Each year, the Harvest Festival and Trick or Treat Street in Elizabeth draws large crowds, but this year visitors to Main Street came out in droves. For the second fall in a row, Batman and zombies, lots of zombies, were welcomed by a perfect fall afternoon as they roamed the tents and booths set up by more than 50 vendors, searching for candy under a cloudless sky.
The Town of Elizabeth’s booth was so busy Oct. 31, staffers were forced to make a candy run an hour after the festival kicked off at noon. According to Dick Eason, Elizabeth town manager, his crew was watching their supplies carefully and anticipating a second trip to resupply before the festival wrapped up at 3 p.m.
In addition to candy, vendors provided games, contests, and face painting. This year’s Harvest Fest featured a separate food court in the parking lot across from the chamber of commerce offices on Main Street. In addition to hamburgers and hotdogs, hungry trick-or-treaters and their parents had a variety of options, ranging from homemade baked goods to freshly made Mediterranean food.
A newcomer to events held on Main Street, Jasmine Parks-Papadopoulos, aka Sugar Mama, offered a variety of baked “Treats and Eats.” Parks-Papadopoulos has been baking her cookies, cakes, and Rice Krispy treats for more than a year for fundraisers and in support of the families of airmen at Buckley Airforce Base, where her husband works for Satellite Command.
Jasmine, originally from Naples Italy, grew up in Athens and worked as a chef in one of the three restaurants that her family owns in the city.
For those who were looking for something a little more savory, Lucy's Armenian-Mediterranean Grill served up delicious (and sometimes messy) Mediterranean food, gyros, falafel and chicken shawarma. Lucy Moore is an Armenian who grew up in Jordan. She and her husband Erskine have been serving their Armenian Mediterranean Grill in Elizabeth for three years and at Harvest Fest for two.
“I mix all my own spices and Tsatziki,” Lucy says as she fills a pita with a mix of lamb and beef, lettuce, and onions before running a generous squirt of the yogurt-based sauce down the middle of her creation.
The Harvest Festival is held each year and is sponsored by the Elizabeth Area Chamber of Commerce and its members. The event is billed as a safe community celebration.
