Fest food
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 3 months, 1 week AGO
Albert Otterson, left, and Kylie Mathews work the deep fryers ahead of the hungry crowds at Spring Fest Thursday.
JOEL MARTIN/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
Knotty Delights owner Ylse Engler serves soft pretzels at Spring Fest and the North Central Washington Fair in Waterville.
Ethan Small, right, shows Landon Noble how to work the fryer safely at the Smulligan’s barbecue booth at Spring Fest.
Sloane Gardner gets lemonade ready inside a giant lemon at Spring Fest Thursday.
Joel Martin has been with the Columbia Basin Herald for more than 25 years in a variety of roles and is the most-tenured employee in the building. Martin is a married father of eight and enjoys spending time with his children and his wife, Christina. He is passionate about the paper’s mission of informing the people of the Columbia Basin because he knows it is important to record the history of the communities the publication serves. | May 27, 2026 3:20 AM
MOSES LAKE — You don’t need a map to find where Spring Fest is set up in McCosh Park. The aromas wafting on the breeze call out to you from a block away.
“It’s a dangerous place to be,” said Karlee Marion-Swan, who was getting teriyaki ready ahead of the crowds Thursday.
Nearly every kind of food and drink imaginable could be had at Spring Fest: hamburgers and hot dogs of all sizes and shapes, elephant ears, stir-fry, tacos and fries in an astonishing variety of forms.
Ylse Engler, of Waterville, had her Knotty Delights gourmet soft pretzels ready and waiting. “Everybody loves a pretzel,” Engler said.
This is Engler’s fourth year at Spring Fest, she said. She also works the North Central Washington Fair in Waterville every year, and farmers markets around the region. The venues change, but some things are constant, she said.
“People are always hungry,” she said. “They’re hungry, and we feed them.”
Knotty Delights is a small, specialized vendor, but there are also some bigger ones. Marion-Swan and her family, based in Portland, have three booths all connected: one selling teriyaki, one with gyros and one offering burgers, hot dogs and fries. Marion-Swan is a third-generation food vendor attending the event.
“This is my dad’s business,” she said. “It was my granddad’s business, and my grandma is in the back cooking. It’s been passed down generationally.”
Marion-Swan’s father, Lee Marion, started making teriyaki and then built the business up piece by piece.
“My dad’s been slowly (expanding),” she said. “He bought the gyro business from another person, and then he made the burger business himself as an add-on to (the teriyaki).”
The epicurean entourage includes Marion-Swan’s parents and grandmother, her two sisters, her uncle and some cousins, as well as employees Kylie Mathews and Albert Otterson. Occasionally they hire some local help as well, she said.
With three booths and three very different sets of cooking apparatus, the setup and teardown are a major undertaking, Marion-Swan said.
“For one booth alone, it takes us at least seven hours to set up,” she said. “For all three of these, it took two ten-hour days.”
Across the way, Sloane Gardner of Moses Lake was making lemonade inside a giant lemon. The owners of the lemon also have stands offering kettle corn, cotton candy and other festival fare.
“I’ve done the turkey trailer and I’ve done snow cones, but this is my first time working in the lemon,” Gardner said.
Many of the offerings at Spring Fest aren’t what you’d call healthy, but that doesn’t matter, Gardner said.
“That’s what a fair is all about,” she said. “This is Spring Fest.”
Knotty Delights owner Ylse Engler serves soft pretzels at Spring Fest and the North Central Washington Fair in Waterville.
Ethan Small, right, shows Landon Noble how to work the fryer safely at the Smulligan’s barbecue booth at Spring Fest.
Sloane Gardner gets lemonade ready inside a giant lemon at Spring Fest Thursday.ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
Quincy National Night Out scales down
QUINCY — Quincy’s National Night Out was more compact this year, which worked out well, said QPD Sgt. Joe Westby, who’s in charge of event planning for the Quincy Police Department. “National Night Out is a big event, and the fact that we’re able to shrink it up is like a breath of fresh air,” Westby said. “If you're always doing the same thing, it's kind of nice to switch things up and see how it works.” National Night Out took place Thursday on the block of C Street next to the police station, a shift from previous years when it was held at Lauzier Park. The smaller space meant fewer emergency vehicles for children to explore, but it also meant less walking for attendees. Grant County Fire District 5 brought a fire truck, and the Grant County Sheriff’s Office had a patrol boat. Renew, the Grant County behavioral health agency, had a booth and so did Quincy Partnership for Youth. Veterans Operation Creation sang the national anthem, and the Quincy Animal Shelter brought kittens that piled over each other making friends with passersby. As before, the QPD served grilled hot dogs.
Quincy Police retirements leave big shoes to fill
QUINCY — There are some big shoes to fill at the Quincy Police Department. “We’re losing 48 years of experience between them,” Quincy Police Chief Ryan Green said at the retirement party for Capt. Jorge Trujillo and Det. Damon Powell Thursday. Trujillo, who grew up in Sunnyside, has been with QPD for 19 years, he said, coming on as a patrol officer fresh out of the military. From there he served as a field training officer, a detective and finally captain. “I consider him my left-hand man,” Green said. “He runs the operations side of the house … He knows the agency very well, and he knows the community.” Trujillo has some projects around the house to tackle now that he’s retired, he said.
Big fun on a small scale
Wheat Land Communities’ Fair opens Thursday
RITZVILLE — The Wheat Land Communities’ Fair isn’t as big or as flashy as some of the county fairs around central Washington, but the folks who keep it going like it just the way it is. “It’s somewhere you can go and get an old-time traditional feeling, and you’re comfortable letting your kids roam the grounds and experience all that it has to offer,” said Board Member Lori Williams. “It’s more of a feeling than (one) specific thing,” The fair starts Thursday in Ritzville and runs through Sunday. Starting Friday, the 56th Ritzville Rodeo will take place alongside the fair at the rodeo grounds. This year the entertainment budget was expanded, Williams said, to be able to offer more fun that’s covered by the cost of admission. For the kids, there’s face painting, balloon art, Lego crafts, races, contests and games. Children can also ride on a little train towed around the fairgrounds behind a tractor.