Seafood Festival

" Welcome to Apalachicola. It's a fun time of the year. We've got some great weather today."

" My name is Dan and that's all you need to know about me. We're here to have a good time. Welcome to the 45th Annual Seafood Festival."

" Hi, I'm Barb Freda, your visitflorida.com dining expert. I'm here in Apalachicola, Florida for the 45th Annual Seafood Festival. Apalachicola is a great seafood town. The Apalachicola oyster is known in the world over by chefs and everyone who loves an oyster. We're gonna be seeing the oyster shucking contest, the oyster eating contest. And this year for the first time ever, there's a seafood cooking contest. It's a great way to spend a fall weekend."

" There are all kinds of things for everyone. If you don't touch on a little bit of this and a little bit of that, you've missed a part of the Seafood Festival. So, you just gotta see it all."

" One of the bases of the seafood industry is our oysters and so what we try to do is to celebrate that by doing a couple of contests a year. One is the oyster shucking and one is the oyster eating. We have contestants from all over the United States, but so far none of them lost their thumbs, fingers, or anything else. So that's a good thing."

" Shuckers, shuck!"

" Hey, can you show us, what it takes to shuck an oyster? "

" Yeah, you just put it in. Push down and when you pop it open, go across to the top. Cut it loose. See how clean it is? And then you cut it loose from the bottom. So now you gotta eat it."

" Nice."

" People do talk about a word of caution when they're consuming raw oysters, what do you have to say?"

" If you've got a bad liver, then you probably shouldn't eat raw oysters or any other kind of raw shellfish. But, that is a very small part of the population. For the most part, they're great."

" 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1! Go! Give them a big hand! Good job!"

" Blue crab races are a big part of the festival for the kids. Incredible fishing rods have been given out to the winners and it looks like they all had a great time."

" We're about to head over to the first ever seafood cooking contest that's gonna be a part of the Florida Seafood Festival here in Apalachicola. What were some of the criteria for the recipes?"

" I think, number 1 is it has to be local seafood. It can be prepared anywhere they wanted to, you know, they got to bring it in."

" I'm here with Pamela May who's the first place winner of the first ever seafood cooking contest here at the festival. What'd you cook for the judges Pamela?"

" Apalachicola shrimp balls."

" I heard you said something about that sauce."

" Well. Actually my daddy, when we have shrimp balls, he makes a wonderful shrimp sauce and I love it. And when I was debating on the sauce to serve with my shrimp balls, I called my daddy."

" The Florida Seafood Festival in Apalachicola is one you really can't miss, but there's a lot more going on year round in Florida with seafood. There's a Homasassa Seafood Arts and Crafts Festival coming up. There's also a mighty mullet festival : Mighty Mullet Festival in Panacea. If you get down to Key West in January, there's the 4th Annual Key West Shrimp Festival. And don't forget, all the way back in September next year, there's the Pensacola Seafood Festival. So, there's always something going on with seafood in Florida. If you wanna try an oyster for the first time, then Apalachicola is the great place to start. The texture is never slimy and a good oyster shouldn't be. It's smooth, it's tender, and it makes for great eating -- let me tell ya."