Lincoln Square Apple Fest

We came to this festival by accident. We were returning a toy to a store that happened to be in the middle of the festival. There were so many people that it was hard to move around. There were a couple of things that sounded delicious to eat but the lines were so long that it made it not worth it. There were so kid things to do but the lines for those were insanely long too. I think if we did this next year, we would get an early start. We went around 12. I prefer to go to festivals when they first open to avoid crowds and lines.

I loved this fest last year but this year the lines were so incredibly long it just wasn’t worth it. Last year I bought things from at least 4 different vendors, this year, I got some snacks and left. Not worth the trip out.

It was busy with long lines for food and drinks. I didn’t mind the crowd too much but the lines were beyond outrageous. Maybe bc it’s free that the crowd was plentiful. It has a lot to offer, but again limited access due to the lines. Very kid friendly.

I look forward to fall activities more than my own birthday, and the Lincoln Square Apple Fest is typically a part of my autumnal rotation.
This year, it rained cats and dogs. I mean not literally, though that would have been awesomeeeee, but it poured the rain. Tough luck for the fest, considering what a gorgeous fall Chicago experienced this year. But the mister and I slogged through the damp and wet and went about perusing the different vendors. This year they were all about the same. The same variety of apples, the same over-​priced cider, and the same delectable pies. In hindsight, I should have bought a pie. They were beautiful and probably tasted even better. The apple selection could have been better but I understand that’s up to the farmers. And God. I was still disappointed I didn’t find any Jonah Golds though. I did find a lot of pumpkins to bring home, which pleased me to no end.
However, whatever is in water in LS4 has got the kiddies up there acting a fool. I was in the middle of perusing some lovely baby Cinderella pumpkins when a small female human approached me and kept telling me «I wan a punkin!» Ok… I don’t care… who are you even? I thought I had shaken her tail on me by moving down the pumpkin display, but after I huddled under the umbrella with the mister, the small human found me again, shoved a pumpkin in a my face, and proceeded to demand that I buy her that pumpkin. Not to worry, I set her straight and told her she did not belong to us and then shooed her out of our umbrella space. Some SERIOUS shade was thrown to her parents over by the cider who couldn’t be bothered to coral their git. They of course didn’t care and were probably relieved to have a few minutes of peace from their minion. I, on the other hand, am now scarred for life.

This stretch of Lincoln Ave already gets me kind of frazzled on a normal day with the car vs pedestrian traffic. But close the street down, add booths/​vendors, a doggie costume contest, a bouncy house castle, strollers upon strollers and it becomes a hot mess.
I love fests and this one offers some great things – neighborhood businesses handing out information, free contests (I won 2 mos of free classes at a gym!) fresh apple farm apples and yummy apple pie from the chopping block. It was just so congested, there was hardly any room to walk/​maneuver. When you had to line up for things – like the donut vendor or the bounce house, you ended up lining up in front of other vendor’s booths. Not cool for them and not cool for the folks that want to check that vendor out. The space they gave for Timeless toys and the products they were showcasing was unbelievably small so kids were just kind of climbing over each other to play with the items.
I don’t shy away from events that are «Family Friendly». I get it, there will be lots of kids, and strollers. My 3 year old was excited to go to this. We arrived early (915) and it got crowded fast. But this fest, ugh, by 1030 I was ready to call it quits. We hit Merz and Provenance and got the heck out of there.
I love the stuff that I ended up buying at the fest – donuts, fresh apples and the apple pie, but I don’t think I’ll return to the fest unless there are some logistical changes.

