After soft launching a seafood festival in 2025, Chef Dean Neff of Seabird restaurant is making it bigger and better this year with celebrity chefs, industry leaders and a plan to highlight Wilmington's role as a hub for seafood.
It's also newly dubbed as the Out to Sea NC Fest, thanks in part to forager Ana Shellem. It takes place Nov. 8-10 at multiple venues in downtown Wilmington. There's a dinner packed with award-winning chefs and documentary screening at Thalian Hall.
"That's the one we'd love to get everyone out for," Neff said. In addition to the screening, and a panel discussion after, there will also be a reception with oysters from local farms.
"We'd love for people to experience all the good things we have in this community in terms
of seafood," he said. "The mission of the festival is really all about telling the story of the individual pieces of the seafood industry... and how we can support the people doing the work."
Here's a look at the events.
Sunday, Nov. 8: Chef Keith Rhodes of Voyce Bistro continues the "Saltwater Stories" dinners that focus on Black foodways. This one will tell the story of the Nixon family who opened the first oyster shucking plant in New Hanover County. John Mallette from Southern Breeze Seafood in Jacksonville is also participating. It starts at 3:30 p.m. at Brooklyn Arts Center.
Monday, Nov. 9: The Daytime Block is an educational session designed for the seafood and hospitality industries. It includes a caviar class with North Carolina-based Marshallberg Farm, a session on seasonality and sustainability of finfish, and one on the State of NC Shrimp Industry.
The Night Block is “Saltwater Cinema: Stories from the Southern Coast” at Thalian Hall. It's a screening of The Local Palate magazine's "ShellBound: An Anthology of Southern Oyster Culture" plus My Home, NC’s “Ricky Moore and Ana Shellem Forage NC Shellfish." It begins at 5:30 p.m. with a reception of freshly shucked oysters from six oyster farmers who will be paired with local chefs for accompaniments. After, there's a conversation with Neff, Shellem, oyster farmer Conor MacNair, Chef Ricky Moore of Saltbox Seafood Joint in Durham, and filmmaker Heather Burgiss. Proceeds from this event will be going to the Oyster South and Cape Fear River Watch organizations.
Tuesday, Nov. 10: Seven chefs join forces for a Collaborative Chef Dinner at Seabird. They include a Food & Wine Best New Chef Nicole Cabrera Mills of Pêche in New Orleans, Vivian Howard and Charlotte Coman of Theodosia in Outer Banks, Raleigh's Adé Carenna of iLéWA Foods, Chef Carson Jewell of manna, Rhodes, Moore, and pastry chef Leticia Torres-Rojas of Seabird.
Tickets range from $60-$250 and are available through Seabird.
Allison Ballard is the food and dining reporter at the StarNews.You can reach her at aballard@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: Wilmington chef goes bigger with all-star talent for seafood fest
