Great GoogaMooga Food & Music Festival

The Great GoogaMooga food, drink, and music festival returns to Prospect Park, Brooklyn this May

If you’ve been following my blog, you know that I attended last year’s Great GoogaMooga and had an absolutely fabulous time. Well folks, the combination music-food-drink festival is back in Prospect Park this coming May 17-19 and it’s looking greater than ever. They’re kicking things off with a Friday night concert featuring the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Flaming Lips, and The Darkness, then continuing the tradition from last year with a weekend of Baccanalian festivities that’s free to attend: just pay-as-you-go for food and drink from over 85 food vendors, 75 breweries, and 100 wine makers. Here’s a taste of the food you’ll get to enjoy:

Indeed, the 85 food vendors they’re bringing together truly are “Great,” from Taiwanese steamed buns of Baohaus to Roberta’s wood-fired pizza to adventurous hot dogs of Crif Dogs to buttery Luke’s Lobster rolls to unique soft serve concoctions of Big Gay Ice Cream to new Filipino standouts Jeepney and Pig and Khao to the pupusas of the Red Hook Ballfields to the meaty deliciousness of Pat Lafrieda, just to name a few. The Saturday and Sunday food festivals also have plenty of music to entertain the crowd with two stages featuring likes of Matt & Kim, De la Soul, Sharon Jones and the Dap-kings, and Cults, among others, so you can always dance off the food you’re bound to stuff your face with.

Panorama of the food vendors at the Great GoogaMooga — Panorama of the food vendors at the 2012 Great GoogaMooga

What makes this festival great is that it brings so many of NYC’s great restaurants and vendors to one place. There’s no need to take the L train or go from one end of Manhattan to another – instead you can hop from one stall to the next and get a culinary tour of the best of NYC, plus visitors from Boston and LA like Toro and Umami Burger. While the festival had its share of hiccups in it’s first year, we can only assume they have course corrected after the backlash they received. They even explain why 2013 is a “new, improved recipe” on their website, so my recommendation is to mark your calendars and make sure you get a ticket for what looks to be a fun-filled almost-summer day.

The Friday night kick-off concert goes for $49.50 and will be on sale here starting March 28 at noon, and also includes guaranteed admission for either Saturday or Sunday. If you’d prefer to go the free route, you’re not guaranteed a ticket, but you can try your luck in snagging a free ticket to Saturday or Sunday by registering here from April 1-3 for a chance at being one of the 30,000 randomly selected registrants. There’s also a $79.50 VIP Cocktail option for all you lushes out there, which gets you 5 artisanal cocktails from the mixmasters at Booker & Dax, The Dead Rabbit, PDT and more.

So do what you gotta do to get yourself to this year’s The Great GoogaMooga, and if you need more persuasion, just check out the epic food lineup below:

Food Vendors at Great GoogaMooga 2013