We have friends who live in Lincoln Square, and visit them from time to time. They told us about this festival, and since we know the area fairly well and really enjoy this area of the city, we thought we would hit up this fest on Saturday. We arrived about 1:15 pm. There was no music, so it didn’t give me a festive vibe. The crowd was a bit strange too. It was a gray and gloomy Chicago afternoon with light rain, on and off, as we walked through the apple fest. We walked and walked for a while before stumbling upon the apple vendors. They were selling cinnamon apple bread at $ 10 a loaf. I can get the same kind of loaf at the Swedish Bakery for half the price! We had to walk almost to the very end of the vendors before we found any apples. WTF! Finally, we found Fuji Apples from a Michigan farmer. We purchased 2 quarts (for a total of $ 6). We walked around for 30-​minutes, looked at each other and said «Let’s hit up the Lakeview Taco Fest.» Before we left I noticed «The Chopping Block» offering home made apple pie. My husband loves apple pie, so he purchased a slice. He said it was A-​OK and rated it with 3-​stars. I took one tiny bite and the crust was sponge-​like. I didn’t care for the crust. I rate the crust with 2-​stars while the apples inside were tart, sprinkled with cinnamon and a light brown sugar. I tasted one tiny piece of apple, which was excellent. The apples inside the pie are worthy of 4-​stars. The slice of pie from «The Chopping Block» was a decent slice of apple pie, but at $ 6 per slice, it was a bit on the pricey side. We are a couple with disposable income. We are not thrifty with our money. However, the Lincoln Square Apple Fest was not inexpensive. Although there were some vendors that were on the pricey side we did manage to find other vendors who were more reasonable.
We grabbed a couple of veal bratwursts with sauerkraut which made for the perfect amalgamation. They were purchased at the Chicago Brauhaus (a German restaurant that has been around for a very long time in Lincoln Square) and we both agreed that the veal brats were worthy of 4-​stars. We stood under a tree eating our veal brats, because it started raining lightly. Thankfully, we had an umbrella. This festival is geared toward young families. We saw children with balloons. We also noticed a lot of young families with baby carriages. This was our first time attending the Lincoln Square Apple Fest. We do not plan on returning next year. They were selling apple cider, but at $ 10 a gallon, I’ll go to Mariano’s and pick up a gallon for a lot less than 10 bucks. I would have to be super drunk to pay $ 10 for a gallon of apple cider! I recommend this festival for young families. We were disappointed that there weren’t more apple vendors here. After all, the name of this festival is the «Lincoln Square Apple Fest,» but we found this festival boring and uneventful.
We ate Fuji apples on Saturday evening. They were juicy and sweet and very, very delicious. We both agreed that the Fuji apples from Michigan were 5-​star worthy!
We headed over to the Lakeview Taco Fest and were glad that we did, because it had a pretty good vibe, nice crowds, really good live music and best of all fantastic, flavorful tacos. I wrote a review for the «Lakeview Taco Fest» too.

I thought that Apple Fest was cute, but where are all of the apples? I arrived around 12:30 and left around 2pm after popping into several stores. I loved the pumpkin and squash vendor. I didn’t see anyone with an apple donut, I saw two apple pies at $ 20 each, I saw one place with Applewood Pulled Pork, but they were out of the bread pudding. I didn’t see any apple sauces and only one vendor appeared to have jams, butters, and syrups and ciders. I did see some people selling baskets of apples at I believe $ 8 for what looked like 2lbs of apples.
When you tell me «Apple Fest» I’m thinking donuts, pancakes, cakes, candied apples, apple salsa, apple freaking soap and lotion. Some of the lines were absolutely out of a nightmare for Dinky’s for example. Really hard to navigate with human sized (ADORABLE) dogs and space ship strollers (not so adorable), but isn’t that the norm of every Chicago fest?
Would I go next year? Um, well maybe! I think they need to add more vendors so that lines aren’t so crazy. Maybe multiple vendors with cupcakes, pies, etc so not just one vendor has them, has a long line, gets to charge +++ prices, and blocks up all of the traffic.

Apple Fest was a bit underwhelming. That or my expectations were too high.
I love Lincoln Square so the location was perfect as was the weather, but I really felt like that could have been more vendors selling apple related products. I saw maybe no more than 5 booths selling apple products. I didn’t see an apple pie when I stopped by around 2:00. Needless to say, I did not get my hands on the infamous apple pie from Chopping Block mentioned in the other reviews. Nope. They were all out by the time I got there.
My boyfriend and I walked around a little bit and then waited in a long line for apple cider. Unfortunately, he got a lukewarm cup while mine was burning hot since it was from a new batch. That was a little disappointing.
We both a gallon of apple cider for $ 9 and it tastes yummy, but is a bit much price wise, but understandable since we were at Apple Fest.
Overall, OK, but definitely would not trek all the way out from the suburbs to it unless I had other things planned to do in the area.

