California Avocado Festival 2006

It was an avocado weekend. Foods that I never thought would involve an avocado were offered. I tried avocado bread; avocado ice cream and avocado beer to name a few! The ice cream was very “eggy”. It was one of those things you just kept eating because you weren’t sure if you liked it or not. But-then you ate the whole thing and knew you would try it again. I asked an older woman eating a cone if the ice cream was good. She said with a smile, “This is my second one!”. The avocado bread was delicious. I had the best homemade taquitos with guacamole from “Crusade” in Santa Barbara.

I saw a woman walking by with an avocado for a hat, a man making chickens out of towels and more people wearing green than on St. Patrick’s Day. I saw “The World’s Largest Bowl of Guacamole”.

Did you know there are over 1700 varieties of avocados and that number is growing all the time? I counted 16 varieties that were offered to eat or buy at the festival. There was a table in the exhibition hall covered with avocados of all shapes and sizes labeled each by name. A 9.7-ounce avocado for Santa Barbara won the largest avocado contest.