A Celebration of Wine and Food

Written By: Marlene Osteen | Issue: November 2023

Chef Wolfgang Green,
Wolfgang’s Restaurant
and Winie Bistro

During the second weekend of this month, we’ll welcome visitors to the seventh annual Highlands Food & Wine Festival.  Epicurean adventurers all, they will explore the booths, tables, and food trucks of chefs and artisans – sampling delicacies from acclaimed regional culinarians. They will relish charcuterie, and cheese; seek out high-falutin’ dishes, and farm-to-table concoctions, and scavenge for stacked sandwiches and smoky barbecue and juicy burgers and so much more.  

But, as these same folks wander up and down Main Street and various venues, I wonder if they are as struck, as I always am, by the number, quality and diversity of our local restaurants.  Amazingly, this profoundly rural area, which has only recently achieved adequate cell service, boasts a decades old restaurant culture that pre-dates many of our big-city counterparts. 

In fact, the dining options here are as diverse as the colors of the recent autumn foliage, as varied as our surroundings, offering cuisine as elevated as our locale.  A complete listing is available in the pages of this magazine.  They will all be open and eagerly welcoming diners throughout the festival.  

Notable during festival weekend are four unique culinary experiences, hosted by local chefs – each an intriguing opportunity to examine the ever-fascinating world of food and drink and growers, chefs, and artisans.

Chef Andrew Figel, On the Verandah

On The Verandah chef and owner Andrew Figel will host two California wineries. Dinner on November 10 will feature the wines of Rutherford’s Round Pond Estate, and on November 11 the restaurant will welcome Gundlach-Bundschu head winemaker Hernan Valverde. Now the third-oldest bonded winery in California, Gundlach-Bundschu is California’s oldest continuously family-owned winery.   Both events begin at 6:00 PM with a reception to include wine and hors d’oeuvres, followed by a seated multi-course dinner with wine pairings.  $200 per person plus tax and gratuity.  Call for reservations, (828) 526-2338.

This year again, as they have for the past ten years, Wolfgang’s Restaurant and Wine Bistro – one of Highlands’ oldest and most acclaimed restaurants, will welcome a representative from famed Napa Valley winery, Caymus Vineyards.  On Saturday, November 11, Chef Wolfgang will create five remarkable courses to complement the winery’s extraordinary output.  The evening begins with a champagne reception at 6:30 P.M.  $210 per person plus tax and gratuity.  Call for reservations, (828) 526-3807.

Wine lovers will definitely want to add two extraordinary events at Highlands Wine Shoppe,

On Friday, November 10, from Noon to 4:00 P.M., local chef Ken Naron will prepare a classic French lunch paired with sommelier-selected wines from beloved wine regions, including Napa Valley, Champagne, Burgundy, Portugal and Austria.  Cost is $150 per person.

The wines of Northern Rhone are celebrated on Saturday, November 11, from 2:00 to 4:00 P.M. when Eric Hemer, one of only four people in the world to have achieved both Master of Wine and Master Sommelier certifications, guides tasters through a tour of the esteemed wine of the region. Cost is $150 per person. For more information, call (828) 526-4080.

Chef Adam Bresnahan, 4118 Kitchen & Bar

Chef Adam Bresnahan and his 4118 Kitchen & Bar team of culinary wizards will host their annual bourbon dinner on Saturday, November 11.  Only 26 seats are available at this five-course dinner created to complement the rich, sultry nuanced flavors of deluxe bourbons from North Carolina’s Weldon Mills, Colorado’s Breckenridge, Kentucky’s Wilderness Trail and Blade and Bow distillers.  Cost is $190 plus tax and gratuity. Visit 4118kitchen-bar.com/store/events.

Created especially for festival weekend are two events from the talented team at Old Edwards:

A chance to meet farmers and feast on their fare is the highlight of the annual “Farm Harvest Dinner & Barn Dance” at The Farm at Old Edwards on Friday, November 10.  Chefs of Madison’s Restaurant will prepare farm-fresh ingredients from Sunburst Trout Farms, Anson Mills and Painted Hills Beef, accompanied by music from the Back Porch Orchestra.  Cost is $210 per person plus tax and gratuity.  oldedwardshospitality.com/farmharvest.

Globally-influenced Creole cuisine from Sue Zemanick, of Zasu in New Orleans, accompanied by live jazz during cocktail hour featuring Paul Jones are the dynamic components of the Jazz Supper at Half Mile Farm on Saturday, November 11. 

Cost is $185 per person plus tax and gratuity.  

oldedwardshospitality.com/suezemanick

Please note that as of this writing, both events were sold out. 

For more information visit highlandsfoodandwine.com.