Food Network In Concert at Ravinia, Sept 20, 2014

WTF?

http://foodnetworkinconcert.com/index.html

John Mayer and other musicians to be named later will join Food Network and local chefs for an all-day food and music festival. Not a lot of details at Food Network, nothing at Ravinia except that it's on the presale schedule.

It's supposed to include Zakarian, Garces, Burrell... no clue on locals or musicians at all. The only other thing I can find if I google John Mayer and Food Network is a scandal-sheet story of Mayer being caught snogging with (married) Giada De Laurentiis in 2010.

More deets: Tickets start at $99 for a basic lawn seat, to $299 for "Pavilion 1 + Greatest Hits" which includes Wine and Cocktail lessons, and a reception-style tasting with 50 chefs. On top of that, you can up to two events at prices $85-$125.

Music info is still sparse, they've added Twin Forks and Raul Midon (who's pretty cool), but the chef list is beefing up, including David Burke, Jimmy Bannos Jr., Michael Kornick, Tony Mantuano, Paul Virant, Jose Garces, Alex Guarnaschelli, Jeffrey Zakarian, and Anne Burrell.

Unless the music part gets significantly better, it doesn't sound like something I'd want to attend.

This is not an "official" Ravinia event. It's a rent-out.

=R=

Hi- Is anybody going to this on 9/20? I get emails from Groupon, and there is a Groupon out for this. For $150 you get a lawn seat for John Mayer, and Philip Philips, and you get your choice of four different meals, plus you get to go to all the cooking demonstrations. The park opens at 11:00am, and the John Mayer concert is scheduled to end at 10:00 pm. The Groupon is valued at $184. It is interesting because I checked the food network site last night where you have to purchase tickets if you don't purchase the Groupon, and the $299 tickets, which include premium pavilion seating for the John Mayer concert, and all the cooking demos, are all sold out. There are still $99 tickets left for lawn seating, and $199 tickets left for regular pavilion seating. There is not enough here to tempt me. I think a percentage of the money collected is going to go to Share our Strength to help them fight childhood hunger. Here is a link to the schedule. http://www.foodnetworkinconcert.com/ Thanks, Nancy

Hi- Did anybody go to this? How was it?

NFriday wrote:Hi- Did anybody go to this? How was it?

In the absence of reply posts, there's this report, on Eater.com:

Stars and 10,000 People Come Out for the Inaugural Food Network in Concert at Ravinia

Hi- If they had 10,000 people, I am surprised that nobody here attended this. According to the Eater, the program was so successful that they are considering making it an annual event.

I can't attest to whether the event was a success or not (and I don't know exactly who considered it a success), but a friend of mine who attended the event says it was chaotic and will not attend again. She complained that the layout was confusing, that there were huge lines for food, insufficient staff, many garbage cans were overfilled, such that some people felt satisfied just leaving trash on the lawn. She mentioned a couple of other issues I can't recall at the moment but suffice to say she was not a fan.