a few facts about the founding of the church and the multitude of mosaics that covered the walls.  It was a pleasant half and hour or so and while not much of a religious person myself I do enjoy a good house of worship and have always enjoyed the art of Orthodox iconography.

Buying a Souvenir

While I probably should have gone with some of the iconography (or a dog faced nesting doll which could be staring at me even now) now of the pieces on offer really jumped out at me and they all seemed rather ordinary.  Not wanting something that would just sit gathering dust and having just about used up the soap I had purchased at the Cherry Blossom Festival I went with a practical purchase and walked out with some soap made with olive oil.  I’ve used it a few times since I bought it and can report that olive oil makes a fine soap.  That said, I could probably be  a little more daring with my purchases.

Overall I’m going to have to give the Valley Greek Festival four and a half olives.  It was a very nice afternoon, they certainly stuck to their theme, but I ultimately would have liked to have seen more in terms of Greek goods and crafts to counterbalance the food.  Though you can’t argue going with a strong point and it certainly was some of the best food that we’ve had since starting the festival rounds.  It was another good festival for families or anyone looking for a nice bit of Greek food.  Assuming that this was not really “the” Greek Festival, it has piqued my interest and made me ready for more.

Click on photos for larger views.