To Do in RI: Jacques Pépin to headline Newport Mansions Wine & Food Festival. Tix on sale.

Celebrity chef, television personality, author and educator Jacques Pépin will share insights and stories from his illustrious career during the Newport Mansions Wine & Food Festival in September at Rosecliff.

“A Conversation with World-Renowned French Chef Jacques Pépin and Claudine Pépin” will be a highlight of the 19th annual festival, which also features a Connoisseur’s Dinner, Vintner Dinner, Sunday Jazz Brunch and 18 food and beverage seminars from Sept. 19-22. Guests will also enjoy food and beverage samples from festival sponsors in the well-stocked Tasting Tent.

Tickets are now available through www.newportmansions.org/events/newport-mansions-wine-food-festival-2024.

“We are delighted to welcome Jacques Pépin to his fifth appearance at the Wine & Food Festival,” said Trudy Coxe, CEO and Executive Director of The Preservation Society of Newport County, which organizes the annual event. “His star quality is bound to add a lot of excitement to the weekend. And with the addition this year of the Connoisseur’s Dinner, and an eclectic lineup of seminars, this is going to be one of the best festivals we’ve ever held.”

The chef’s daughter Claudine Pepin, President of the Jacques Pépin Foundation, and Rollie Wesen, the foundation’s Executive Director, will present a seminar on French cuisine and also will host the Vintner Dinner, a collaboration of four outstanding chefs whose culinary creations will be paired with specially selected wines.

The seminars explore wines from California, France, Italy, Spain, Australia and other great wine-producing regions. They also venture beyond the world of wine, with experts leading tastings of Remy Cointreau cocktails, Japanese sake, Kentucky whiskey, Mexican mezcal and beers from around the world.

J.P Morgan Wealth Management returns as the Presenting Sponsor of the Newport Mansions Wine & Food Festival for the third straight year.

Support for the festival also comes from Grand Cru Sponsors: Ammunition Wines & Whiskey; Boar’s Head; Cakebread Cellars; Cointreau; Empson USA; The Jacques Pépin Foundation; Mezcalum; and Taylor Fladgate; and Vintner Sponsors: Alexian Paté and Specialty Meats; Ana Fabiano; BankNewport; Benchmark Senior Living; Bonterra Organic Estates; Chef Kevin Des Chenes; Czechvar; Dasani; Daylight Wine & Spirits; Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits; Dewey Crush; Discover Newport; Erdinger Weissbräu; Estrella Damm; Knights Bridge Winery; Komé Collective Sake; National Trust Insurance Services, LLC; Natural Tableware; Quigley Fine Wines; Santa Margherita; Skurnik Wines & Spirits; Touton; and USBeverage.

The festival will also include a Restaurant Program featuring wine dinners at several local restaurants as well as an After-Dark Party at a local nightclub. Check www.newportmansions.org for updates.

Proceeds from the Newport Mansions Wine & Food Festival benefit The Preservation Society of Newport County, a nonprofit organization accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and dedicated to preserving and interpreting the area’s historic architecture, landscapes and decorative arts. Its 11 historic properties — seven of them National Historic Landmarks — span more than 250 years of American architectural and social development.