Saratoga Springs officials and business owners are preparing for the city’s annual Chowderfest on Saturday.
It’ll be a sea of clams and crocks as Chowderfest returns for its 25th iteration, drawing crowds from around the Northeast to eat and vote for the best chowder served by participating restaurants in and around the city.
Commissioner of Accounts Dillon Moran, who is a co-owner of one of the participating vendors, says the city is ready for a return to form after the pandemic.
“This year it’s returning back to its traditional time in February, the business community readily identified to us, though, it was great in March, we really need that revenue in February to help. We gotta be cognizant of the fact that the businesses are a lot of the reasons that we do these special events,” said Moran.
Discover Saratoga, which was designated Saratoga County’s official Tourism Promotion Agency in October, has drawn 85 vendors to the celebration and hopes to beat last year’s attendance of 40,000.
Discover Saratoga President Darryl Leggieri.
“I think that restaurants know that it’s a winning formula for them. It provides great economic benefits during an otherwise slow period of the year. And, it’s a great way for people to just come on out and get rid of the cabin fever, and get outside with their friends and their family and make a day of it. There’s going to be something for everyone,” said Leggieri.
Vendors get creative with their chowder recipes, with this year’s menu ranging from “chicken pot pie” to “Thai curry shrimp” chowders, all the way to an “oreo tiramisu” dessert chowder.
Linda DiBlasio runs The Parting Glass, an Irish pub in Saratoga Springs’ downtown, and says staff is busy preparing 25 pounds of the signature “Luck of the Irish” chowder.
“We’re in the kitchen right now starting to make everything and count how many quarts and gallons of mil we’ll need. And we plan on selling at least 5,000 servings, hopefully more because it’s going to be so nice out,” said DiBlasio.
Having won nine Chowderfest awards since 2008, DiBlasio says she’s moved on from the competition aspect.
“You know I really don’t pay attention to that anymore. We used to try and compete but now we really just want a really good tasting chowder, and we just concentrate on having fun and selling lots of beer and dancing with the band,” said DiBlasio.
New this year is a zero waste washing station through the partnership of Hattie’s Restaurant, Caffé Lena, and Sustainable Saratoga. The station, says Sustainable Saratoga Executive Director Kelsey Trudell, aims to cut down on the thousands of single-use paper cups and plastic spoons that are discarded during the event each year.
“We ordered a set of these reusable bowls, we ordered around 215 of them. So, we’re hoping to go through those 215 at least two or three times over the duration of the event, so that’s upwards of 600 bowls or cups that we’re hoping we can divert from landfills and have people use instead,” said Trudell.
Trudell suggests attendees bring their own spoon to further cut back on the day’s waste.
