‘It just keeps expanding’: Oakmont Greek Food Festival celebrates 50th anniversary
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Frank and Karen Sansosti have been married for 50 years, as long as the Oakmont Greek Food Festival has been around, and almost as many as they’ve attended it.
The allure is simple for the North Huntingdon couple.
“The food,” Frank Sansosti said. “You don’t get lamb every day.”
Whether it’s the food, atmosphere or love of a good community gathering, residents of the Alle-Kiski Valley and well beyond come in droves to the Dormition of the Theotokos Greek Orthodox Church on Washington Avenue each June to fill up on Mediterranean favorites.
The church is celebrating the festival’s 50th anniversary from Friday to through Sunday. Food is available from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. each day, with dancing and music continuing until 11 p.m.
It has been hampered over the years by power outages, tornadoes and covid-19 — organizers modified the event in 2020 and 2021 to meet public health guidelines — but the show has always gone on.
Now, it’s stronger than ever.
Friday was the best attended day in the festival’s history, according to event co-chair Chris Doas, and Saturday was shaping up to be another packed house.
“It just keeps expanding,” Doas said. “We expect this year will be bigger than last year.”
Sunday will cap off this annual Oakmont tradition with another full day of carving lamb for gyros, dancing and — for the first time — a strolling violinist.
Andy Gavrilos, who has chaired or co-chaired about 35 festivals, including this year’s, said the church sells around 10,000 gyros, 15,000 spinach pies and 30,000 pastries each year.
“We’re blessed the local communities support us like they do,” Gavrilos said. “People keep coming back.”
Putting on the event is no small feat.
A committee of around 25 volunteers and parishioners starts planning in January, and it’s September by the time clean up and bookkeeping is complete, according to Gavrilos. At any given time during the festival’s three-day run, there are at least 50 volunteers on site.
The festival has morphed in many ways over the years.
For example, volunteers used to perch by a single deep fryer to make honey balls by hand. The church has since purchased a machine to do the job — and a lot more fryers.
By 1995, demand for pastries grew so high that organizers moved that operation to the Riverside Landings Event Center across the street. The ballroom attached to the church is used for à la carte meals, where Chicken Alexis, topped with a fruit and honey glaze, is the most popular item.
It’s a recipe concocted by and named after Doas’ grandmother, Mary Alexis, who died 20 years ago. The “old timers” still have their fingerprints all over the event, Gavrilos noted, with most recipes coming from the event’s founders, save for a few tweaks.
But the event truly revolves around the gyro tent, where volunteers tirelessly shave chunks of rotating lamb, and festival-goers show equal dedication to mowing them down.
The tent is supported by metal beams bolted into the ground — a testament to the festival’s staying power.
On Saturday afternoon, Chloe Davis sat down with her mother, Melissa, and some friends for a meal under the tent. The group likes to hit all of the Greek food festivals in the area. Next week, Chloe, of North Huntingdon is headed to Greece with her sister, where she’ll be taking a cooking class.
“I’d say going to these made me want to go to Greece,” Chloe said.
For Doas, that’s the part of the joy of putting on the festival.
“We’re carrying on our church’s history,” Doas said. “It’s nice to share our food, our culture, our heritage and be proud of it.”