National Lentil Festival
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The National Lentil Festivalis an annual festival in Pullman, Washington.
[edit] Activities
Each year, the citizens of Pullman congregate to enjoy, celebrate, and revel at The National Lentil Festival, a food festival honoring the lentil.
The Palouse region grows one third of all the lentils in the US, according to the festival's website. The 2007 festival took place on August 17 in downtown Pullman, and on August 18 in Reaney Park. There are many things to see and do at the National Lentil Festival, and all are welcome to attend. Live musical entertainment, a kids' carnival, free lentil chili on Friday night, contests, a lentil cook off, vendors, a grand parade, and even a lentil pancake feed to help round out the offerings of this fantastic family event. The National Lentil Festival "Tour de Lentil Metric Century" (100km, 60 miles) Bike Ride took place on Saturday, August 18, 2007, with riders cycling throughout the region.
Musical groups musical groups Central Service with Carrie Clark and the Lonesome Lovers, Bloodline, United Cities of America, Last Day Lost and Justin Klump performed in 2007.
[edit] Cook-off
A major highlight of this award-winning festival is the Legendary Lentil Cook Off. In 2006, 88 lentil dish recipes were submitted from all around the nation to be considered for the grand prize of $1,000. There is a preliminary cook off event with volunteer judges who rate each recipe on a number of factors, and the top 6 recipes from this preliminary judging event are mass produced for 400 Saturday festival-goers to taste and judge for final placing. The winners of the 2007 Cook Off was Fabulous Lentil Mushroom Poppers submitted by Linhda Sagen of Pullman. The second went to Brown Lentil, Chicken and Andouille Jambalaya submitted by Judy Armstrong of Prairieville, Louisiana. Third went to Cheesy Lentil and Double Olive Nachos submitted by Nancy Dentler of Greensboro, North Carolina. The most creative recipe went to Smokey Three-Cheese Lentil and Caramelized Onion Pizza submitted by Patricia Schroedl of Jefferson, Wisconsin.
The 2008 event is set for August 22 and 23.
