On top of Three Palms Brewing's community-driven Everything Local Spring Fest, the annual spicy foods spectacle that is the Pinellas Pepper Fest and the family- and pooch-friendly Festival of Flowers at Geraldson Community Farm, three other food and drink festivals plan to tantalize the region's taste buds, and affinity for local, this weekend.
The Florida Aquarium's 14th Annual SeaGrapes Fine Wine & Food Festival will take place 8 to 11 p.m. Saturday with more than 150 wines and eats from more than 25 area restaurants.
The cocktail attire affair, which will benefit the aquarium's youth education and conservation programs, allows guests to sample while discovering the many sea creatures featured at the aquatic destination. This year, a wine market headed by Bern's Fine Wine & Spirits will also be featured, along with live entertainment and a silent auction.
General admission tickets are $95 in advance, while VIP entry costs $225.
From 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, just on the heels of Earth Day, St. Petersburg's 29-year-old Green Thumb Festival, an annual horticulture extravaganza, returns to the Walter Fuller Recreation Center.
The free event will have tons of plant exhibits and vendors (more than 2,000 tress will be available for $5 each), a food court, recycling rally, environmental and children's programs, a tool-sharpening booth, complimentary butterfly plants and mulch, among other features.
Next to the Museum of Fine Arts at South Straub Park, the Painting in the Park gathering will run from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday. The event's a collaboration between the museum and Local Buds Aritsan Collective, and with food, drinks, shopping and kid-friendly activities, it's a mini festival all on its own.
Alongside bubble painting as well as origami hat and kite making, children will have the opportunity to participate in three workshops led by local purveyors Mother Kombucha and O'Berry's Succulents and The Hole Donuts.
Savory Pockets, Confectionistic Tendencies, Pop Craft, The Urban Canning Company, Squeeze Juice Works and Green Bench Brewing Co. complete the vendor lineup.
This article appears in Apr 23-29, 2015.