Festivals For Your Foodie Fix
Beaver Creek Wine & Spirits' Grand Tasting
Image: Zach Mahone
Beaver Creek Wine & Spirits Festival
This culinary event on Beaver Creek Mountain pairs food and wine with outdoor activities (last season included tasting hikes and 4x4 tours enhanced with port and artisan cheese to sunrise al fresco spin classes and yoga sessions followed by a breakfast feast) and indoor seminars celebrating food-geekdom (with wine, tequila, and cigar tastings held in village restaurants, lounges, and galleries)—culminating with a Grand Tasting where corks are popped and all the culinary stops are pulled out under a circus-size tent staked beside the Centennial Chairlift.
When it is:
Aug 8–111
Where it is:
Beaver Creek Village
What it costs:
$50–$175
Who goes there:
Wine-loving residents of Beaver Creek and Bachelor Gulch, Front Rangers who haunt Denver’s hottest restaurants, seeking a respite from the city’s heat
More info:
If you’re a localvore ...
Mirabelle’s Farm to Table Dinner, hosted by master chef Daniel Joly, who plates dish after dish with locally sourced ingredients—some harvested from the geodesic greenhouse just behind the restaurant, a historic pioneer farmstead at the resort’s gatehouse that’s also Joly’s home (Aug 8 & 9, 6–9 p.m., $130)
Image: Zach Mahone
Gourmet on Gore
This four-day, outdoor, pay-as-you-go food bazaar with local restaurants serving small plates from tented stalls to strollers sipping and noshing their way around the streets of Vail Village also includes ticketed outdoor excursions, like a guided cruiser ride down Vail Pass, and guided hikes on Vail Mountain to burn calories that will be more than replenished with after-action gourmet fare. Gourmet on Gore dollars (purchased at booths scattered around the venue) are the only cash vendors will accept; to avoid long lines at the currency exchanges, stock up the first day.
When it is:
Aug 30–Sept 1
Where it is:
Gore Creek Promenade and other venues around Vail Village
What it costs:
Varies by vendor; excursions from $20
Who goes there:
Front Rangers looking for one last taste of the high country’s festival season
More info:
The Fall Food & Wine Classic
The summertime cousin of Taste of Vail, a weeklong food and wine festival wherein a horde of Oregon pinot and Colorado lamb devotees from across the valley and around the Front Range besiege Vail Village every spring like a scene from World War Z. The Classic revolves around two days of active foodie adventures (last season’s event included a hike up the Berry Picker, a catered fly-fishing excursion, a cycle down Vail Pass followed by lunch at Matsuhisa) and culminates with a grand tasting at the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater, pairing small plates prepared by local chefs with wines from the southern hemisphere.
When it is:
Sept 21
Where it is:
Vail Village
What it costs:
$65
Who goes there:
Local foodies and gourmands from the Front Range experiencing Taste of Vail withdrawal
More information:
