Prep your palates for San Diego Bay Wine & Food Festival

Next week, San Diego is the place to be for the finer tastes in life. The San Diego Bay Wine & Food Festival at Marina Park (near Seaport Village) and other locations will be underway Nov. 12-15, 2008, with a medley of mouthwatering events.

Things get going with the WineRave on Wednesday, a wine-tasting event at the trendsetting W San Diego hotel. Other events include a sake tasting, wine classes, discussion panels (such as one on sustainable and organic wines) and a Master Sommelier Blind Tasting.

But what’s looking particularly good to me are the cooking classes on the festival’s schedule, including the following, held at the Macy’s School of Cooking and the San Diego Wine & Culinary Center: “Arousing the Senses With Chocolate and Vino” by Master Chef Michael Antonorsi of Chuao Chocolatier; “Shrimply Delicious” by Executive Chef Gary Thompson of Viejas Casino; and “A Tapestry of Local, Organic Ingredients: Feng-shui Cuisine With Chef Scott Wagner” by Wagner of ChileCo Catering.

On Nov. 15, the festival’s grand finale, the Grand Tasting Event, takes place at Marina Park (a.k.a. Embarcadero Park North), and will feature the works of 60 top San Diego chefs, 30 gourmet-food companies and 150 winemakers and spirits producers.

Cost: Tickets for the Grand Tasting Event are $100 per person in advance, $125 at the door. Ticket prices for other events vary; see the website for more information on ticket prices, parking information and directions.

Hotel package: If you want to stay overnight locally, check out this special package at W San Diego. For rates starting at $419 per night (pre-tax and based on double occupancy), you’ll receive two VIP tickets for the festival; an in-room delivery of a fruit-and-cheese plate, red wine and bread; and priority dinner reservations at onsite Rice restaurant with a complimentary amuse bouche (hors d’oeuvre). A two-night minimum is required. It sounds like a good time, though if you’re looking for something a bit friendlier to the wallet, you’ll have no problem at all finding moderately priced accommodations in or around downtown, or — for better deals — in the unatmospheric but cheap Hotel Circle, about a 10-minute drive from Seaport Village.

Contact: World of Wine Events, (619) 342-7337.

– Susan Derby, Special to the Los Angeles Times

[Photo: 2007 San Diego Bay Wine & Food Festival, World of Wine Event; LLC / Matthew Meier]

Permalink | E-mail | Print | Add to My Trips

This entry was posted on Friday, November 7, 2008 at 10:59 am by Susan Derby and is filed under California, Festival, Gourmet, San Diego. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.