Bacon Ball

http://www.louisvillevisualart.org/BaconBall_000.htm

Does anyone have any detailed info on this event, like what the $25 tickets gets you? The website is a little vague on the specifics.

Free beer ?....BBC beer...?,
Did I say free beer ?

I am not sure how many restaurants are participating, but I think I was told at least 11. Restaurants were asked to create dishes using Bacon.

Sweet Surrender is providing cookies for the event, and I know that Comfy Cow will also be there, but I do not know who all the other restaurants are.

If they are not already there, Meridian cafe should be there.
They have the best bacon on the planet, sorry it's true.
Apple cider cured bacon, no not applewood smoked, apple cider cured.

To die for

Proof
Hammerheads
Blind Pig
Zanzabar
Papalino's
Bistro 301
Eiderdown
Mark Williams - Brown-Foreman Chef
I think I'm missing a few

From what I was originally told the $25 admission got you in the door for all the bacon tasting, DJing, and Band playing as well as a drink ticket. It looks like the poster has changed now and it is now free BBC beer and a cash bar. It should be a pretty hopping event from the estimation numbers I've heard, and we're very excited to be there giving away some of our house cured bacon. The whole shebang benefits the LVAA, Jefferson County Schools Art Programs and some other things. There is a bit more info from the Fox41 Morning segment they did here at Zanzabar.
http://www.fox41.com/story/14356448/bacon-ball-at-the-historic-water-tower

Well, we went to this on Saturday. First, let me preface everything by saying that I'm sure the event raised a boatload of money for the LVAA, which is a great thing. However:

1. Beer. There was confusion on here (see above) and confusion regarding two versions of the event poster, which originally stated that included in the admission price was one drink, then changed to state that included in the admission was free BBC beer plus a cash bar, then changed back on the day of the event to its original incarnation. In reality, the $25 admission included a drink ticket good for one Makers Mark drink, one glass of wine, or one beer. Additional drinks were additional $$$. This is fine, but the organizers really should have made this clear at the outset and not changed the event poster back and forth.

2. Crowd. Yes, this was a fundraiser, so, generally, the more the merrier. In this case, there really should have been a limit on the number of people allowed in. There were waits of 20-30 minutes for entry to the event, 15+ minute waits for drinks (only 2 bars set up for this entire shin-dig), and we spent almost 45 minutes waiting to taste two food items (kudos to Hammerheads and Bling Pig - their offerings were very good). It was really just a crushing crowd - one couldn't move about, find a place to sit, or really taste many of the food items.

All in all, the event has a lot of potential, and based on the crowds, I'm sure a ton of money was raised for a good organization. It needs a lot of work, though, as we really found the experience unpleasant. Too many people were crammed into a relatively small space, and we noticed many a grumbling attendee leaving because of it.

Well, we went to this on Saturday. First, let me preface everything by saying that I'm sure the event raised a boatload of money for the LVAA, which is a great thing. However:

In this case, there really should have been a limit on the number of people allowed in. There were waits of 20-30 minutes for entry to the event, 15+ minute waits for drinks (only 2 bars set up for this entire shin-dig), and we spent almost 45 minutes waiting to taste two food items (kudos to Hammerheads and Blind Pig - their offerings were very good). It was really just a crushing crowd - one couldn't move about, find a place to sit, or really taste many of the food items.

All in all, the event has a lot of potential, and based on the crowds, I'm sure a ton of money was raised for a good organization. It needs a lot of work, though, as we really found the experience unpleasant. Too many people were crammed into a relatively small space, and we noticed many a grumbling attendee leaving because of it.

For their first time out, I'm certain that the organizers meant well and got excited by the number of tickets they sold. Unfortunately, I think they might have lost sight of the "perceived value" of the donation for those in attendance. Hopefully they have learned from this mistake as I haven't heard anything really positive about the event from those I know that went.

