Despite gray clouds trying to force their way into the afternoon ,the sunshine won and turned out to be the perfect day for The Taste of La Porte. With tons of residents, food stands, vendors and music, it was a great way to celebrate with the La Porte and Michigan City community.
To see more photos from the event, click here!
This was the first time the Taste of La Porte had been featured at the Civic Auditorium, a change that initially made Downtown Director of the Greater La Porte Chamber of Commerce Thaddeus Cutler a little nervous.
“This was the first time we ever had this event at the Civic Center and initially I was a little nervous, but in the end it turned out great and we had a ton of space for everyone,” said Cutler.” Its almost like we're starting over again, it's a whole new location but setting up has been great and I'm really excited about it.”
The Taste of La Porte is a celebration of what La Porte and Michigan City has to offer in terms of food, music and vendors. While the event had previously been limited to the city of La Porte, this year was done differently with the festival being open to all of La Porte County, now offering a showcase of both La Porte and Michigan City.
“In years past, we used to do only restaurants from La Porte but we decided to open it up for Michigan City this year,” said Cutler. “That's the whole purpose of this event, we're sister cities, we're all in this together, so its a really cool thing to see this happen.”
Dozens of vendors displayed their delicious offerings with a varied mix from both La Porte and Michigan City. Some of the more famous vendors included Etropal, Momma Sue's and Cool Runnings.
“We're happy to be here, we've had customers from La Porte come to our restaurant so it was only natural that we bring the food to them here as well,” said Denice Shipp-Glenn of Momma Sue's. “It's wonderful to see everyone come together and promote their business while making a little money along with it.”
One of the highlight activities included a diamond dig event sponsored by the Greater La Porte Chamber of Commerce, where by paying for a $10 ticket, participants searched for colored plastic diamonds hidden in the sand in the hopes of winning a 1.5 carat diamond, recliner or guitar provided by La Porte's Engstrom Jewelry.
“We love doing events like this, we love working with small businesses in order to promote them and help them become represented in the community,” said Cheryl Seitz, Ambassador of the Greater La Porte Chamber of Commerce. “It's the chamber's job to help small businesses and we love doing fun things like this for them.”
Rita Morzinski of Engstrom Jewelry was happy to have the opportunity to work with the chamber and be featured at the Taste of La Porte.
“As a small business, we like working with the chamber and we like doing events like this with the chamber, they do a lot of us and other businesses and we truly appreciate that,” said Morzinski.
A variety of music acts were also scheduled to perform. Gunpowder Treason a country/rock band kicked off the show and wowed the crowd with their impressive stage presence and some covers of classic country songs.
Even though this year's Taste of La Porte was a success, Culter and the Chamber already have plans for the next one.
“We really want to add more of a festival atmosphere, with the potential of adding more rides and kid attractions,” said Cutler. “It's already a kid friendly event, but we have the space and we have the parking. We want to keep expanding and make it even greater."