Concession Stand Review – Goldsmith Schiffman Field

This post was supposed to have appeared last Friday, but with the latest car accident, it was postponed until today. Another concession stand review should be up later in the week – two for the price of one!

Friday, October 29 was the last football game of the regular season and I covered the Columbia vs. Madison County game that was played just one mile from my house at Goldsmith Schiffman Field (GSF). I haven’t had many good experiences at the GSF concession stand and last Friday was no exception.

I left my house at 6:30 in order to get to the stadium at 6:32. Ha! That’s funny to me for some reason. I found a prime parking spot at the corner of the street which made it easy for me to make my escape to the newsroom after the game.

I had eaten a snack of deviled eggs (I was on a deviled egg kick last week. I think I ate a dozen or more!) before I left for the game and decided I would finally have some nachos for a change. I love nachos, but they are messy and not always a good option when working at a game. After I got set up (had my own room again – yay!) I headed down to the concession stand to see what they had to offer.

I knew that GSF as well as the other Huntsville City School ran facilities had Pepsi products so I had brought with me a Diet Coke purchased at Propst Drugs earlier in the afternoon. So, my drink was covered. I looked over the menu and decided on nachos and a hot dog. I placed my order and wouldn’t you know it, the nacho cheese wasn’t ready. I’m not even kidding here. How can the nacho cheese not be ready 20 minutes before kick-off? So, I opted for popcorn in place of nachos. As soon as I was handed my hot dog and popcorn and not a second later, the nacho cheese was all of a sudden ready. Again, I’m not even kidding. I think it was some kind of ploy to get folks to buy more food. I went ahead and got the nachos so that I wouldn’t have to come back down and stand in line at half time because I know from experience that the halftime line at GSF is ridiculous! Even though there are four windows for taking orders, only two windows are used and I haven’t for the life of me figured out why that is.

I took my loot up to what we will call my private suite and ate the nachos first since that was what I wanted the most. The cheese that was so complicated in its getting ready process was kind of runny and didn’t have much taste. The basket ‘o chips was also not full. I felt cheated! Next I took a bite of the hot dog and one bite was all it took for me to score two points at the trash can. It was terrible. Last, but not least I ate the popcorn, which was probably the best of the three. I think I’ve mentioned before that it’s really hard to mess up popcorn.

To make matters worse, the Diet Coke I purchased earlier in the day was expired and also tasted terrible. I didn’t think I needed to look at the expiration date on a 20 oz Diet Coke before purchasing it but apparently I do. I hope I remember to check it out from now on. Shame on you, Mr. Coke Man for not properly rotating your merchandise and leaving expired items on the shelf! You ought to be ashamed! Some of us live for the ice cold taste of a Diet Coke and you ruined my moment! Ruined it! I should have walked across the street and gotten some grub from Sonic but it was cold and well, my foot (having surgery December 2 by the way).

The total for the three items was $5 – nachos ($2), popcorn ($1) and hot dog ($2). The highest priced item was $3 for chili cheese nachos. They also had candy and I think pizza, but can’t remember for sure. Needless to say, if you’re headed to a game at GSF, be sure and eat before you go.

Final Score: C-