On Saturday, May 6th, Westford celebrated food and wellbeing with WestFest, a health and food celebration celebrated with an array of food trucks to support healthy lifestyle. Due to rain, not many people showed up. Hosted by Auntie’s Sweet Shop and the Westford Health Department, WestFest was held from 11am- 4pm.

Admission was free, but you could buy tickets for certain activities upon entry. Down the road, there were many different charities, fitness centers, realtors, and local teams as well as theater groups like SBTA. Music blared from a DJ playing popular songs by cover artists.

Jewelers selling fine jewelry peppered the farmers market-like hall of vendors. The jewelry was very beautiful, but I did not buy any. The price of some of the necklaces and bracelets were out of my budget of about $50.

Stony Brook Theater Arts offered muffin tosses and face painting, led by Theater Arts teacher Andrea Watson. At this point of the walk, the rain started to come down, and it was time to pull out the trusty umbrella.

Orange Theory sat at the end of the line of vendors, selling memberships to their gym. I took at turn towards the food trucks up the hill. 7 trucks sat at the hill, offering all kinds of food to eat for lunch. I tried the first truck in line, the fish truck. I ordered the clam chowder and salmon burger. None of the tables or chairs were dry, and I was not about to sit down at a chair with a huge puddle on it.

The burger was dry and had no taste except for a strong fishy flavor between two slices of broiche bread. There was a huge slice of onion on the inside, overpowering the burger.

Clam chowder is my favorite soup of all time, so I had high expectations. I took a bite and it had no potato, and was full of cornstarch-like flavor. The clams were not the star of the dish but seemed like it wasn’t the most important part. This chowder was one of my least favorite clam chowders I have ever had.

Next up was the Roving Lunch Box. It was a really cute truck and definitely caught my eye. They had items that were served as hand pies, which seemed like an interesting take on food. They put chili in a hand pie as a popular item at West Fest. I tried the Pineapple Upside Down pie, and was the best thing I had there. It was filled with a sweet pineapple filling and a crispy pastry on the outside. It was sprinkled with powdered sugar. It was so delicious, I wish I bought two. The price was excellent as well, 1 pastry for $5.

After that, Augusta’s was next in line. They claimed “Famous Chicken Bites and Chicken Subs”. I could not try it due to dietary restrictions, but I talked to a man eating their fried chicken bites and a sweet and sour sauce.

“What is good is that they are hot, crispy, and freshly cooked to order. The chicken bites are all white meat. The sweet and sour sauce was watery and didn’t stick to the chicken. They offered very little favor to complement the crispy coated chicken,” a customer said.

Inside of the gym was a huge selection of health related companies, like Play Well Technologies, Merrimack Valley Medical Reserve Corps and some tables advertised skin cancer awareness.

A walk around the school was advertised, 700 steps in total. Along the walk, people had posts to have you do small activities, such as jumping jacks. Not many people walked, as the main attraction seemed to be the food trucks.

Overall, my experience didn’t live up to my expectations, and would have been better if there was a rain date set up. I would give this year’s WestFest a 2 1/2 stars.