Wichita will be filled with three food-focused festivals over the next two weekends
Wichita is well-known for three popular cuisines: Mexican, Vietnamese and Lebanese.
And over the next two weekends, three annual food-filled festivals will be serving up the cuisine of Mexico, Vietnam and Lebanon.
They are:
Nomar Fiesta
11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday, Nomar Plaza, 204 E. 21st St. North
Saturday will mark the second installment of this big fiesta on Wichita’s North End, which will feature Hispanic food, art, vendors and live music.
The event, a celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, is put on by Empower, a nonprofit whose mission is to improve and promote Wichita’s North End neighborhood and its businesses. Ariel Rodriguez, the executive director of Empower, said that this year’s event will be even more packed with food and activities than the 2022 inaugural installment.
“It’s going to be a whole lot bigger and better this year,” he said. “We listened to the people.”
The hours for the party are extended this year: Instead of starting at 4 p.m., it will open at 11 a.m., and live music will start when the gates open. Also, the number of vendors is up from 30 last year to more than 60 this year, and of those, 40 will be food vendors selling things like tacos, churros, elote, empanadas, ice cream, coffee and more, Rodriguez said.
The free party also will include a car show set up around 21st Street, artists, cultural dancers and activities.
Last year, about 5,000 people attended the event, and Empower hopes to double that number this year, Rodriguez said.
Vietnamese Fall Festival 2023
3-10 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m.-11 p.m. Saturday, All Saints Church, 3205 E. Grand
This event, also in its second year, will feature shopping, karaoke, dragon and lion dancers, games and contests — but the big draw will be food. The party, put together by the church and by the owners of local boba shop Feng Cha, will have more than 40 local vendors serving more than 120 traditional Vietnamese street foods, snacks and drinks, including things like beef noodle soup, savory crepes, banh mi sandwiches, sticky rice dishes, vermicelli noodle dishes, fried bananas and more.
The church organizes the festival, and Kevin Nguyen from Feng Cha recruits the vendors. Last year’s inaugural event was so successful, the organizers decided to make it an annual party that will always happen on the first weekend in October. Nguyen said he anticipates the festival will continue to grow: He already has several vendors on a waiting list for next year.
Three of the vendors at the event — Feng Cha, Lu Ngoc Ian Fashions and Tung Food Truck — plan to donate 100% of their profits toward the church’s efforts to fund a $720,000 HVAC system for the All Saints school.
Admission is free, but the organizers advise that people bring cash to spend with the vendors as many do not accept credit cards.
St. George Lebanese Dinner & Food Sale
4 to 8 p.m. Saturday (dine-in closes at 7 p.m.); noon to 7 p.m. Sunday (dine-in closes at 3 p.m.), St. George Orthodox Christian Cathedral, 7515 E. 13th St.
One of Wichita’s biggest and most anticipated church dinners will happen next weekend — Saturday and Sunday Oct. 14 and 15 — and as usual, it will offer full Lebanese dinners to both drive-up and dine-in patrons. The meals include salad, pita bread, cabbage rolls, kibba, ruz and yuknee — which is a Lebanese green bean, rice and tomato stew — and baklawa. Meals are $22 for adults, $15 for children 10 and under.
The dinner, now in its 88th year, is the church’s biggest fundraiser, and it takes between 200 and 300 church volunteers to organize and cook for the event each year. In addition to the meals, the dinner also includes a popular Country Kitchen offering extra portions of things like kibba, grape leaves and baklawa as well as salad dressing and pita bread. People who attend also can take tours of the church.
Organizers made one big change this year, said Jennifer Sebits, one of the event’s co-chairs: They shortened the hours for dine-in service at the event. People just weren’t dining in during the later hours in years past, preferring to pick up meals in the drive-through instead.
Sebits had a couple of pieces of advice for this year’s attendees: They should come early if they want to shop at the popular Country Kitchen because items sell out fast, and they should stop at the baklawa sundae booth, which is returning after a long absence. It will be staffed by parish children, who will crush up baklawa and layer it with ice cream donated by Spangles.
Last year, the church served 5,128 people at the dinner. Tickets are available in advance at the church or at the event gates.
This story was originally published October 4, 2023 at 12:26 PM.
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