Austin Food & Wine Festival Returns in November

After a delay and ultimately a cancelation in 2020, the Austin Food & Wine Festival is back in 2021 with a full lineup of events. The festival, held at Auditorium Shores, from Friday, November 5 through Sunday, November 7, will take largely the same general format as previous festivals. However, the lineup is conspicuously subdued this year, with a focus on local rather than celebrity chefs, although more information could be forthcoming on that front.

The festival takes place during the daytime over the weekend with different chefs featured each day serving up bites to eat, cooking demonstrations, wine tastings (although the sommeliers have not been announced yet), cookbook signings, and more. There will also be live-fire cooking demonstrations.

As in years past, there are two additional regular evening events included in the All-In tickets. The festival starts on Friday with the “Grillin’ and Chillin’” event hosted by chef Tim Love of Lonesome Dove at Zilker Park. Then Saturday night is the Rock Your Taco event, where chefs compete for the guests’ choice of favorite taco, at Republic Square Park downtown. Reigning champion Andrew Zimmern will not be returning to defend his title.

This is the 10th year of the festival, although it was canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and in 2016 due to heavy rains. The festival is presented by Food + Wine magazine and local production company C3 Presents, and benefits the nonprofit Austin Food & Wine Alliance.

Austin Food & Wine hasn’t announced COVID-19 prevention measures or requirements, although they will likely be similar to those of the Austin City Limits Festival (proof of vaccination or negative test within 72 hours of the event), which C3 also puts on.

Tickets for Austin Food & Wine Festival are $275 for the Weekender passes of $625 for All-In passes. Check out the full lineup of chefs below:

Rock Your Taco

• Tatsu Aikawa (Ramen Tatsu-Ya)
• Nicola Blaque (Mi Roti, The Jerk Shack, San Antonio)
• Dawn Burrell (Late August in Houston and a Top Chef finalist)
• Tyson Cole (Uchi)
• Diego Galicia & Rico Torres (Mixtli, San Antonio)
• Sarah Heard & Nathan Lemley (Foreign & Domestic)
• Helene Henderson (Malibu Farms)
• LeAnn Mueller (La Barbecue)
• Ryan Pera (Eight Row Flint, Houston)
• Jam Sanitchat (Thai Fresh)
• Charles Schlienger (Sway)

Fire Pits

• John Bates (InterStellar BBQ)
• Sonya Coté (Hillside Farmacy, Store House Market + Eatery)
• Lance Kirkpatrick (Stiles Switch BBQ)
• Tom Micklethwait & Ren Garcia (Micklethwait Craft Meats)
• Marco Oglesby (The Switch)

Festival Chefs

• Christopher Andrews (TLC)
• Jeff Balfour (Southerleigh Fine Food & Brewery)
• Daniel Brooks (Licha’s Cantina)
• Jeff Brown (Old Thousand)
• Jo Chan (Eberly)
• Krystal Craig & Ian Thurwachter (Intero)
• Nick Ervan (the forthcoming Wax Myrtle in downtown Austin)
• Jacob Euler (Le Vacher)
• Reed Faitak (Austin Daily Press)
• James Flowers (1417)
• Rachelle Fox (Wicky’s Walkup)
• John Gocong (Salty Cargo)
• Mark Grimes (CreekHouse)
• Wade Guice (Juliet Italian Kitchen)
• Victor Ibarra (Andiamo)
• CJ Jacobson (Aba)
• Andrea Juarez (Walton’s Fancy & Staple)
• Andy Knudson (Tillies)
• Geronimo Lopez (Botika, San Antonio)
• Jason McVearry (Poke-Poke)
• Margarita & Nestor Mendez (Pueblo Viejo)
• Josh Neises (Lonesome Dove Austin)
• Daniel Olivella (Barlata Tapas Bar)
• Matthew Perez (The Beer Plant)
• Chris Rios (The Vegan Nom)
• Ryan Samson (Vespaio & Enoteca)
• Jam Sanitchat (Thai Fresh)
• Carmen Valera (Tamale House East)
• Ling Wu (Lin Asian Bar + Dim Sum)

Cooking Demos and Conversations

• Dawn Burrell (Late August, Houston)
• Helene Henderson (Malibu Farm, multiple locations)
• Fermín Núñez (Suerte)
• Yoshi Okai (Otoko)
• Jam Sanitchat (Thai Fresh)