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By Katrina Margolis
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Incredible smells wafted from the Wingate Independent Residences, foreshadowing the incredible tastes to follow inside. A harpist sat in the corner setting the scene for an afternoon of delicious treats and community mingling.
Maria Lastoria, the Executive Director, said “This is our first annual Wingate Food Festival. All of the vendors are local from the neighborhood so we have a good relationship with them. Especially with Scott from Blue on Highland – he’s right up the street so we’ll go up there for cocktails and dinners, and he was the first to jump on board.”
The offerings ranged from fried shrimp at the Blue on Highland table to tapas offered by Wellesley’s Bocado, ice cream from JP Licks, and other offerings from local spots such as Spiga. There was also a bar offering wine and champagne. In addition, Wingate had their own chefs present. Lastoria said, “Ours is at the back. We’re doing a ragu beef with a scallop and we paired it up with some chocolates from chocolate therapy, so it’s a little bit of everything.”
Scott Drago, the General Manager of Blue on Highland, has a longstanding relationship with Wingate. “This is my first year doing the event, but Maria asked me to come down, just to sort of showcase their new property. What she does and is she comes down to the restaurant and once in a while sets up a little area to promote Wingate and it’s sort of a little relationship between us and Wingate.”
All of the collections from the event went to the Needham Food Pantry, which was the ultimate goal of the event – to give back. “It’s good to work with the community and have the community that has not come in know what we’re all about, so it’s kind of a win-win. But the goal was for the Needham food pantry. I see some familiar faces and I see some new faces. We’re honored to work with the food pantry and anything that we can give back to the community, this is a nice way of doing it,” said Lastoria.