After being away from Chicago for a few years, it was nice to return to Chicago to go to a few street festivals. And even though this is not your typical festival (this is more family friendly), it is one of my favorite ones.
You got apple pie by the Chopping Block, sausages by Chicago Brauhouse, pork by Foutain Head and a few other places… Then there is apple cider, apple whiskey, apples, crepes, and you leave with a stomach ache. If you were planning to get your standard street festival food here, this is not the place for you. If you want to celebrate apples and the harvest, well come and enjoy

There is not much to this festival. Basically you can buy some apples and cider. Although there are cute little girls dressed like apples. It’s nice that Lincoln Square has this festival but there’s so much more they can do with it. They do have it every year though.

Out of Lincoln Square’s long list of festivals, I sadly have to place Apple Fest towards the bottom of the list. Keep in mind, I did arrive two hours prior to the event’s end, but there were practically no apples to be found! What kinda apple fest is it?! This event in particular is very kid-​orientated with hay to play in, live music/​games, story-​telling and even Scooby Doo’s Mystery Machine to accompany you in a picture. My partner and I dressed up as characters (him being the evil monster of course) and we made fools of ourselves — Ruh Ro! I was hoping to not only find more apples for purchase, but also more apple items (pies, crumbles, cider, caramel apples, etc). There were only enough to count on one hand. I will give kudos to Pizza D.O.C. for their creation of apples (duh), cinnamon, and raspberries on a crust=Apple Pizza. See
for the recipe provided by ABC7 & the restaurant. I may take on another festival next year, however, if you have young family members, it would be worth a visit.

This is the first year I have attended this fest, and I really enjoyed it! It is definitely kid-​focused, which is well-​suited for our family-​friendly neighborhood of Lincoln Square. There were some cute kiddie activities including a little hay maze for them. I picked up some delicious Honey Crisp apples from a local orchard as well as some jams and apple syrup. I also split a piece of the skillet apple pie from the Chopping Block with my sister. HEAVENLY! Seriously sooooo good! This is a fun little festival geared toward kiddies but also a great place to pick up some apple treats.
My one complaint — no apple cider donuts?! I was really hoping one of the orchards would have some! :)

The Lincoln Square Apple Fest is usually a small event and I honestly just ran in to grab a piece of the apple pie from the Chopping Block. I’ve always heard such great reviews of their iron skillet apple pie that they serve at Apple Fest — I had to try it. It was excellent! Great taste, light crust. I can only imagine that it would be even better hot and fresh out of the oven. I’d go back again for another piece!
It looked like a nice event to go to with kids — there were tons of them there — and it was a perfect autumn day for an outside fall festival in the city.

I found Apple Fest really disappointing. It was supposed to end at 4, and we got there at 2:30, and everything was basically closing down. All the food vendors were gone by 3pm, and we only had time to pick up a handful of apples before everything was sold out. We didn’t see any cider, apple pie, or caramel apples, which are things I thought we’d definitely come home with. The festival started at 8am, and I’m really not sure who wants to go to a fest that early on a Saturday morning. This might be fun if you go early in the morning.

Eh, it was okay. At least we got perfect fall weather for it.
We arrived at about 2pm (it ended at 4), and there was only one stand actually selling apples and they seemed completely disinterested. For an apple fest, I thought there would be more APPLES but maybe people had already packed up for the day. It was kind of a bummer.
There was a good crowd and the street was pretty packed. The hay maze was demolished by the time we made it, but all the kids had a blast just jumping around and playing in the hay. (Note to self — don’t buy future kid fancy toys, just give them a bail of hay to play in.)
It’s a small festival, maybe a block or two long at most. Not a lot to see. We actually had more fun going in and out of all the local shops than we did at any of the street fest vendors.
I’d go back again and hope for a better experience earlier in the day.