Hot Chocolate, Sauerkraut, and Poutine: Upcoming Food Festivals in Vancouver
byWhether you live gluten free, are crazy about cupcakes, addicted to all things bacon or have a deep relationship with chocolate, Vancouver probably has a festival for you. Here are three upcoming events and foodie series that speak to your sweet tooth and your savoury side.
Vancouver Hot Chocolate Festival
The 3rd annual Vancouver Hot Chocolate Festival takes place January 19th to February 14th, 2013 at locations throughout the city featuring 23 ‘chocstars’ and over 60 flavours. Participating venues include: Beaucoup Bakery, Bel Cafe, Bella Gelateria + To Die For Banana Bread, Beta 5 Chocolates + The Juice Truck, Blenz Alma + Cocolico Chocolates, Blenz Thurlow + Kale & Nori Culinary Arts, Chocolate Arts, Chocolaterie de la Nouvelle France, Cocoa Nymph, French Made Baking, Gem Chocolates, Leonidas Chocolates, Rubens Chocolate, Schokolade, Soirette Macarons & Tea, Terra Breads, Thierry Chocolaterie Patisserie Cafe, and Thomas Haas.
Funds from the Vancouver Hot Chocolate Festival benefit Vancouver’s A Better Life Foundation. Follow organizers CityFood Magazine on Facebook for more information.
The Oyama Choucroute (Sauerkraut) Festival
Oyama Sausage, one of the busiest stalls at the Granville Island Market on any given day, is hosting The Oyama Choucroute (Sauerkraut) Festival from January 17th to January 20th, 2013. They’re offering up their own Alsatian style sauerkraut for you to take n’ go. Fully cooked, all you need to go is heat it up. They also have beer and wine pairing recommendations thanks to Liberty Wine Merchants and Granville Island Brewing. Pick up some of Oyama’s corned beef to make a reuben sandwich or try it with some of their sausage, smoked pork, and other delicious combinations.
For five generations the Oyama Sausage family has been schnitzing and dicing, grinding and spicing to make the best sausages, hams and pates they can. Find them on Granville Island at #17, 1689 Johnston Street, Vancouver. Follow them on Twitter @OyamaSausage.
Poutine Festival Vancouver
The Poutine Festival is returning to Vancouver after an incredibly high turn-out last year. Anticipating that it will be just as popular this year, organizers are planning ahead and getting the word out early. This Francophone party will take place at Heritage Hall on Main Street (a much larger venue) on Saturday, March 9, 2013 with live music from Liftoff and more poutine for everyone thanks to a partnership with La Belle Patate. Families are welcome and there will be activities for kids so scoop up your tickets early to get in on all the cheese curd and gravy-covered festivities.
8 Comments — Comments Are Closed
Hot chocolate and poutine = comfort food these chilly Winter days 🙂
I really hope the poutine festival is run better this year. It was one of the worst run events I have ever been to.
In fact, I was there for over 2 hours and didn’t get to try 1 fry let alone poutine. Yet the event organizers were eating round after round of it. They ran out of soft drinks about an hour into the evening.
This all would have been OK, except for the fact that every 15 minutes the organizers would go on the P.A. and tell people to not eat too much poutine because we would be full for the rest of it. Ha!
If you went on Twitter you saw nothing but people complaining about it. I knew a couple people who paid and were not even let in the door because the event had run out of fries and were waiting for more from the sponsoring fry shop.
After the 2 hours of waiting and not trying anything my wife and I left and went out for dinner to a restaurant instead.
Complete waste of time, poorly organized, a lot of rude people and line budders…I would suggest skipping it.
I just noticed that it says on their ticket buying page that “incl. 1 poutine”. Hopefully this is in reaction to the disaster that was last years event.
Last year (for the same price) was supposed to be all-you-could-eat, which I guess they thought was nothing.
Hopefully they actually monitor or ticket for the “incl. 1 poutine” otherwise it will be another disaster.
Dear Brad,
Regarding the poutine festival, I understand your concerns, but I just want to point out that the only reason why the festival last year was, and I quote you on this: *worst run events I have ever been to* or *disaster that was last years event*, is only due to the fact that we had way more people than we anticipated. The response from the people living here was so overwhelmingly positive that we did our best to cope with a situation that we did not anticipate. It was after all our first year organizing this, all made possible by unpaid volunteers, with the sole purpose to share the francophone culture. If you don’t want to come to the event this year, I would understand. Your compassion would most liley never reach this level, but, please keep me posted about the event you do organize and it would be my pleasure to attend it, then *comment* on it. You will be able to reach me at [email protected]. In the meantime, please stop pissing vinegar. It stinks. Alex
Yes it was a disaster and the pissy response from the organiser (one ‘Alex’) does not bode well for this year-I think I’ll pass-too many stellar events run by friendly welcoming people to bother with amateurs and their attitudes.
I was looking forward to going to this year’s Poutine Festival as my husband is from Quebec. However the comment from Alex has turned me off. I can find very good poutines elsewhere. Alex should have taken the criticism and used it to make improvements to the festival and not lambasted a potential festival goer. You have lost another two.
Just wow.
Don’t think I’ve ever seen a more rude or unprofessional response from a local “festival” organizer. Brad wrote an honest comment without exaggerating the truth and you responded like a dick.
You’re right, Alex, the initial response was overwhelmingly positive because everyone was excited for the festival – until they actually got there. What a complete farce. I had a similar experience to Brad only I didn’t have the patience to wait more than an hour. The response to your event during and afterwards was overwhelmingly bad. People were pissed off at how poorly the event was run and how no contingency plans were put in place.
I considered giving it another chance this year but certainly will not now that I know what a huge asshole the organizer is.
Good luck.
>>
Alex Brabant
January 15, 2013 at 1:34 PM
Dear Brad,
Regarding the poutine festival, I understand your concerns, but I just want to point out that the only reason why the festival last year was, and I quote you on this: *worst run events I have ever been to* or *disaster that was last years event*, is only due to the fact that we had way more people than we anticipated. The response from the people living here was so overwhelmingly positive that we did our best to cope with a situation that we did not anticipate. It was after all our first year organizing this, all made possible by unpaid volunteers, with the sole purpose to share the francophone culture. If you don’t want to come to the event this year, I would understand. Your compassion would most liley never reach this level, but, please keep me posted about the event you do organize and it would be my pleasure to attend it, then *comment* on it. You will be able to reach me at [email protected]. In the meantime, please stop pissing vinegar. It stinks. Alex
Ditto. Will be telling as man people as possible to skip this event.