Las Olas Wine & Food Festival is back

Here’s who’s pouring and who’s cooking at fundraiser

The 25th edition of the Las Olas Wine & Food Festival will make its long-awaited comeback in downtown Fort Lauderdale on Nov. 19, after more than 18 months sidelined by the pandemic.

The nighttime open-air fundraiser will run from 7:30 to 10:30 p.m. on Las Olas Boulevard, a showcase for nonstop noshing and sipping with more than 50 area restaurants and more than 40 national and international spirits companies and breweries represented.

The street also will be home to live music, DJs and lounges hosted by the likes of Tequila Herradura, High Noon and Riverfront hot spot Bodega Taqueria y Tequila Fort Lauderdale, complete with Airstream trailer. You should be dancing, yeah.

Organizers are expecting 1,500 people to stroll the four-block party east of Southeast Sixth Avenue, capacity down from 2019’s attendance of 2,500-3,000 as a nod to COVID safety.

“We’re so excited to be able to get back out there and tell everyone: ‘The world is back. South Florida is back,’ ” says Valerie Roy, co-owner of CI Management, which has produced the festival for more than six years. “We need, more than ever, to celebrate South Florida and the culinary talent down here and the restaurants that were so resilient for the past so many months.”

Food is about community, says Tim Petrillo, of The Restaurant People, owner of popular Fort Lauderdale eateries including YOLO, Java & Jam, S3 and Boatyard.

“We really missed having this event the past two years. There is no better way to celebrate one another, Las Olas and our downtown than gathering together to taste a variety of dishes from all the great

restaurants we have to offer in Fort Lauderdale,” Petrillo says.

Tickets for Las Olas Wine & Food Festival cost $150 and offer unlimited sampling. All proceeds go to the South Florida American Lung Association, host of the event.

New this year is a VIP feature, for an extra $50, that includes early admission and, literally, another level of hospitality.

VIP guests will gather at 5:30 p.m. at the Riverside Hotel on the new rooftop terrace above Tommy

Bahama for a champagne toast from Napa Valley’s Schramsberg Vineyards and light hors d’oeuvres from Wild Sea Oyster Bar. VIPers then may enter the festival 30 minutes before the rabble.

As always, the event offers a broad survey of local restaurants, from old favorites such as Louie Bossi, Gran Forno, YOLO, Wild Sea Oyster Bar and Casa Sensei, to spots that may become future favorites, including Rivertail, Bodega Taqueria, Crowned Waffles and Anne Marie’s Pizza and Wine Co.

Wines include bottles from Raeburn Winery from Sonoma, Argentina’s

Piatelli and Chile’s Santa Ema. Breweries represented include Stella Artois, Veza Sur and Wicked Weed.

As a fundraiser for the South Florida American Lung Association, the expected COVID safety measures will be in place at the festival. To enter, you must have proof of a negative COVID-19 test within 48-72 hours of the festival or proof of vaccination.

Roy says there was a period in August, during a South Florida spike in the Delta variant of COVID, when the festival looked like it might be canceled again. She says the recent drop in case numbers put things back on track.

“South Florida is excited to do things. The restaurants deserve it, so we’ve gotta do it,” she says.

The 2021 Las Olas Wine & Food Festival takes place 7:30-10:30 p.m. Nov. 19 on Las Olas Boulevard in downtown Fort Lauderdale. There are entrances at Southeast Sixth Avenue in front of Cheesecake Factory and at Southeast 10th Terrace in front of Louie Bossi. Tickets cost $150. The event is 21 and older. Visit LasOlasWFF.com.