Taste of Chicago? More like "Waste of Chicago"

See what I did there? Clever title, right? right?

So last week I went to Chicago's annual display of "local cuisine" -- grease and meat. I was actually really looking forward to this, having never been before but having heard great things. And besides the sort of insane clouds and weather

Weird clouds above Buckingham Fountain

it's absolutely true that the coolest part of the event was the vibe of it -- thousands of people happily eating, chatting, walking around. All walks of life, all facets of the city eating pizza and ribs.

However, the one attraction that should be the most appealing -- food -- was absolutely lacking. Trying not to be overwhelmed by the more than 70 booths, I chose early that I was going to get $16 dollars worth of tickets, spend half on the Taste perennial favorite -- barbecue turkey leg from Manny's -- and corn on the cob (one of the few vegetable-like things I could find). What I got was largely vile. The corn had been steaming in  water for what seemed like hours, and was cloyingly sweet and buttery and generally bad. The turkey leg was overdone--the meat stringy and dry. I was hesitant about eating this kind of mass-produced meat at the Taste, but figured I might do it for the experience. Instead I got this gross massive thing of meat smothered in cheap barbecue sauce. I threw out almost all of it, which just made me feel worse about wasting all that horrible meat.

Figuring I'd just hit a bad string of shops, I bought more tickets to supplement the $4 I had left to try vietnamese egg rolls (almost entirely rice flour rolls with no filling. apparently they want you to ignore this by smothering it in duck sauce), poutine fries (think, soggy fries covered in watery gravy, the kind you make from a powder you buy at a grocery store), dried chilli chicken (good, but not as dry or as well-balanced in terms of spicy vs. other flavors as when you get in the purveyor's normal chinatown restaurant) and fudge (soft and artificial-tasting. like it had been made with nesquick powder. maybe not bad for some people, but I found it way too sweet). I mean, I guess I shouldn't be too surprised, because you're asking these shops to cook in make-shift kitchens outside for thousands of people, but seriously, this food was almost all bad! And yet people were walking around stuffing their faces.

Now that the Taste has closed, it seems as though the whole endeavor lost money, which is a real shame because the City of Chicago / the organizers had really done a fabulous with the logistics of the events. There were ample, well-maintained toilets with hand-washing facilities, plenty of areas to sit down and eat, really good promotional materials and maps, police presence, and overall a tame, organized vibe. It's frustrating that a well done city attraction like this can't bring in revenue