Scallop Festival - Two Weeks to Go !!

Scallop Festival - Two Weeks to Go !!

It is now only two weeks until the 11th annual Whitianga Scallop Festival held on the19th September, where we expect over 100,000 scallops will be shucked and cooked in a myriad of ways. The 50 plus available cuisine stands have all been booked by a mix of local chefs, restaurants and community groups.

Another of our local restaurants, Blue Ginger Café has created a mouth-watering dish just for the 2015 festival: lotus buns with pork belly, grilled scallops, watercress slaw with cucumber, coriander and hoisin. You can find them on site 41 in the Asahi Marquee. Celebrity Chef, Ray McVinnie who helped us celebrate the Scallop Festival's 10 year anniversary can’t wait to return to the New World cooking stage for the 2015 festival and joining him we welcome the Winners of Masterchef 2014 - Karena and Kasey Bird . All our chefs will be cooking 2 scrumptious scallop recipes on stage and the crowd will have a chance to taste their creations, and pick up a copy of the recipes to take home and try. Keeping the New World cooking stage together once again Tracey- Lee Hooton (of Masterchef fame) will be exchanging her cooking utensils for the MC microphone for the day.

Entertainment throughout the day includes The Mullet Man (who needs no introduction with his take on the Mullet), juggling and having fun!! There’s something for everyone including the Classic Photobooth where you can take home a photostrip for your fridge with your memories of the day. We will have the festival favourites back again this year, the Sea Creature Stilt Walkers along with Neptune and his mermaid. New to the festival entertainment line-up this year is Two Gents from a Queen tribute band, who will be bringing their unique blend of music to the Mills Reef stage. Local Artist Tim Armstrong is also back performing at Stage on the Point. Past crowd favourites and rising star Coral Pitcher will include a mix from her original compilation as well as her own spin on some covers and The Vegas Brown Band will also be back performing on the Whitianga Waterways Music Stage - keeping the crowd rocking!

If you fancy a round of golf, to make room for a few more scallops on the Saturday, register for the Mercury Bay Golf Club – Scallop Festival Open. Make a long weekend of it and come and enjoy what the picturesque Mercury Bay and Coromandel Peninsula has to offer. The vote and win competition winner on our facebook page was: Alyson Fitzsimons.

Tickets are on sale at www.scallopfestival.co.nz and Eventfinder. Event organiser, Linda Simonsen says, “Don’t delay in getting your tickets as they are selling fast. Only a limited number of tickets are available and once they are sold, there will be no gate sales on the day of the festival.”

ENDS

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