People sample food Thursday, April 21, 2016, from Rafferty's Restaurant and Bar during Taste of Bowling Green at the Sloan Convention Center. (Bac Totrong/photo@bgdailynews.com)

The smells of sushi, pizza, steak and other foods mingled throughout Sloan Convention Center on Thursday as hundreds of people moved about, sampling wares from 42 businesses.

In a corner of the thickly packed room, first-time vendor White Squirrel Brewery offered beer, pulled pork sliders and tortilla chips with a bowl of Southwestern hummus for dipping.

Jason Heflin, one of White Squirrel’s three owners, said the event’s turnout was impressive.

“It’s overwhelming,” he said. “For the first hour and a half, there was a line of a good 20 or 30 people waiting to get beer.”

The people who came to his booth were a mixture of people who were new to White Squirrel and people who were familiar with its beer. Heflin was there to spread awareness of White Squirrel’s beer, particularly its kolsch, a sweet German style. 

Marvin Benoit, who was attending Taste of Bowling Green for the fourth year in a row, said the atmosphere of the event keeps him coming back. 

“It’s the camaraderie and the fun of meeting people out here,” he said.

The food and alcoholic drinks are a big draw as well, Benoit said. 

“You have all the different restaurants in Bowling Green and you can sample them all,” he said. 

Doug Goscher, owner of Doug’s Motor City, is a Taste of Bowling Green veteran. His restaurant, which opened in 2011, has been a vendor at the event every year since.

“I think, dollar for dollar, it’s a great advertising venue,” Goscher said.

Doug’s Motor City is known primarily for its breakfast food, according to Goscher, who said he was trying to raise awareness of his restaurant’s lunch and dinner options. To do this, he brought chicken wings, fried cajun-style catfish and what he called triple play burgers, which were about slider-sized and featured pastrami, bacon and pepperjack cheese.

He serves as a vendor at Taste of Bowling Green every year partly because it is a fundraiser for the Dream Factory, a Hopkinsville-based charity that grants wishes for critically and chronically ill children.

“It’s a wonderful program,” Goscher said. “I support it myself personally and as a business.”

Since his first Taste of Bowling Green appearance, he’s seen the event grow, he said.

“It gets busier and busier every year and we bring more and more food every year and we run out earlier and earlier,” Goscher said. Last year, he said, his station ran out of food around 9 p.m., a full hour before the event ended.

This year, he was down to the last two dozen wings by 8:45 p.m. 

— Follow Daily News reporter Jackson French on Twitter @Jackson_French or visit bgdailynews.com.