Overview Winter Fest is Jackson Hole Food and Wine's three-day festival of tastings and dinners in Teton Village and town, and its centerpiece is a wine dinner at 9,000 feet, reached by the Bridger Gondola, which Rick Bayless cooked in 2025. Around it run a whiskey tasting, Big Wines, Small Plates, a wine seminar and a walk-around grand tasting of Jackson restaurants, and every event is 21 and over. The organizer is a 501(c)(3) that runs a summer and a winter festival each year and gives part of its proceeds to Hole Food Rescue in Teton County. On site The rooms are small. In 2026 the Lost Whiskey tasting took 50 guests in the Four Seasons ballroom, where founder Mark Turner, his father, sister and daughter told the Triangle X Dude Ranch story behind the bourbon; Big Wines, Small Plates seated 70 in the Lupine Room at The Cloudveil, with each panelist's own food memory turned into a course by Mike Britton of Fine Dining Restaurant Group; a blind Pinot Noir tasting took 40. Joey Edwards of Blackberry Mountain cooked the dinner at Piste Mountain Bistro to Peay Vineyards wines, and the Winter Grand Tasting at the Jackson Hole Conference Center closed the weekend for 400 with a DJ. Audience More than half the crowd travels: across the 2025 festivals, 54 percent of guests came from outside Teton County, with Wyoming, Texas, Colorado, California and New York sending the most. The festival falls in ski season, the afternoon tastings started at 2:30 and 3 p.m. in 2026, and guests are told they can come in ski clothes. Talent and Influencers Winter guests have included Tyler Florence, Richard Blais, Stuart Brioza and Nicole Krasinski, Sarah Grueneberg and Rick Bayless, with Death and Co. co-founders David Kaplan and Alex Day behind the bar and restaurateur Drew Nieporent at four winters. Preston Van Winkle came in 2020, 2022 and 2025; in 2025 he poured 10- to 23-year Pappy Van Winkle at a tasting billed as Pappy Hour. In 2026 the panel and seminars brought Andy Peay, Billy Weiss of North Berkeley Imports and Andy Chabot of Blackberry Farm. Track record The 2025 festival was the seventh Winter Fest and the 2024 festival the sixth. Grand tastings have drawn 350 at the Jackson Hole Conference Center in 2025 and 400 at the Four Seasons in 2024, when the weekend opened with a champagne and caviar dinner at Solitude Station served from a one-kilogram tin. Across both festivals the organization had raised more than $131,000 for local and national causes by 2026. Brand presence Partners attach to single events. In 2025 Snake River Roasting Co. presented the Grand Tasting, Prugh Real Estate presented Pappy Hour and Westside Wine and Spirits sponsored Big Wines, Small Plates; in 2026 Prugh Real Estate presented the Pinot Noir seminar. Resorts and hotels host outright: the Four Seasons, The Cloudveil, the Wyoming Inn and Jackson Hole Mountain Resort each took an event in 2026. The top partner level adds category exclusivity, a custom activation space and VIP gifting.