Culinary Culture in Comics: Comic-Con 2011 Wrap-Up

San Diego Comic-Con 2011 has been over for a week and while other sites may do coverage of the latest news to affect Hollywood and— god forbid— news about comics, I’m sharing the culinary side of the convention: costumes, products and food.

There were the usual scantily-clad slave Leias on parade during the convention along with Stormtroopers and the occasional Darth, but Jedis were nowhere to be seen. Costume mash-ups were HUGE this year (taking two characters and making them into one). Among my favorite mash-ups was Chef Darth wandering the convention with Jar Jar Binks’ head on a platter.

Powdered Toast Man from Ren & Stimpy fame was another figure seen throughout the convention. He looked mighty delicious with his huge bread head wandering the halls around lunchtime.

Another mascot I saw was Waffle King. He’s reminiscent of the mascot I’ve seen inside the Waffle Spot in Mission Valley but wearing a mask. It seemed like a big stretch for even Comic-Con.

A few edible products were for sale within the convention center (aside from the sub-par sandwiches and overpriced pretzels sold by the vendors). One exhibit displayed boxes of Soylent Green crackers, Zombie Jerky and Stay Puft marshmallows. I was eager to get my hands on the crackers but discovered they won’t be available until this fall.

An extremely popular product this year were the Star Wars molds from Kotobukiya. Silicon molds of R2-D2 and Han Solo in carbonite ($9.99 each) were quick sellers and sold out by Sunday. Also available (and not shown) were light saber chopsticks.

Over at Paul’s table, we were giving away cookies with purchase. The cookies were made by the fabulous Jenny Wenny Cakes. Many people thought the cookies were fake because of the Cool Jerk logo (it was actually printed on edible paper and attached to the fondant). The cookies were hard to resist and we found ourselves eating a few for a sugar high in the afternoon.

I was especially touched when someone came over to the table with a printout of the map of places to eat from my previous post (where to each during Comic-Con). We, of course, talked about food and where he was planning to eat for lunch.

As mentioned before, the convention filtered outside to the Gaslamp Quarter. People were handing out flyers for events and promoting their stuff and there was free food! Last year, lines for garlic bread to promote Scott Pilgrim were crazy and this year was no different although for other things.

Right outside of Cafe 222, Adult Swim was handing out free full-sized Ben & Jerry’s ice cream pops. I waited in line for a bit but gave up. I found out later Seth Green himself was helping give out the ice cream — a plus for any person looking for that brief celebrity encounter. I noticed that San Diego’s own Sweet Treats Truck was hired by Adult Swim to rent out their vehicles for the promotion.

Double Tree Hotel was out in force midday on Saturday, handing out their free chocolate chip cookies while it lasted. Everyone was eager for their free cookies. Sweets obviously ruled in this convention.

On Saturday, part of the Tin Fish property was rented out to NBC to promote their new fall shows, Whitney and Up All Night. Their promotion: free popcorn. You could choose from five flavors: kettle corn, plain popcorn, Whitney’s Way (caramel with spicy nuts), Up All Nighter (brightly colored popcorn flavored like hard candy) and I’m A Free Agent (chocolate brownie with vanilla-flavored popcorn). With my infamous sweet tooth, I tried the Up All Nighter and I’m A Free Agent and unfortunately found them even too sweet for me.

Once again, Ralphs was not immune to some dressed-up characters during Comic-Con week and I’m sure to the amusement of the regulars shoppers. Doctor Clayton Forrester and TV’s Frank from MST3K were seen hanging around the sandwich bar one night.

In all, the convention was an exhausting few days filled with food, friends and lots of revelry. Check out the rest of my photos here and be sure to read Paul’s photo recap here.