FallFeast Dishes Up Falafel to Fromage

Harvard’s annual celebration of autumn will take a culinary turn this year with a host of ethnic cuisines, offering falafel, Tibetan delicacies, hot apple cider, Swiss rolls and Pinocchio’s pizza.

Last year’s FallFest, which drew hundreds with its carnival atmosphere, giant inflatable slide and bouncy dinosaur, has become this year’s FallFeast. The event, run and financed by the Undergraduate Council, will take place tomorrow from 12:30 to 4 p.m. in the Quad.

“This event is not a carnival,” said Jessica R. Stannard-Friel ’04, social chair of the council’s Campus Life Committee. “Instead, it is a concert and food festival.”

She said the council wanted to try something different for this year’s festival.

“Food seems like the thing most people care about at our age,” she said.

All told, 26 student groups will be taking part and many campus ethnic clubs will be providing food. The three Quad dining halls will be serving New England, Asian and Italian cuisines.

Many non-ethnic groups will also be represented, including the Fair Trade Coffee Initiative, the Surf Club and Swift Magazine.

To accompany all the feasting, there will be an eclectic mix of live music. Subject to Change will be playing folk rock and Un Poquito Más will offer Latin music. Simon and the Salamanders will also play

Extra shuttle service will be running from Johnson gate and the river houses to the Quad. Bad weather has been predicted for Saturday, in which case the event will be held in the Pforzheimer Dining Hall with student groups upstairs and music downstairs.

Unlike SpringFest, its vernal counterpart on the river, FallFeast is entirely financed by the council and directed at undergraduates.

The University President’s Office partly financed last year’s SpringFest and changed its focus to include the entire Harvard community—students, faculty and staff.

For FallFeast this year, the council solicited student groups by sending e-mails through the House lists in early October.

Council members chose the bands from among 12 that submitted demo tapes.

So far publicity has been conducted mostly by word-of-mouth, said publicity coordinator John P. McCambridge ‘06.

There has also been postering around the Houses and the Yard. More announcements will be made in dining halls and outside the Science Center today.