Splashing Back into the HILTON HEAD ISLAND SEAFOOD FESTIVAL
Get your taste buds ready for a week-long love letter to the bounty of the Lowcountry’s waters. BY BARRY KAUFMAN
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PHOTOS PROVIED BY HILTON HEAD SEAFOOD FESTIVAL
The season has turned, bringing with it the cooler temperatures that beg Lowcountry foodies to bring the party outside and turn their appetites to festival season. Let summer have its celebrations – the real gourmets know that sweater weather is the best accompaniment to any fine meal. That’s doubly true when the meal in question is part of the unique culinary lexicon of the Lowcountry. The arrival of the R months brings with it the return of oysters to steamers and firepits across the region, (even if the purists turn their nose up at any attempts to cook them). The white shrimp season is in full swing. And the notion of sitting 42
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around waiting for a whole hog to reach the perfect slowcooked consistency becomes much easier when the heat index isn’t hotter than the smoker itself. In short, it’s the perfect time for a food festival. But you don’t have to tell the folks at the Hilton Head Island Seafood Festival that. They’ve known it ever since the first installment of the event, which turns 17 this year. Wildly popular right off the bat, the celebration of Lowcountry food has since evolved and grown, bringing in chefs from all over while expanding the shrimp net to pull in the tastiest morsels from around the southeast.