Thousands expected to show for 2-year-old Taste of Durham festival

Summer brings Festival for the Eno, autumn has Centerfest, winter has Light Up Durham and now spring in the Bull City has a festival to call its own. For the second time, Memorial Day weekend serves up a Taste of Durham.

"We are trying to create another staple," said organizer Kimberly M. Ruskan. "We're setting something for years to come."

Taste of Durham opens this morning at 11 and continues until 8 tonight in and around Brightleaf Square and Peabody Place, in the 800 and 900 blocks between West Main and Peabody streets. It is an extravaganza of food, with celebrity chefs' demonstrations, an ice-carving contest and samples from more than 25 Durham eateries.

On the side, there will be wine and beer from around the world and five venues with dancers and musicians, magicians and puppet masters.

"It's about touching people's hearts, touching people's happy buttons," Ruskan said. "All the good-life stuff."

General admission tickets are $6 at the festival; free for children under 12. Coins for food and beverage purchase and tickets for wine and beer tastings are sold separately at a booth in the Brightleaf parking lot. During the festival, Gregson Street will be closed between Main and Peabody, and Peabody Street will be closed between Gregson and Duke.

"Last year, she brought 7,000 or 8,000 people here," said Richard Morgan, owner of Peabody Place on Duke Street and Morgan Imports on Gregson Street. "It was a great success -- brought a lot of people who had never been here before.

"Any time you can bring more customers down on a given day, it's good."

Taste of Durham will have food from Mount Fuji, Kashmir Indian Cuisine and Ted's Montana Grill, to name just three establishments. It will have zydeco, tango, cool jazz and an accordion player, all with local roots. Ruskan learned about festivals with the International Sanibel Jazz Festival in Florida, and said she used the Taste of Chicago festival as a "template"; but for the many-flavored event she is staging today, she said, "The concept was inspired by Durham."

Ruskan spent two years organizing the first Taste of Durham, and said she took care to make it different from events already established in the area like Centerfest and Raleigh's Artsplosure.

"We even picked music that's not overplayed," she said.

"I've been here for nine years," she said, "and there are a lot of us transplants coming here. ... We've got a festival here that kind of welcomes the new kids on the block.

"Wine-tasting pavilion, beer-tasting pavilion, chef demonstrations, music, even a Food Network customized kitchenette. Ice carving ... a taste of Preservation Hall jazz. If you look at each component, there is a constant theme ... good life."

For Brightleaf Square, the festival is good advertising, said Rodney Allison, president of Property Advisory Services, Brightleaf's managing agency. Moreover, he said, it's fun, and the inaugural event last year was a major success.

"We got a lot of positive feedback from Brightleaf tenants," Allison said, "It's good ... on a Saturday, on a holiday when typically not that many people are in town, that many people having a good time."