[Park Hopper]

Well, our third visit (Week 2) to this year's International Food & Wine Festival was marked by the anticipation of seeing the Beach Boys at the Eat to the Beat Concert series. Sad to say, though, they were a complete disappointment.

By far the biggest-name act to perform at the series, the band did little more than go through the motions of singing -- sometimes badly -- a selection of their hits. Many of the oldies groups that perform at Epcot really get into it with the audience, but there was no rapport with the Beach Boys whatsoever. Unlike the next night's performance by The Temptations where the crowd was singing, swaying, clapping, stomping and dancing in the aisles, the Beach Boys elicited applause and not much more.

We anticipated a line waiting to get into the America Gardens Theatre, and what a line it was. It made the lines I've seen for the Candlelight Processional look like nothing. During the evening's three performances, people were 5 and 6 deep on the sidewalk outside the theater listening and trying to get a glimpse of the Beach Boys. Not worth it!

There are only two members of the original group left performing, and perhaps that had something to do with it, but I've seen lots of other groups with replacement members who don't miss a beat from the originals.


At any rate, the rest of the day was quite enjoyable, starting with a wine seminar/tasting of Aussie Great Whites. The wines were good, but the Crocodile Dundee-sounding presenter was the highlight of the event.

The only food booth we stopped at was Peru, where we had Papas Rellenas (beef stuffed potato with roasted corn relish) and Anticuchos with Papas Huancaina-Peruvian (a skewer of roasted chicken served with purple potato salad). Both were delicious.

The evening concluded with dinner at Bistro de Paris, where the usual fine-dining experience was given a somewhat odd twist by having Teresa Kerry, wife of the presidential candidate, dining in the restaurant.

The next day's Food & Wine visit was topped by the performance of the Temptations, led by almost-original member Dennis Edwards. The five singers, complete with colorful outfits bedecked with sequins, were backed by an 11-piece band. To use an old term, they tore the joint down.

The earlier part of the day was taken up with a seminar on the red wines of Spain, where the very entertaining presenter took the audience on an imaginary day-trip to Barcelona through the eyes of a native as he detailed how often during the workday everything comes to a halt to eat and drink wine. The Grand Reserve Cabernet he served was the best I've ever had.

We then stopped at the Poland food booth and enjoyed Kielbasa and Pierogies w/sour cream and a Cabbage Roll w/spiced beef. We followed that with a German cooking demonstration in the Odyssey Center, where we sampled an angel hair pasta salad with veal. Delicious. The chef from the Biergarten Restaurant said he has worked for Disney for 33 years, a major part of his tenure at the old Empress Lilly in Downtown Disney. We really enjoyed talking to him after the demonstration about the good old days on the boat.

Next came dessert from the Piemonte, Italy food booth. Chocolate Gianduja Torte and Flourless Chocolate Hazelnut Cake are not to be missed. The last thing we did before going to the Temptations concert was the Samuel Adams beer seminar, where the presenter gives you a brief talk about beer and then you get down to the serious stuff of sampling four different brews.