The annual Savannah Food & Wine Festival became a COVID-19 pandemic casualty in 2020 and without it, a void has sat unfilled in town for the past three years.
Enter Heritage Fire.
The popular event aimed at challenging local chefs to a grill, al fresco meal with a central goal of supporting our local farmers has become a hit in cities such as Charleston, Asheville, Austin and New York City. It’ll be making its first trip to the Hostess City on April 16 with the hopes of highlighting the Savannah culinary scene.
"I think the Savannah culinary scene has been on the map for quite some time," said Lauren Melamed, director of integrated marketing at a21, the company that produces and owns the event.
“(We’ve been) doing different culinary destinations each year, but we're excited to be coming to Savannah. We think Savannah is such an incredible landscape and really just attracts such a great diversity of people from all walks of life. So it's kind of a natural fit for us.”
Credit: Carrie Turner Photography
Credit: Carrie Turner Photography
Heritage Fire works like this: a line-up of local chefs arrive at the site and begin cooking and preparing a dish with a wood fire, working in a variety of meats and vegetables sourced from local farmers and growers. Pair that with wines and cocktails from Georgia such as Creature Comforts Brewing Company and Scofflaw Brewing, a winner is selected at the end of the day and is crowned the “Heritage Hero” for the year with the winnings going to the farming source of their choice.
“We like to give our chefs the liberty to choose their medium of choice of how they want to cook their live fire dish of choice,” Melamed said. “We don’t want to be dictating and saying, ‘Oh, you need to cook this,’ but we try to say give us a farmer of choice that you’d like to support, and then obviously help with offsetting their costs with product and give them a recipe stipend. Because even though the pandemic has passed, we obviously try to help support our chefs as well as farm as much as possible.”
The Savannah event will feature a truly all-star cast of chefs from the area, including: Collin Clemons (1540 Room), Terren Williams (Slow Fire Barbecue), Bernard Bennett (Okàn Bluffton), Ryan Whyte-Buck (Folklore and Bellwether House), Joseph Harrison (Common Thread), Daniel Aranza + Felipe Vera (Strangebird Savannah), Derek Simcik (700 Drayton), Ashley Cunha (FARM Bluffton), Todd Harris (The Garage at Victory North), Alexander Bollinger (Rhett), Derick Wade (The Darling Oyster Bar), Joe Pribelsky (Ardsley Station), Daniel Herget (The Emporium Kitchen & Wine Market/ Perry Lane Hotel), Victoria Shore & Robert Newton (Fleeting - Thompson Savannah), Karim Elkady (Southern Cross Hospitality) and BowTie Barbecue Co.
Credit: Courtesy of Sam Ferguson
Credit: Courtesy of Sam Ferguson
Melamed said they’re excited to see what this crew comes up with and with previous events in other cities, they’ve found that chefs love returning each year but they also put an emphasis on identifying rising talent to keep the competition fresh.
“It's a great way just to get (chefs) out there and even though Savannah is a new market, I believe there will be people probably going for this event, so we're super excited.”
Heritage Fire: Savannah will be held on Sunday, April 16 at The Westin Savannah Harbor Golf Resort & Spa. VIP ticket holders have access from 4-7 p.m. while general admission runs from 4:45 to 7 p.m.
VIP tickets run $175 while general admission tickets are $125. Learn more about Heritage Fire and check out tickets at heritagefiretour.com/savannah.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Heritage Fire bringing top-notch culinary festival to Savannah in April
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