"Wisconsin-Happy Festival State", by Eve Phillips. My husband and I love to travel in the state of Wisconsin where we live and get great pictures on the way. My name is Laurie Kutil and photography has become a great passion of mine since 2010. One thing I have learned in researching each town before visiting it is that, "Every town has it's story". When I do uncover those stories by connecting with local residents, our experience becomes so much richer. In turn, sharing the stories with you brings me joy :)
The last time we were able to attend the Mustard festival was in 2013. The festival always begins with the National Mustard Museum‘s Curator Barry Levenson kicks off the event with mustard songs and thanking the many sponsors.
Here are the words to the songs, audience participation highly encouraged!
The music is played by the Madison Accordion Band, dubbed the POUPON U Accordion Band during the festival.
The Duchess of Mustard is the star of the show! Everyone wanted pictures with her. She makes her own special hats, quite the talent! She can also yodel and did so for the growing audience.
After the opening ceremony we mingled with the crowd and took in the sights.
Get your picture with the French’s Mustard bottle or the Culver’s mascot Scoopie! We posed with Scoopie in 2013, not this year.
Culver’s also had a mustard custard made special just for this festival.
The Weinermobile was also there for selfies, since Oscar Mayer provided the hot dogs for sale.
Love the beer mug hats this couple is wearing.
Of course we had to stop inside the mustard Museum itself and look at the mustards on display. Very impressive!
The museum sells about 400 mustards and ALL are available for tasting before buying. How else would you know if you like it!
There was even a movie theater downstairs showing mustard videos.
After the museum I stopped by the souvenir tent. Even after the event, you can still pick up many of these items in the museum.
Enjoy the music entertainment at the festival, the Madison Accordion band and the Red Hot Horn Dawgs.
Lots of fun games too for both kids and adults. Feed the Curator is tossing mustard packets into the mouth of Barry Levenson and win a bottle of mustard!
Another great day at the National Mustard Day festival.
I have not been to this festival in four years so I was real happy that this year it worked out. Barry Levenson is the owner and curator of the National Mustard Museum in Middleton. This is his moment to shine, he is very excited during the festival and it shows when he mixes and mingles with the crowd.
At 9:30 the event kicks off with the Accordion Band, headed by the Duchess of Mustard, who also yodeled for the crowd.
Soon Barry arrives to kick off the festival and to thanks his sponsors.
He even took a picture with us a little later. What an honor! We had many pictures taken with the many mascots wandering about.
It was time for lunch! Hot dogs were offered for free, $1 donation encouraged for each hot dog. Merchandise was for sale also, and lots of it. Culver’s was there selling their famous Mustard Custard, made and sold ONLY at this festival. Its an interesting taste.
It was quite busy inside the museum and store as well, for some people their first time going there.
They also offer mustard tasting so you can pick the perfect mustard 🙂
The museum is downstairs. The collection is over 5000 mustards and mustard pots, used to keep a personal supply of mustard with you at the dinner table.
We were entertained by two wonderful groups. The first one was the Red Hot Horn Dawgs. They got everyone going playing popular classic rock songs.
Next up was Harmonious Wail. Their genre is Gypsy swing, a combination that works better than you would think!
While I was taking pictures of the group, a Photographer from the Capital Times took my picture in turn. It was up on their website today!
Photo by Michelle Stocker, Capital Times, Madison.
This was the best Mustard Fest ever, we highly recommend going if you love mustard!
