Thousands of food fanatics of all ages piled into Fairfield Hills for the first Newtown Food Truck Festival, on June 17. More than 20 trucks serving pretty much anything deep-fried, greasy, and downright cholesterol-raising but, yes, tastebud-tingling that you can imagine kept bellies full on Saturday from 11 am to 5 pm and beyond. The campus was bustling despite on and off rain showers.

The fest, sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce of Newtown as well as Newtown Parks and Recreation and NYA Sports & Fitness Center, included a variety of merchandise tents, inflatable bounce games and slides, face painting for children, and live music throughout the day.

Local bands Dramatic Turn, Harrison Street, and Zuzu's Petals performed as attendees went from truck to truck and opened their wallets for such snacks as empanadas, crispy macaroni and cheese-filled meatballs, and deep fried brownies from vendors who set up from nearby and far away towns. There were also more traditional items such as hamburgers, french fries, barbecue fare, and ice cream, including servings from Ferris Acres Creamery.

"The Newtown Food Trucks Festival is something this town has needed for a long time and its success has spoken volumes. We attracted all demographics, with plenty of food varieties and activities. Planning an event in my hometown is something I am glad to say I was finally able to accomplish with the help of our hosts, especially with our presenting sponsor, Dental Associates of Connecticut," Newtown Food Truck Festival Director Veronica Parsloe said. "We look forward to finding ways to improve next year's festival and thank you to everyone who came out to support this exciting new fundraiser in the Newtown community."

The consensus among Parks & Rec, chamber, festival, and police officials was that this turned out to be a more popular happening than anticipated.

"Apparently the word of mouth really got out there for this event," said Newtown Police Lieutenant Aaron Bahamonde, patrol operations commander. "We're happy it was such a successful event."

With the success came long lines at the trucks as customers waited patiently for their food. Due to the unexpected large number of attendees, some of the trucks ran out of food. Newtown Parks and Recreation Director Amy Mangold said the organizers, and representatives from NYA, Chamber of Commerce, and Parks and Recreation will meet to discuss plans for next year. They may consider having more trucks to create an more extensive variety of snacks while ideally minimizing customer wait time, as well as whether to charge attendees going forward; admission to the first-time event was free. Trucks were charged a fee to participate and had to get all health certificates through the town and get inspected that morning, which was one of the reasons the number of trucks was restricted this year, Ms Mangold said.

"There is a lot of input from various town departments and agencies that goes into and dictates all decisions," Ms Mangold added.

While things went smoothly overall, Lt Bahamonde said that police are looking into ways to make some improvements for next year.

Several police officers were assigned to the event, but when the crowds kept coming other already on duty officers were added to help manage the abundance of people, said Lt Bahamonde, adding that there were no problems except for a few minor parking issues, and that from a police perspective the festival could not have gone much better.

The Newtown Food Truck Festival piggy-backed off the annual morning Mad Dash events, also at Fairfield Hills. Lt Bahamonde said the events may need to take place on different days in the future since there was some overlap.

"We definitely will look at it and make adjustments just as we do for every single event in town," Lt Bahamonde said.

One thing that police and event organizers may not be able to control is the backup of cars going into and out of Fairfield Hills, and spilling onto side streets in the area of Wasserman Way throughout the day.

"There certainly was an increase in traffic and there certainly were delays on Wasserman Way in both directions from Route 34 all the way to Main Street," said Lt Bahamonde, adding that with crowd-drawing events there is going to be heavy traffic.

But for the thousands of hungry residents and nonresidents alike, the wait on the road and in line at the trucks was worth it. After all, it was a first-time fun-filled family-oriented activity in town.