Fest food

MOSES LAKE — You don’t need a map to find where Spring Fest is set up in McCosh Park. The aromas wafting on the breeze call out to you from a block away.

“It’s a dangerous place to be,” said Karlee Marion-Swan, who was getting teriyaki ready ahead of the crowds Thursday.

Nearly every kind of food and drink imaginable could be had at Spring Fest: hamburgers and hot dogs of all sizes and shapes, elephant ears, stir-fry, tacos and fries in an astonishing variety of forms.

Ylse Engler, of Waterville, had her Knotty Delights gourmet soft pretzels ready and waiting. “Everybody loves a pretzel,” Engler said.

This is Engler’s fourth year at Spring Fest, she said. She also works the North Central Washington Fair in Waterville every year, and farmers markets around the region. The venues change, but some things are constant, she said.

“People are always hungry,” she said. “They’re hungry, and we feed them.”

Knotty Delights is a small, specialized vendor, but there are also some bigger ones. Marion-Swan and her family, based in Portland, have three booths all connected: one selling teriyaki, one with gyros and one offering burgers, hot dogs and fries. Marion-Swan is a third-generation food vendor attending the event.

“This is my dad’s business,” she said. “It was my granddad’s business, and my grandma is in the back cooking. It’s been passed down generationally.”

Marion-Swan’s father, Lee Marion, started making teriyaki and then built the business up piece by piece.

“My dad’s been slowly (expanding),” she said. “He bought the gyro business from another person, and then he made the burger business himself as an add-on to (the teriyaki).”

The epicurean entourage includes Marion-Swan’s parents and grandmother, her two sisters, her uncle and some cousins, as well as employees Kylie Mathews and Albert Otterson. Occasionally they hire some local help as well, she said.

With three booths and three very different sets of cooking apparatus, the setup and teardown are a major undertaking, Marion-Swan said.

“For one booth alone, it takes us at least seven hours to set up,” she said. “For all three of these, it took two ten-hour days.”

Across the way, Sloane Gardner of Moses Lake was making lemonade inside a giant lemon. The owners of the lemon also have stands offering kettle corn, cotton candy and other festival fare.

“I’ve done the turkey trailer and I’ve done snow cones, but this is my first time working in the lemon,” Gardner said.

Many of the offerings at Spring Fest aren’t what you’d call healthy, but that doesn’t matter, Gardner said.

“That’s what a fair is all about,” she said. “This is Spring Fest.”

    Knotty Delights owner Ylse Engler serves soft pretzels at Spring Fest and the North Central Washington Fair in Waterville.
  

    Ethan Small, right, shows Landon Noble how to work the fryer safely at the Smulligan’s barbecue booth at Spring Fest.
  

    Sloane Gardner gets lemonade ready inside a giant lemon at Spring Fest Thursday.