Atlantic Antic '09

Atlantic Antic is no joke, people.

I headed to Brooklyn last weekend expecting food, music, and the typical street fair vendors that infiltrate the streets of New York every weekend. What I didn’t expect is that the festival would be so big that I’d be worn out after walking the whole thing (granted, I did do a lot of backtracking when pondering my culinary options).

The festival spanned 10 blocks of Atlantic Avenue from 4th Avenue in Boerum Hill to Hicks Street in Brooklyn Heights and featured ten live entertainment stages (all incredible and reflecting a wide range of musical tastes), more than 600 vendors, a plethora of heart attack-inducing foods, and even moon bounces (if only I could’ve jumped around with all the other elementary school kids without exceeding the weight limit!).

Additionally, the New York Transit Museum celebrated its 16th annual bus festival , displaying a collection of vintage buses dating all the way back to 1917. It was just so cute to see all the transit employees proudly standing in front of the retro buses and inviting onlookers to climb aboard. My fave was definitely the Park Avenue bus of the ‘50s.

My number one find of the festival however, was Building on Bond’s food tent. Two options: beef and chorizo burgers or BBQ pork with apple jicama slaw on pretzel bread. I was torn, but I love me some BBQ (and there was a 10 minute wait for the popular burgers), so I jumped right in. I was curious to find out what “pretzel bread” tastes like. All you need to know is that it’s excellent. I happily inhaled my sandwich while sitting on a little stool in the middle of the road and taking in the scenery. I also spent some quality time contemplating whether or not to try the fried twinkie down the street. I decided to save that and the mozzarepa for another day and headed home feeling tired, but also full and accomplished.