1183 Hertel Ave., Buffalo NY 14216
Web: Buffalo Italian Heritage Festival
Phone: 716.877.1776
See More Restaurant Reviews For:
Buffalo Festivals Italian
"The enormous slices were thick with dough that had been braided at its edges to beautiful effect, and full pizzas were being carved up and sold off at a staggeringly brisk pace."
After Sobieski's conspicuous sponsorship of Dyngus Day led us to discover the company's legitimately great vodka, we were convinced: corporate sponsorship of local festivals isn't necessarily a bad thing. Sure, there's something about the "Sorrento Cheese Buffalo Italian Heritage Festival" that doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, and on-stage events such as the "2nd Annual Cheese Building Contest" seemed somewhat... forced. Yet this four-day festival has plenty to offer if you're looking for a fair-like atmosphere in Buffalo's Little Italy, complete with carnival rides and a dunk tank for kids, plus a bocce competition and Italian cooking lessons for adults. As of today, there are three days left to check it out; it runs from July 16th through the 19th, 11am through 10pm or 11pm, depending on the day.
If you're planning to visit to sample Italian food, you'll have plenty of chances - there are roughly 55 vendors on hand - but after walking the stretch of Hertel Avenue occupied by the Festival, one thing is clear: expect fair food, with some small exceptions, rather than the more creative options offered at Taste of Buffalo. Though there is modest overlap between the restaurants here and the ones at Taste, the Italian Heritage Festival's vendors have more in common with the Allentown Art Festival: lots of Italian sausages are being offered, Russ's Bakery has two trucks set up with desserts, deep fried dough and Oreo stands are all over, and stands with Italian ice and lemonade are in between them. But there were many other vendors on hand; here's just a sampling.
Mineo & Sapio. At least two and possibly more vendors were prominently advertising Mineo & Sapio's Italian Sausage ($4-$5), mildly spicy, super thick links made with pork, cheese, and parsley inside, served on plain white rolls and topped with onions and peppers. The slightly salty, comparatively mild version of the sausage served at the Festival isn't our favorite - we're bigger fans of the hot one - but it's still a nice snack.
Kabob Shack. We couldn't help but get excited over this small dessert stand's Frozen Cheesecake ($5), a full piece of cheesecake on a stick with milk chocolate drizzled on all sides as we watched. The three of us split on the item, two pooh-poohing the chocolate, one not liking the cheesecake, and one liking both the cake and the chocolate just fine. The Strawberry Banana Kabobs ($5 each) were even more interesting visually, alternating full strawberries and banana chunks on long sticks with similar chocolate coating, but after the mixed cheesecake verdicts, we opted not to sample them.
Johnny's Meats. We initially came here for the Cooked Tripe ($5/$8), a bowl with a few ounces of cooked beef stomach served in a tomato sauce, and found the dish to be fine, not memorable. As much as we love steamed and ginger-heavy tripe at Chinese Dim Sum places, in Italian cooking, it tends to taste like lightly meaty, mostly fatty pieces of beef in plain red sauce; it was served here with a slice of Italian bread. Based on Johnny's signs that it was "specializing in Italian Sausage", we grabbed one for $5 to compare against the Mineo and Sapio version, and liked this one - it was grilled rather than fried, served on a more impressive sesame bun, and used lighter onion and pepper toppings that added more to the slightly charred, mild pork flavor of the sausage. We'd still go for the spicy version of the Mineo sausage first.
The Pasta Peddler. One of us was enticed to this booth by a sign advertising Deep Fried Ravioli ($5), which upon order were pulled from a freezer and tossed into a fryer for a few minutes, then served with a light tomato sauce. We all tried the four-piece finished product; none of us were impressed by the sauce, the truly plain flavor of the flour packets, or the boring cheese inside, so we tossed the fourth ravioli out rather than eating it.
Sorrento's. As the major sponsor of the Festival, Sorrento's was offering free samples of both Brie and a Mozzarella, Pesto, and Tomato-Topped Crostini; the member of our group who sampled them felt that both were good, and nice little handouts.
Campi's Pizza. Last up before we left was this stand, which caught our eyes early on with its Famous Sicilian Pizza ($5). The enormous slices were thick with dough that had been braided at its edges to beautiful effect, and full pizzas were being carved up and sold off at a staggeringly brisk pace. We grabbed a piece with onions, sweet and hot peppers, pepperoni, cheese, and sauce, but found the dough so bland and overwhelming that we didn't even want to finish it; a few attempts were made by two of us, including picking off the fine toppings, but as a whole, this just didn't work for us. Thankfully there are hundreds of other local pizzerias to cater to all sorts of different tastes.
Muscarella's. This stand was set up specifically to sell Cannoli ($3.50), and delivered a freshly filled cone that was dipped in green sprinkles on both ends. The two of us who tried it shrugged it off; it wasn't anything special, not as good as the one from Falletta's, the award-winning one from Carmine's, or really a dozen or two other local places. Russ's Bakery does a better job, but ideally, we'd have sampled more of the options here.
Some of the other restaurants at the Festival, generally offering four- to five-item menus, include Angelo's Italian Pastry (Desserts), Captain Mike's Seafood (Clams, Shrimp & Lobster), Hertel Market & Deli (Sausage, Peppers & Sandwiches), Lorigo's Meating Place (Sausages, Sandwiches & Peppers), Misso's Taste of Italy (Sandwiches & Stuffed Artichokes), Molto Buono (Ice & Gelato), Panaro's, Oberst Concessions (Burgers), RJ's Concessions (Deep-Fried Snacks), Salvatore's Italian Gardens (Appetizers), Santillo's (Sausages & Fried Items), and WD Louie's (Eggplant, Gnocchi, Lasagna). Go in expecting carnival food and you'll be pleasantly surprised by all the options.
New! See additional photos of the Buffalo Italian Heritage Festival on our Facebook page.
Comments (5)
My girlfriend and I strongly disagree with your review of Campi's Pizza. We walked by this stand once and thought the pizza looked great, but upon returning, they did not have any Supreme pizza (the one you discribed), so we waited for one to finish. After waiting 20 minutes we got a slice each of this wonderfully delicious pizza. It is NOT italian style pizza so it is not going to have the complete traditional taste to it, but to describe the dough as so bland that you did not want to finish it is way off base. The dough is a thick bread type dough and was not bland. It is just different than what most people are used to on pizza and if it were that bad, Campi's would not have sold 40+ pizzas in the 20 minutes that my girlfriend and I were waiting. We both agreed that this was some of the best pizza that we've had.
Posted by Chris | July 19, 2009 10:46 AM
Posted on July 19, 2009 10:46
"To describe the dough as so bland that you did not want to finish it is way off base."
Actually, it's right on base. You're welcome to hold your own opinion of the pizza, but that's your opinion, not ours. Two of us tried the pizza and found it bland enough that we didn't want to finish it. Going further, we would never waste our time or money on it again. Obviously, your tastes are different. To each their own.
"If it were that bad, Campi's would not have sold 40+ pizzas in the 20 minutes..."
The pizzas were, as noted in the report above, beautiful - some of the most visually striking food items being sold at the Festival. We also noted how briskly they were selling, which we would attribute in large part to their attractive presentation. But attributing the sales to the taste of the pizza suggests that people knew what the pizza tasted like when they ordered it. Maybe some did. We sure didn't. Our guess is that most of the sales were from people who showed up at the festival and went for something that looked interesting.
Posted by Jeremy Horwitz | July 19, 2009 11:32 AM
Posted on July 19, 2009 11:32
After Juction West performed, I walked down to Campi's to grab a slice but they were all gone. The girl told me she had two last pies coming out of the oven, so I waited. Well, I've had this pizza for the past few years and I loved it, but this piece I had on Sunday was under baked and it was bland. The $5.00 was a bit steep for this lousy tasting piece. I was very disappointed. The News reports today that this Dunkirk based pizza joint is thinking of opening a shop in Buffalo after recording record profits at the Fest!! Go Figure.
Posted by Mike | July 21, 2009 5:14 PM
Posted on July 21, 2009 17:14
We had great time at the festivals and really enjoyed your in-depth coverage. I wanted to let you know our coverage of the two festivals is on the front page of foodchannel.com and you can follow the banner to the story. Feel free to link to the story/video if you like.
Sincerely,
David Nehmer
Creative Director
foodchannel.com
Posted by David Nehmer | July 27, 2009 11:24 AM
Posted on July 27, 2009 11:24
I've had the Campi's pies for a few years now and haven't run into bland taste or anything really negative about the stand overall.......The pizzas are stacked with toppings of all sorts...Personally the pizza doesn't even last long enough to admire the braidwork in the crust
Posted by Chris M. | August 28, 2009 5:23 AM
Posted on August 28, 2009 05:23