Taste Of Hudson

Having attended «the taste» many years since its inception; I’m getting the sense that these «taste events» may have run their course and be tapped out.
Hudson was an early adopter, but now nearly every major upper middle class city in NE Ohio has a «Taste of». Despite the press cheering record crowds, attendance felt light the last few times I was there.
Food is expensive and portion sizes are so large there is nothing «taste» about them. Heck, Flip Side was there selling whole burgers, what is «taste» about that?
All in all, after years in, I’m thinking these events have jumped the shark. Time to move on.

This was my first year going to Taste of Hudson. Unfortunately, it was raining, quite a bit, and they had the beer and wine garden shut down for some reason. Besides that, it was a ton of fun. We got to sample a lot of food from the area, all which was great. If I had a bigger stomach, I would have tried more. The best thing we had was the flipside burger… really just bravo flipside!
I will be back next year and hopefully it won’t be raining!

I’ve been to a few «Taste of…» events over the years: Cleveland, Chicago, Marin County, CA. They all follow pretty much the same template: outdoors, pedestrian-​friendly, live music, booths with restaurants offering a taste of their grub.
Hudson’s is pretty good, in that it is spread very nicely over several blocks around their faux-​village shopping area making for some variety of venue. (Taste of Chicago, by contrast, takes up square MILES but is completely park land, so it all starts to look alike.) As with most things «Hudson,» you’ll have lots of preppy, yuppie, country clubbie types wandering around in that «I’m really only here because Babs makes me come» snoot. Okay, sure, just stay out of my way, okay Biff-​Tad?
Here’s the real reason to check out TOH: The music. If you can’t find at least three bands/​performers/​soloists you like, you’re just not even trying. I think they have six or seven stages, and each act only gets about an hour or hour and a half of performance time, so things move briskly. Young kids rocking, older dudes jazzing, full orchestra, solo singer-​songwriter, you just have a whole world of possibilities. Celeb chefs, balloon-​twisters, car collectors, and the obligatory guys dressed like they live at the country club. Sheesh.
Free. Except for what you eat and drink, it’s all free. Sweet.