The Town of Brome Lake is launching the first edition of its new Les Friands festival this weekend to showcase the culinary expertise, producers, and artisans of the area. 

The Les Friands festival is described as an extension of Tourism Lac-Brome's successful Grande Tablée events that were offered this summer. The Grande Tablée invited local producers Vitality Elderberry, Léon Courville Vigneron, and Cheeky Creek Farm to open up their grounds to locals and visitors alike to share a five-course meal created with the help of a chef. The goal was to experience what these producers offer in an enhanced setting that also saw musicians, artists, and story-tellers make an appearance.

“You can say it’s a continuation, or the next line, of la Grande Tablée with the gourmet concept. I think the difference is that with an event or a festival like Les Friands we have the opportunity to bring the community together,” explained Kevin Brunelle, coordinator of communications and promotion of recreation, tourism, culture, and community life for the Town of Brome Lake. “The Grande Tablée is more of a dinner, it’s more private. With an event and a festival, you have the chance to get people out and enjoy all of the great food, wines, beer, and coffee, and enjoy all of that with your community basically.”

For Brunelle, integrating shared gourmet experiences as an important part of community life within the municipality is one of the most valuable aspects of events like Les Friands. 

“I want people to have a good time. The community aspect for me is really important. If people can discover a new product, a new producer, and at the same time spend time with their neighbours, I’m happy,” he said. 

Organizing a gourmet event like Les Friands made sense for a municipality that has an abundance of "quality" products and produce to promote and that wants to “encourage people to buy locally,” mentioned Brunelle. 

“We are so lucky to have great producers, products, great ingredients, great chefs and restaurants. We have to take advantage of this and showcase this quality of food that we have in the region,” he said. 

According to Brunelle, the Les Friands festival will have some “familiar faces” with the likes of Brome Lake micro-brewery Knowlton Co. and coffee brewer Virgin Hill, whom will both be conducting tastings. 

“We’re also going to have a sommelier guiding wine tasting workshops. We are going to more than 20 different wines from La Route des vins that people will be able to taste,” he highlighted. 

On the food side of things, there will be a number of “culinary kiosks” and two local chefs from Le Sapin Bistro du Lac and Quilliams Restaurant will be whipping up something special for festival-goers. 

“They’re going to prepare around ten finger food kind of tastings, so we’re going to have a lot of choice from people to taste [from]. You know there’s the food, the beer, the wine, and the coffee, but we also wanted to make sure the weekend was family friendly,” noted Brunelle. 

Which is why Les Friands will also have a “family zone” designated with different activities and games, including a petting zoo, and there will be concerts put on by local bands.  

“I think people of all ages will be able to enjoy the weekend,” said Brunelle.

As the first edition of Les Friands, Brunelle hopes that it will be a success and grow to become an annual tradition in Brome Lake. 

“It’s a first step, we are trying something new. But of course, it’s the type of event that benefits so many different people and we would be happy if it would repeat over the next years,” expressed Brunelle. 

Les Friands is taking place on Sept. 23 from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sept. 24  from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m in Coldbrook Park, Knowlton. More details can be found here.

“I don’t know if you knew this, but ‘les friands’ translates in English to ‘be fond something.’ So in our case, we are pretty fond of all of the great food and wine, beer, and coffee that we have in the region. That’s the main motivation for us is to showcase and highlight all of this,” Brunelle emphasized to CIDI. 

Listen to the full interview with Brunelle below: