Rheingau Gourmet & Wein Festival is one of the wine festivals that anchors the Rheingau calendar, drawing both local visitors and international wine travellers each year.
Rheingau Gourmet & Wein Festival is one of the wine festivals that anchors the Rheingau calendar, drawing both local visitors and international wine travellers each year. It is held at Hattenheim in Eltville am Rhein, in the heart of one of Germany's most distinctive wine areas. It is an annual event with an established local audience and a consistent place in the regional calendar.
18 days of gourmet lunches, gala dinners, masterclasses with star winemakers and chefs. German wine festivals — weinfeste — are some of the country's most-attended summer events, with hundreds taking place across the wine regions between June and October. Programmes typically combine open-air tastings under marquees in the village square, tastings of the local Riesling, Pinot Noir (Spätburgunder) and other regional varieties, traditional brass-band music, food stalls offering Flammkuchen, Maultaschen, Schnitzel and the local sausage specialities, and a Weinkönigin (wine queen) ceremony at the heart of the programme. Many festivals trace their origins to the medieval guilds and have run continuously for over a century. The event is organised by Kronenschlösschen / Rheingau Gourmet & Wein Festival, which sets the tone and direction of the programme each year.
The Rheingau is one of Germany's smallest wine regions but also one of its most prestigious — only around 3,000 hectares, but with a reputation for top-quality Riesling and Spätburgunder (Pinot Noir). The region sits on south-facing slopes along a 30 km stretch where the Rhine river bends west between Wiesbaden and Rüdesheim. Riesling accounts for around 78% of plantings, with Spätburgunder concentrated around Assmannshausen. The Rheingau pioneered the Erstes Gewächs (First Growth) classification of vineyards and is home to the Geisenheim viticultural institute, one of the world's leading wine-research centres.
The 2026 edition is scheduled for 19 February - 8 March 2026. Cost details are best confirmed directly with the organiser ahead of travel. Full programme, ticketing and updated information are published on the official site at rheingau-gourmet-festival.de. Visitors are advised to check directly with the organiser for the latest schedule, as festival programmes are sometimes updated close to the event date.
The Rheingau is reached via Frankfurt airport (just 30 minutes away), with Wiesbaden, Eltville, Oestrich-Winkel and Rüdesheim as the main wine-tourism towns. The Rheinsteig hiking trail follows the river along the Rheingau hills, and the Rheingauer Riesling Routes Sundays close the road to cars and open it to bikes and pedestrians. Hessian cuisine pairs the wines with Frankfurter Würstchen, Handkäs mit Musik (sour-milk cheese marinated with onions), Grüne Soße (green herb sauce), Spundekäs and the area's Apfelwein cider, with Riesling pairing especially well with Rhine river fish.
