Looking forward to a fulFILLING weekend

Aside from the incredibly odd weather, I must say this has been a very nice summer. Mind you, I’m not complaining about the cooler-than-normal temperatures we’ve had the past couple weeks. Anything over 80 makes for a grumpy Scott.

While the summer has been good, I have to say that this coming weekend is likely my favorite of the year. It’s filled with free food, friends and frollicking. Okay, maybe not frollicking, but I wanted a trio of Fs. I guess I could have said fun. But I think that is copywritten by McDonald’s.

Saturday I will make my apparently annual pilgrimage to the Dożynki Polish Harvest Festival at Corpus Christi Church where I will — for the third straight year — be one of the lucky ones judging the 6th Annual Buffalo’s Best Pierogi Contest.

Previous year’s pierogi have included standard sauerkraut, reuben, chicken wing, hot pepper, a cheeseburger pierogi (complete with lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle), Kielbasa and cheese, a Japanese pierogi, beef on weck, Greek and more. It’s heaven.

Even without the gluttony of pierogi that I’ll be consuming, Dozynki is always a blast. Last year we went bowling at the Corpus Christi Athletic Club after I was done consuming my pierogi. It was fun. It was cheap. It was different.

If you’re looking to get out of town on Saturday, head on out to Superman Corner in Buffalo and have some tasty food and say “hi” while you’re there. I’ll be the guy loosening his belt.

But wait. That’s not all. If you act now, you get … the Taste of Lockport on Sunday.

Last year I was a judge at the Taste, as well, helping to judge the appetizer category. This year, they’ve switched things up on me and I’ll be one of the very lucky people judging the sandwich category along with Lockport Journal Sports Editor (and friend) John D’Onofrio.

Fortunately, we’ll be judging the food early in the day which means that I should have it digested well before the Taste is over so I can eat everything else.

Normally I work Sunday nights, but I took the day off so I could eat more. Lucky, lucky me.

To make a long story short  — too late? — I’m going to have a great weekend with food and people that I love. Hope to see you there. And if you’re not there, I hope you’re weekend is as happy as mine is sure to be.

Scott Leffler isn’t Polish. And he’s not originally from Lockport. But he’s going to pretend to be both this weekend — for the sake of the food. He’ll probably tweet photos of his gluttonous behaviors @scottleffler.

Can't beat a weekend of food, folks and fun

Amongst my many varied likes are tasty food, cold beer and cute brunettes. Not necessarily in that order.

So you can only begin to imagine my delight when I was granted a weekend jam-packed with all three.

This past weekend, I was honored to be able to serve as a judge for the pierogi contest at Buffalo's Dozynki festival on Saturday. I was also fortunate enough to judge appetizers at The Taste of Lockport on Sunday.

The weekend began normally enough - waiting for my girlfriend to get out of the bathroom. (Seriously, girls, what do you do in there and why does it take so long? Every man in America is dying to know).

Then we packed up the kids and headed to North Tonawanda for the Thunder on the Niagara jet boat races, which I knew would be a real treat for my girlfriend — who probably took 1,000 pictures of the boats— and her son — because what six year old boy doesn't want to watch jet boats race?

After we got our fill of jet boats (and the kids got their fill of PB&J), we headed to the heart of Buffalo for the Dozynki Harvest Festival at Corpus Christi Church where I saw some old friends, did some 12-ounce curls, and feasted on pierogi in an incredibly wide variety of flavors from standard sauerkraut to cheeseburger (with all the fixings). I was one of 20 judges for the pierogi contest and while it was certainly fun, in honesty, it wasn’t easy because there was not a single bad pierogi amongst the offerings. In all honestly, some were simply more awesome than others.

My favorite pierogi of the day a beef on weck created by Brian Marek. Sadly, our table didn’t get a chance to try the top vote getter in the non-traditional category, a reuben pierogi. But I had a reuben pierogi last year and can understand why it would win.

After pierogi, we bowled at the Corpus Christi Club across the street from the church. I won, of course, (with a measly 120) but Heather and the kids did great, too. Then we trekked back to Lockport to rest up for day two of my great Western New York eat-a-thon.

Sunday had been planned out for months. I took the night off work so I could spend it serving as Heather’s tag-along, carrying coffee, protecting her from her adoring fans and whatever other odd jobs I’d be given. Heather is, among other things, co-president of the Lockport Business Association, which oversees the Taste of Lockport.

However, early last week I secured a spot as a judge in the appetizer category of the Taste, a role I’ve served in a few times since the Taste began just over a decade ago. So what had been planned as a day of me following my girlfriend around became another day of hard labor, forcing down delicious goodies.

As was the case the day before, I can honestly say that there wasn’t a single poor offering put in front of me as a judge. There were some offerings, however, that were more spectacular than others. My personal favorite was a meatball on a stick from Middleport’s Alternative Grounds Caffe.

After the judging, there was some walking, more eating, and of course, washing all those tasty morsels down with cold beer. It was such a hard day.

Between Dozynki and the Taste, I ran into far too many people to even begin to name drop without leaving people out and offending, so I won’t. But it’s always nice to get out and see people — especially those I haven’t seen in a year or more.

Sadly, I missed the Erie County Fair this year — one of my favorite annual pilgrimages — but with so many other things going on, I barely missed it.

Scott Leffler is a professional food taster and an amateur columnist — at least in some people's eyes. Follow him on Twitter @scottleffler where he can name drop at will.