Big Food Weekend
It’s October and there’s another big food weekend in store for Austin! Celebrate Texas Wine Month with a pleasant drive to the Hill Country for the Fredericksburg Food & Wine Festival (866/TEX-FEST, www.fbgfoodandwinefest.com). Festivities are from noon until 7pm, Saturday, Oct. 26, at the downtown Marketplatz. For $20, adults over 21 get a souvenir wineglass, five wine tastings, and free food samples. Admission is $5 for those 12-21 and free for kids under 12. Twenty Texas wineries will be pouring their best vintages, and there will be delectable samples of many Texas foods, craft and gift items, cooking demonstrations, wine appreciation classes, and live music from Ponty Bone & the Squeezetones, the Badlands Jazz Band, and Johnny Nicholas, as well as the Gargantuan Great Grape Toss, the famous team water balloon fight. There are also pre- and post-event functions such as the Celebration of Texas Food & Wine on Friday night at Wildseed Farms ($75), the Patron Party on Marketplatz ($75) on Saturday morning, and the brunch at Becker Vineyards ($60) Sunday morning that require reservations in advance. Check those out online. We’ve found this event to be extremely friendly and approachable for the wine-loving public, as well as a terrific bargain. Don’t miss it… Attention, chileheads! Chile Pepper/Cooking Zesty magazine brings it’s Zesty Foods Show to the Palmer Event Center this weekend, Oct. 25-27. The show is open to the trade from noon to 5pm on Friday, and open to the public from 10am to 7pm on Saturday and 11am to 5pm on Sunday. This event, formerly known as the Fiery Foods Show, offers chile lovers the opportunity to sample hundreds of spicy food products — sauces, salsas, condiments, sweets, you name it. They’ll have it, and it’ll be hot. We got an advance sample of some award-winning Chipotle Chocolate Chunk Cookies from a company called Mi Tejas Spice that were very tasty. You’ll also find chile-themed crafts, gift items, clothes, books, art, and kitchenware for sale, as well as cooking demonstrations from some of the big names in spicy foods. For more information, call 888/SPICYHOT or visit www.izfs.com.
This article appears in Stan Knee.