Bites Nearby: BBQ & Craft Beer Festival

I hadn't been to since I was a kid, but was excited to hear that over Labor Day weekend, they were hosting a .  

After the beach this Saturday, I trekked over to Oceanport and first checked out the beer tasting.  For $10, each person was given a 2 oz pilsner glass and 10 different tickets. Some of my favorite beer brands were featured, including Blue Moon (Harvest Pumpkin Ale, Belgian White Ale, and Pale Moon), Long Trail (Double Bag, Long Trail Harvest, and Wolover's Pumpkin Ale), and Flying Fish (Octoberfish, Pale Ale, and Hopfish). I tend to go for the hoppier IPAs or the pumpkin ales for a fun seasonal beer.  They also featured Palm, Brooklyn, Cricket Hill, East Coast Beer Co., Victory, Spaten, Stiegl, Magic Hat, Beck's, Shock Top, Shipyard, and Erie.  Erie is not as known, although I have tried it at the annual Monmouth University Alumni Beer Tasting.  They featured the Railbender Mad Anthony beer, and Misery Bay IPA.  

After sampling 6 different beers, we were ready to put our last four on hold and go eat a variety of BBQ.  We first visited the Southern Smoke Cajun & Caribbean BBQ truck, and ordered Smoked BBQ Wings with Spicy Creole Wing Sauce with a side of Cornbread Hush Puppies.  The wings were great, but we probably should have opted for the Slow Smoked Pork Shoulder with House Slaw, pickles and BBQ Sauce.  They also featured ribs and other sinful dishes like the Caribbean Spiced Flounder Sandwich or the Grilled Peanut Butter and Bacon sandwich.  

Wanting to sample a few different varieties, we then move next door to Harvest Specialty Foods & Catering, based out of North Brunswick. We sampled the Jerk Chicken Skewer and a side of macaroni and cheese; a tough decision between that and pulled pork, beef brisket, and sides of corn on the cob, collared greens, or dirty rice. The jerk chicken was definitely a great choice, which we took the liberty of topping with extra jerk sauce.

While starting to feel full, we definitely pushed the limit with our last two stops before we called it a day.  We first went back to the tent for a few more beer samples, and then was motivated to find a good pulled pork sandwich to split.  We chose , with locations in Neptune City and Cookstown.  The sandwich was mouth-watering as expected, but we should have added extra BBQ sauce on top.  

We finished off the day with zeppoles and fried oreos, just because we figured we needed (or so we convinced ourselves).  

Other food vendors featured both Saturday and Sunday from 11:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. were A-maize-ing Roast (vegetarian friendly with roast corn, nachos with cheese, portobello burgers, fresh squeezed lemonade, limeade, and orange-ade, and corn dogs), Aramark, Ben's BBQ & Catering Company, Chop Shop Barbeque out of Seaside Heights, Dan's Backyard BBQ, Greenlight Food Service out of Long Valley, Three Men & A Baby Back, and Memphis Pig Out out of Atlantic Highlands.   

The BBQ and Craft Beer Festival was a fun way to close out the summer for those that aren't as into betting on horses.  I enjoyed it, as I still had a little back of the track experience but I also left full and happy.  My only regret was not finding some way to try each food vendor! All of them looked so good, it took us awhile to walk around and plan our strategy.  Knowing some of these vendors are relatively local for me, I plan to check them out in the near future -- so perhaps more BBQ pieces to come!