Sobelicious: Behind the scenes at the Wine & Food Festival

The annual bacchanalia, scheduled for Feb. 19-22, raises funds for the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management. Approximately 900 hospitality students help make the event a success, gaining valuable hands-on experience in the process.

By Martin Haro

February in South Florida – it really is the time when everyone else in the country turns to us and thinks, “I wish I was there.”

The weather is perfect and Miami is alive with fun, energetic and vibrant events, one of which is closely associated to FIU: the annual Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival, scheduled for Feb. 19-22.

“SoBe,” which began as a one-day event known as the Florida Extravaganza held at Biscayne Bay Campus, has all but exceeded expectations and grown into an outstanding must-attend event since moving to South Beach in 2002.

Expected to arrive in town for the 2009 edition of the festival are Bobby Flay, Katie Lee Joel, Masaharu Morimoto, Rachael Ray, Tom Colicchio, Paula Deen, Emeril Lagasse, Martha Stewart and the king and queen of Spain, as well as a small army of Golden Panthers who will gain first-hand experience working with these and other culinary world superstars.

FIU hospitality students reap the benefits of SoBe. Joseph McKinney ’07, MS ’08 has worked with SoBe for the past four years, as the festival’s coordinator for tent logistics at the signature Grand Tasting Village, a three-block mini-city built on the beach on Ocean Drive. He says the festival has afforded him invaluable experience.

“I’ve learned everything at SoBe,” he said. “How to deal with people, the process of building this entire city that we have to build to pull this weekend off – everything from logistics to management, to HR and PR and advertising. The Wine & Food Festival is all-encompassing. And 2009 is the second year we are going green. We’re really pushing that hard.”

McKinney says working side-to-side with the world’s top chefs and wineries, under the auspices of the brands that serve as sponsors, at hot-ticket events like the Amstel Light Burger Bash and the Perrier-Jouët BubbleQ is an opportunity that is second to none.

Last year, SoBe, truly the toast of the town, broke all records, drawing more than 40,000 local, national and international guests onto South Beach’s sandbar, and raising a reported $1.7 million for FIU.

A year in the making

SoBe is such a massive event Golden Panthers literally begin working on the next edition no sooner than the current one has wrapped, if not while it is underway. Susan Gladstone ’76 is the festival’s activation director and an instructor at the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management.

At SoBe, Gladstone oversees everything from securing sponsors to space design to bringing in anything sponsors need to set up, cook and serve at the event. She does this with the help of the undergraduate and master’s students on her student management team and the small army of FIU student associate volunteers who find the experience nothing short of “awesome.”

“About 90 percent of the student body at the School of Hospitality is involved in the festival,” she said.

For a complete schedule and more information, visit www.sobewineandfoodfest.com.