In my experience organizing events of this nature, the number of tickets that are going to sell is one of the first things that I like to bring up for consideration. I'm very much concerned with how much the tickets should be, what would be an appropriate cut-off based upon the size of the room, how much food the number of restaurants participating will have to donate, etc.etc.

For the chowder throwdown, it was important for all the organizers to be able to cut the ticket sales off so we didn't "oversell" the event. We wanted everyone there to be able to move around the room and enjoy themselves. Sure we could have probably sold more, but by limiting the number of tickets it allowed us to let the participating restaurants know ahead of time how much food they would need to prepare so everyone in attendance would be able to sample all the offerings. Doing this also allows a realistic estimate of the amount of money we were able to raise.

Personally, I would have been a little upset if I was donating my time, efforts and product to a charity event that I expected 300 to show up for and then had to try to feed 700 instead.
I'm curious to hear how this all went down for the participating restaurants.......

For the first two hours we got crushed; we had originally planned a plated dish of a Nord's Bakery Donut Puree, 63C Egg Yolk Fluid Gel, Pickled Blue Berries (Vanilla, Rosemary, and Habaneros), Sunegros Sulawesi Coffee Powdered Sugar, Makers Mark 46 Gastrique, Freeze Dried Peaches, and Fresh Mint to compliment our Smoked and Sous Vide Bacon Cube. Unfortunately after the first 100 plates in 10 minutes from the onslaught of people and us running a two man show we had to nix two ingredients from our 8 step pickup. That wasn't as bad as the fact that we had absolutely zero time to talk about the dish to anyone (as it was as per usual a bit different), people were grabbing it as soon as we put it up and even some were trying to take them off the back table as we were plating them.

We ended up putting out about 500 plates in the first hour; and luckily after I'd received the phone call the day before letting me know they'd sold 500 presale tickets I cut more bacon out of the supply I'd made for the restaurant.
I think a few restaurants were out of food in the first hour or so, though I did see a few come back pretty strong. Not sure where they got more food from. It was definitely controlled chaos, but we kept putting out reincarnations of the dish as we ran out of ingredients until the end when we ran out of bacon, a 1,000 or so plates later. Luckily we had Brian Morgan from Eider come over and whip out a few hundred plates with us when they ran out of food.

I can't speak from a attendees perspective, but we really enjoyed the event and were glad to help the LVAA. And I personally loved the crush of people, but I'm a bit of a plating adrenaline junky.

It was DELICIOUS! Unbelievably creative uses of bacon/pork bellies too. After tasting the first station, I was willing to work it to get to them all. It was so crowded it was funny . But I did feel for everyone plating up. It was a confluence of several great things in that the weather was good, the event itself was in and out of doors along the river, some still fondly remember Bacon Camp, the event itself was a chance to show your support for art and JCPS, a chance to hang with art, and BACON was involved!

I think some came for the laughs because they thought it was a send up of the Bourbon Ball but what they also got was some seriously creative food. That it appeared in the Leo's April 1st. issue gave it credibility. It also appeared albeit w/limits on Try It Local. WFPK's Matt Anthony was there with his 45s and 33s There was a country Western band by the river. Plus LVAA amassed the largest collection of volunteered pig art in the county! I think the event registered with many people on several levels thus the large turn out.

Regardless, it was delicious. I could sit at home for the next year and not come up with anything like I tasted Saturday. Even after tasting Saturday's food.

Forgot to say thank you to everyone involved esp. chefs. I'm so glad to have had the experience. Thanks again!

Very last thought as a result of sleeping: Perhaps one reason Bacon Ball got mobbed has nothing to do with bacon but as a result of recent events leading up to the changing of the guard at the Fund. I myself committed immediately to support LVAA.

Kinda curious if anyone has any feedback on this years event Saturday?
Noticed that it has increased from $25 to $35....reading las years posts there was confusion about free beer and no free beer?...long lines ?...just wanting to figure out if the $35 gets you visits to the vendors only or beer?
Thanks