Hot and Spicy Festival

What the heck? Why was there only one food vendor + roasted corn? How many terrible costume jewellery and clothing stands does a food festival with no food need? I went hungry; I left hungry and angry. Happy to see the mustard stand though!

We visited the Hot and Spicy Festival on September 6, 2015 and, compared to previous years, it’s really gone downhill. It USED to have jerk chicken, tons of hot sauces to choose from and just many more vendors. This year was a real letdown as all we had was the roasted corn (not spicy) and some bland samosas (painfully slow servers). The one highlight was trying the Fire and Ice Competition ($ 8 for about five dessert items). There was a Venezuelan chef that prepared a coconut type ice cream — it was to die for. I tried to locate him on the website but, no such luck … Even the live bands/​music wasn’t what it once was. There was a lady selling soup, tamales and chocolate but it was hugely inflated and didn’t look like anything original. Bathrooms were disgusting as well but that’s just Harbourfront for you.

I love going to this festival, we stumbled upon it on accident when biking around Toronto and I am glad we did. First off, this really should be called Hot Sauce Fest or The King of Condiments Fest, because to be honest the food aspect of the festival is pretty week. So why they high rating? I love hot sauce. At any given time i have between 10 and 15 flavors in my fridge and more in the cupboard. Ohio has a great festival at Jungle Jims and The National Fiery Foods & Barbecue Show in New Mexico is like the hot sauce Super Bowl. This is the closest option to me (Buffalo) for small batch craft sauces. There are literally hundreds of sauces here, most of which are reasonably priced. In addition to hot sauce, you can get a variety or bbq, spices, salsa, mustards, jams, etc. The variety and originality of some of the sauces are great. The location is right on the waterfront which is always nice. Give it a shot and you will be impressed… if you keep in mind that it should be renamed to better reflect the products offered.

The Hot & Spicy food festival is one of the last summer festivals the city of Toronto offers. It’s situated in a decent location right by the lake at Harbourfront Centre. It also offers ample room to move around which makes it comfortable for families, seniors and festival goers in general and the lineups for vendors are short and minimal which work well in favour of the festival.
The one area were they could really improve is offer more food vendors, instead of really having tons of vendors selling just hot sauces and spices. I’m not saying they should be reduced but there should be more of a balance because a lot of people come to festivals for the food. This would make the festival so much better because the location is pretty good, lineups are minimal, there are music performances and there is ample room to move around.
One thing that worked well was the taco takedown competition where 6 restaurants in Toronto offered their take on tacos to see who had the best tacos in town, the price was $ 8 to try six tacos, one from each restaurant, they were pretty good but good thing «Seven Lives» wasn’t involved in the competition because they would have blown away the competition. The lineup was a little long at 30 minutes but that’s because it was the main food highlight of the festival.

This was more of a hot sauce festival than spicy food festival. There were a reasonable amount of vendors selling their wares but nothing I wouldn’t find a dedicated hot sauce shop. Lots of samples was the only good thing I can think off.
Me and my Unilocal eating Buddies tried a few stands and maybe we have a higher tolerance for hot items most of them didn’t even make us break a sweat. Some of the vendors priced themselves out for us as 10 $ for a smallish bottle is way to high for me.
Being a long weekend Monday some of the food vendors didn’t even show up. Some of food items are there on a permanent basis so I don’t see a reason venturing here for those.
The good part was a nicely setup free sample area by Martini & Rossi (hey I am always up for free booze hic!)
The Iron Chef competition was OK with a reasonable dose of Food Channel celebrities.
Other than that this was poorly managed and executed festival.

What a letdown.
I was expecting to find something more like the Vegetarian Food Festivals I’ve been to, with a bunch of vendors selling delicious spicy food, daring you with hot and sour soups, spicy appetizers and some Mexican insanity peppers. Instead it was just rows and rows of hot sauce vendors. As far as I could tell, there was NO FOOD, save for the grilled corn guy and the same food place that are always there. I’m not really one to buy hot sauce, I prefer to make my own, so after taking a big tour around all the vendors, we left.

This is my first time going to the annual Hot and Spicy Festival down and Harbourfront Centre. I guess I was expecting to have a lot of food vendor and I was disappointed.
Most of the vendors that participated are selling hot sauces, mustard and more hot sauces… Might as well renamed the event to Hot and Spicy Sauces Festival.
The Iron Chef Final on the last day was interesting though… and I got to sample the winner’s cooking at the end of the show!
If you are in the area, definitely drop by. But doesn’t worth a special trip for this!