The New Year brings a plethora of hospitality events to Vancouver. Dine Out Vancouver Festival is celebrating its 24th year from January 21-February 8 with more than 300 restaurants participating. Lots of wineries and craft breweries are involved plus 13 Food Trucks at the Vancouver Art Gallery Plaza from January 22-25 for Street Food City 2026. The inspiring Chefs’ Table Society of BC is an expanding force of influence with their newly opened Culinary Commons for the revived Chowder Cup on February 3, AGM & Marketplace on February 23, and Curry Cup on March 30 in addition to the later dates for Spot Prawn Festival in May & CooksCamp in September. So many more exciting food & wine events too detailed to list here. The oldest and arguably the most instrumental hospitality event going since 1979 has been the Vancouver International Wine Festival (#VIWF and @VanWineFest) now with the 47th edition scheduled from March 7-14 with a spotlight on France. This year features 114 wineries from 14 countries at 33 events.
Lots of activities planned from the International Festival Tastings to Restaurant meals, and a Gala dinner/auction. A key focus has always been the important educational wine seminars and Trade events. Over the years the Wine Festival has been an important catalyst in getting younger demographics interested in the art of wine and learning about its complexities. Hopefully this will continue. However, any event where lots of alcohol is available will be under a detailed fine microscope especially this year as Canada’s Guidance on Alcohol and Health reports there is no safe amount but low risk is limited to only two or fewer standard drinks per week. This 47th Van Wine Fest has a very good record for responsible wine tasting and it is not a simple booze-up event but this could be a key crossroads for it. Your scribe has been involved actively with the #VIWF since day one and is probably the only person to have attended all of them so obviously I am biased. However the emphasis has always been on education first and foremost. The system in place still requires a knowledgeable winery principal to be at their wine tasting booth explaining their product. Thinking back to day one in 1979 the feature event was purely educational where Michael Mondavi conducted a component tasting of Robert Mondavi Winery acid, tannins, and oak influences on fruit – not wine drinking. Van Wine Fest is an easy target because it lasts a whole week. Early on it nearly was changed to the now more common one night fundraiser format but in a very close vote (I was a part of) we retained the one week length for the unique valuable educational features it provides. In these times it would be prudent to reemphasize these most important educational goals of Van Wine Fest. Also provide even more easy access containers for proper wine tasting spitting etiquette and encourage tasters to spit. A good thing!
You might also like:
 |
 |
 |