Apple Festival of Kendallville

The Apple Festival of Kendallville celebrates its 25Th anniversary this year. A cacophony of color, aromas, music, people and entertainment it both assaults and satisfies its patrons. Cool weather thinned yesterdays crowds which despite the temperature made it more enjoyable for me. Visitors to the festival have been know to exceed 70,000 people, I was there in o5 and I think all of them were there on the same day.



Food and fall are screaming at every vendor, this is one of the better planned festivals with consistent high standards each year. Many repeat visitors have a list of what they plan to eat, with so many delicious choices planning ahead is an excellent idea. For me and it is apple dumplings, chicken noodle soup and spiced cider. I did sample Bruce's apple burger ( ground beef, ground apples, cinnamon, nutmeg and onion salt were included in the recipe) and taffy apple, we took home maple creams, walking around eating is highly underrated.


This year we enjoyed a bit more of the entertainment than usual, we caught most of the Mills Family which includes juggling, unicycles and plenty of good natured family humor. The family patriarch was miked and engaged the audience, often spouting one shameless pun after another. The show was cute and the juggling kept the children spellbound.


An old fashioned brass band walked the fairgrounds playing up tempo tunes and dancing with festival goers. Their vintage tuxes and tunes evoked Dickens . The vendors do a good job of announcing fall with their bales of straw, corn stalks, pumpkins, gourds and mums. Some of the decorated gourds especially caught my eye, they were little works of art with careful attention to detail.


A week end at the apple festival might mean an extra couple hours at the gym this week but yum........yum........it sure is worth it.





Fall is county fair time and we were lucky enough to enjoy seeing The Little River Band at the Dekalb County Free Fair last Tuesday night. I love Little River and have seen them several times. They are on my IPOD, my favorite song is Cool Change, Buffett should sing it.