{"id":14008,"date":"2013-10-15T04:02:05","date_gmt":"2013-10-15T11:02:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/?p=14008"},"modified":"2015-04-20T12:20:36","modified_gmt":"2015-04-20T19:20:36","slug":"taste-of-the-pier-attracts-over-5000-to-redondo-pier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/taste-of-the-pier-attracts-over-5000-to-redondo-pier\/","title":{"rendered":"Taste of the Pier Attracts Over 5,000 to Redondo Pier"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/images\/rdbtaste.jpg\" alt=\"img\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Redondo Pier Taste photos: The iconic Tony&#8217;s where over one million Mai Tai cocktails have been served; Mike Trutanich greets customers; a family from Orange County samples ice cream at the Taste event.<\/p>\n<p>By Chris MacDonald<\/p>\n<p>More than 5,000 people came from all over to enjoy the 4th Annual &#8220;Taste of the Pier and Boardwalk&#8221; in Redondo Beach recently.<\/p>\n<p>They purchased $1 &#8220;Taste Tickets&#8221; to sample delicious Salmon Chowder (Tony&#8217;s on the Pier), chicken tacos (El Torito), fresh-squeezed lemonade (Craig&#8217;s Hot Dog on a Stick), egg rolls (Mini Chinese), grilled Cajun shrimp (Portside Caf\u00e9), churros with caramel (Pier Bakery) or get handmade shell necklaces (T&#8217;s Toe Rings &amp; Gifts), flashing LED pins (Awesome Blossoms) and so much more.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve never tasted better chowder. It&#8217;s absolutely delicious,&#8221; said Debbie Darlington of Canton, Ohio. &#8220;We plan our visits with relatives here to coincide with the Taste event.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The chowder and incredible crab cakes came from Tony&#8217;s on the Pier, which other event participants enjoyed as well. &#8220;I love the crab cakes and like checking out all the autographed celebrity photos of customers who have dined at Tony&#8217;s the past 60 years,&#8221; said Navy retiree Billy Whitsett, a native of Des Moines, Iowa. He said he even met\u00a0\u00a0Redondo Union High School graduates, the Smothers Brothers, whose photo hangs on the wall.<\/p>\n<p>Whitsett and some of his former Navy pals stayed past the 4-hour event and enjoyed a legendary Sunset from the octagonal &#8220;Crows Nest,&#8221; which Tony designed himself, atop the restaurant. (The late Tony Trutanich flew on 25 missions, including D-Day, during World War II, and his proud son, Mike, helps run the iconic spot today.)<\/p>\n<p>Martha Watson of Los Angeles used a ticket at the Shark Attack store to see the famous educational exhibit featuring the preserved remains of Georgette, a 16 \u00bd-foot Great White Shark, which weighed 3,400 pounds. (Owner Judy Milner said their business is closing and they are donating the fascinating exhibit to The Ocean Institute in Dana Point.)<\/p>\n<p>The Redondo Pier Association sponsored the Taste, which raised funds for the local Cancer Support Community and Educational Foundation. The Redondo Pier is located at 100 Fisherman&#8217;s Wharf, Redondo Beach, CA. To find out more see: RedondoPier.com<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Redondo Pier Taste photos: The iconic Tony&#8217;s where over one million Mai Tai cocktails have been served; Mike Trutanich greets customers; a family from Orange County samples ice cream at the Taste event. By Chris MacDonald More than 5,000 people came from all over to enjoy the 4th Annual &#8220;Taste of the Pier and Boardwalk&#8221; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[29],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14008"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14008\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.seecalifornia.com\/traveltips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}