More than 250 people turned out last week to eat, drink, mingle and — most importantly — help raise funds for the Cazenovia Children’s House during the organization’s annual Taste of Cazenovia fundraising event, held this year at the Cazenovia Country Club.

The annual event is an evening of food and drink samplings from local farms, restaurants and businesses, accompanied by live music and fundraising auctions. The Taste of Cazenovia is the biggest fundraiser of the year for CCH, a not-for-profit childcare and pre-school educational facility that uses the proceeds to support programming and tuition assistance for qualifying families with financial need.

This year’s Taste raised around $16,000 from sponsors, raffles and auctions, although the final figures have not yet been tabulated, said CCH Director Torrey Lansing.

“This is probably the fastest Taste of Cazenovia ever put together,” said Lansing, who succeeded retiring director Penny Noll just three months ago. “I started in June, and we had our first meeting in July. It was fast and it is beautiful. The community just came together and I’m so grateful. It turned out to be an amazing night.”

Noll, who was at the event, agreed. “This has a great community feel,” she said. “I’m impressed by all the new faces … the great new sponsors, as well as all our returning friends.”

The goal of the 40-year-old Taste of Cazenovia is to change the venue every year in order to showcase various locations around Cazenovia. This year’s Taste started a new tradition to announce at the end of the event the venue for the next year’s fundraiser.

In what will be a very “exciting” Taste of Cazenovia in 2016, the venue will be the new Empire Brewing Company Farmstead Brewery, which is currently under construction on Rippleton Road, Lansing said.

In addition to raising money for CCH, this year’s Taste of Cazenovia also raised money for the Reger family of Cazenovia. Marla Reger is a CCH board member, and her husband, Kyle, suffered a stroke and is in the Acute Rehabilitation Center at Upstate Medical Center. The CCH auctioned off a Bahamas villa with room for eight, courtesy of the Christakos family, that raised $1,100 for the Regers’ medical expenses.

“The Regers are so kind and caring to this community, and we as an organization wanted that to be our contribution to their family,” Lansing said.

This year’s Taste of Cazenovia offered a long list of local food, farm and drink sponsors for the event, including: Dave’s Diner, Pewter Spoon Café and Eatery, Lincklaen House, Horned Dorset and Drover Hill Farm, Junior’s Caz Bar, Hartwood Farm, Kriemhild Farms, 7 Trees Dairy Goat Farm, Cakes & Other Goodies, Cazenovia Cut Block, Creekside Meadows Farm, Drover Hill Farm, Empire Buffalo, Frosty Morning Farms, Heartstone Bakery, Meadowood Farms, Mountain Grown Farms. Life of Reilley Distilling Company, Empire Brewing Company, Owera Vineyards, Harvest Moon Cidery and Henneberg Brewing Co.

More information on the Taste of Cazenovia and a full list of this year’s sponsors can be found on line at tasteofcazenovia.com.