On Sept. 27 and 28, the Transfiguration Greek Orthodox Church hosted the annual Ogden Greek Festival where they served over 25 different Greek dishes to over 10,000 people and did tours of the local church.
The festival began at 10:00 a.m. and went all day until 10:00 p.m. on Sept. 27. It reopened the following day at 10:00 a.m. and the festival concluded at 8:00 p.m.
Each year, Ogden hosts the Greek Festival where vendors sell Greek food and drinks to locals who come to participate in the festival. There were four different marketplace vendors selling different food, pastries and drinks. They sold traditional meals such as: chicken souvlaki gyros, dolmates, spanakopita, kourambiethes, and finkia. The money from the festival goes to the church and to local charities.
On the nights of the festival, they had a performance by the Ogden Greek dancers. It was a chance for the community to gather together to watch and learn from Greek culture.
The Transfiguration Greek Orthodox church has been open and hosting the event since 1964. The Standard-Examiner said, “They’ll go through 84 legs of lamb, 1,200 pounds of chicken souvlaki, 800 pounds of pork souvlaki, 50 cases of gyro meat, 12,000 stuffed grape leaves, 4,500 cheese triangles, and about 2,400 spinach pies.”
Each year, the Greek food festival runs out of food due to the thousands of people who come to the event.
Once people get to the church building, the community waited in a long line to get into the cafeteria where they were able to purchase the food. Over the years, the Greek food festival has become more and more popular as members of the community learn to love the food that is served at the event.