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Jack Bradley, of Manson, has been around the country to some of the biggest food and beverage shows in the nation.

Saturday's Central Iowa Food & Beverage Expo at Iowa Central Community College may have been a smaller event than that of the Chicago Food Expo, but for Bradley, the president of Manson Industries, which produces Sheila B's Popcorn, it was still top rate.

"We've had a lot of people stopping by," he said. "We've made quite a few good contacts here. I've been to a lot of the national shows and the Chicago Food Show, and this one has been just as good. We've had just as much fun today as we have anywhere."

Bradley even brought a microwave to the show to keep up with popping enough popcorn for the many samples of the four different varieties of popcorn he was handing out.

"The jalapeno popcorn has been a hit today," Bradley said. "We're planning on going into Texas and southern California with it."

Also among the 45 featured vendors, which included everything from wineries to home products and catering businesses, were several bakeries offering tastes of the many items they have available for the holidays and other events.

Marcie Welter, owner of Sweet Centsations, of Fort Dodge, was at her first show Saturday. Assisted by family members, she spent the day handing out samples of several types of cookies, cheesecake cups and miniature pumpkin pies her business offers. Welter said with the holidays fast approaching, she will be keeping busy with orders for work parties and family gatherings.

"I've been baking for 14 years," she said. "But have been doing it as a business for about three. I don't think we even intended to get this big, but business just exploded for us."

Based out of her home, Welter also grew the pumpkins used to make the miniature pies that were an obvious hit among those stopping by for samples.

"We do a lot of pies, cookies and bars, but our decorated sugar cookies are always the best seller this time of year," she said.

Just across from Welter's booth, Jina Rasmussen, owner of Jina's Cakes, of Goldfield, showcased some of the elegant wedding cakes her business offers and had samples to go along with them.

"I do a lot of weddings," Rasmussen said. "And birthdays, but we can do all occasions."

New to the Food & Beverage Expo, which was the second held this year, were break-out sessions on topics such as nutrition, food safety presented by Iowa State University, and several cooking demonstrations throughout the afternoon.

"We've had a lot of involvement from Iowa State this time," Event Coordinator Sue Heistand said. "They helped with some of the funding and presentations, which has been a good fit."

Heistand said the change in hours, location and demonstrations from the first to second event added more variety and helped the event "flow" more.

"It's a better time of year for vendors to get out and market because a lot of them are taking holiday orders," she said. "We've offered several demonstrations during the day instead of one because we had many people say it made for too long of a night last time waiting for the demonstration to begin."

Chef Michael Hirst, coordinator of the Iowa Central culinary arts program, gave three cooking demonstrations throughout the afternoon on how to create holiday side dishes from seasonal vegetables such as turnips and rutabaga

"They're seasonal sides for Thanksgiving and Christmas," Hirst said. "Everything I made was from vegetables that are available here in town. It's a way to get people to think outside of the box a bit from their traditional Christmas dinners."

Heistand said 450 tickets were sold prior to the event, with several hundred people also paying at the door.

Contact Emilie Nelson at (515)573-2141 or enelson@messengernews.net