NH FISH & LOBSTER FESTIVAL

Saturday, September 19, 2009 
Noon - 4:00 PM
Admission - FREE
Coinciding with the Fairy House Tour
Enjoy free parking at nearby City Hall or 75¢/hour at the downtown parking garage!

Otherwise known as the Fishtival, this brand new event is a special collaboration between a variety of community organizations to support the local fishing industy.

This fun-filled event will feature seafood tasting, games, music and more.

Walk the decks of a local fishing boat, taste freshly-landed local seafood prepared by Seacoast chefs, learn to identify and prepare local fish, watch an on-location cook-off competition between chefs, investigate the Gulf of Maine ecosystem, sing a song and hear a tale or two.

This first-ever interactive festival celebrates 18 miles and 400 years of NH fishing communities and traditions.

13 chefs and restaurants will serve up fresh and delicious seafood tastings. Each were assigned a different locally-caught fish species at random (via lottery) to prepare at the event. The restaurants and their catch of the day are:

Little Bay Oyster fresh shucked oysters
Fresh Local mackerel
Jumpin' Jays Fish Cafe monk fish
Philbrick's Fresh Market squid
Robert's Maine Grill skate
Seaport Fish hake
Portsmouth Lobster Co. whole steamed lobster
Blue Mermaid lobster
Portsmouth Brewery flounder
Green Monkey & Brazo cod
River House Restaurant pollock
Portsmouth High School Culinary Arts haddock
Old Salt Restaurant bluefish

"Iron Chef" fans will also love the chef cook-off competition between chefs Ben Hasty of the Exeter Inn and Alec Maxon, a professional chef and fisherman from Newburyport. For this Seafood Throwdown, the chefswill be asked to prepare on-site an undisclosed locally-caught fish species with a limited amount of time to travel to the Portsmouth Farmers' Market to collect supplies, return to the park and prepare, cook, and plate samples for the judges!

Admission is free, with seafood tastings for $3.

The Fishtival coincides with the annual Fairy House Tour, also held in Prescott park, lending for a great, fun-filled day on the Seacoast.

The Fish & Lobster Festival is a very special collaboration between Prescott Park Arts Festival, City of Portsmouth Fishing Industry Committee, Seacoast Local, Seacoast Eat Local, Slow Food Seacoast, and UNH Sea Grant. Find more information about the movement to support New Hampshire's local fishing industry at www.nhseafood.com

The event is proudly sponsored by:

The City of Portsmouth 
NH Division of Ports & Harbors 
Friends of the South End
New England Grassroots Environmental Fund 
UNH Cooperative Extension
Sea Grant New Hampshire
NH Commercial Fishermans Association
Esther's Marina

Festival Supporters:

This is truly a grassroots festival, please support the businesses and non-profit organizations involved. Hats off to goods and services provided by Eastman's Fish Market, Portsmouth Lobster Company, New England Marine and Industrial, Seacoast Growers' Association, The Wire, Taste of the Seacoast, Rumbletree, Calypso Communications, Favorite Foods, Marianne Pernold Young (photography), Ian Ciesla (graphic design), and the Portsmouth Chamber of Commerce.