South Beach Wine & Food Festival organizer Lee Schrager, along with chefs Todd English and Emeril Lagasse. (Seth Browarnik / courtesy South Beach Wine & Food Festival)

More: SoBe wine highlights | Swirl Girl Dry’s lessons learned | Dispatches from “Sweet”

So much wine and food, so little time.

Such is my short take on the just-concluded 2010 South Beach Wine & Food Festival, the ninth annual edition of what’s become the Super Bowl of the gourmet set.

This year’s event, held this past Wednesday through Sunday on the sands of Miami Beach (and nearby venues), followed the same format of festivals past.

That means a lot of celebrity chefs, a lot of seminars and one huuuuge tasting village (the Grand Tasting Village, it’s called).

I caught plenty of the weekend’s action. Here are some highlights — in no particular order.

South Beach comes to Palm Beach: Technically, the festival doesn’t reach beyond the boundaries of Miami-Dade County. But because so many prestigious winemakers and chefs fly in for the event, they’re bound to make the most of the opportunity and visit other parts of South Florida.

Witness a wine dinner held last Wednesday at the International Polo Club in Wellington: It featured vintner Victor Marcantoni of the Graffigna winery in Argentina and Argentinean-born chef Mauro Colagreco, a rising culinary star in France. Highlights of the meal included a rose-scented Torrontes (a great white wine from South America) and a dessert offering of three unique frozen treats: a lemon semifreddo, a thyme sorbet and a yogurt ice cream.

Marcantoni and Colagreco were featured later in the week at BubbleQ, one of the festival’s signature events.

Traditional ’cue wins out: Speaking of the BubbleQ, it was hosted this year by Emeril Lagasse and it spotlighted some 25-plus chefs from around the world, who showcased a variety of grilled and smoked dishes.

But for all the exotic takes on barbecue — grilled lamb ribs with Calabrian chilies and pickled fennel, anyone? — I have to say it was the traditional offerings that impressed the most.

Specifically, I’m talking about the out-of-this-world Texas-style smoked brisket (courtesy of chef Elizabeth Karmel’s Texas-inspired New York ’cue joint, Hill County) and the equally amazing (and equally tender) “World Championship” pulled pork (courtesy of Big Bob Gibson Bar-B-Q of Decatur, Ala.).

But I did like one contemporary (and very Floridian) take on barbecue from chef Gordon Maybury of the Loews Miami Beach hotel — namely, his honey-citrus barbecue ribs, served with spicy corn jalapeño pancakes.

The school of beer: Sometimes lost in the festival’s heady mix of food and fun is the fact that the entire event goes to benefit a worthy cause — Florida International University’s School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, one of the top programs in the country for would-be restaurant execs. But FIU is more than a festival beneficiary — its students are largely the engine that drives the festival train, since they’re the ones who assist all those celebrity chefs throughout the weekend.

But I was equally impressed by another facet of FIU on display at the event: its School of Beer. Seriously, as part of hospitality program, FIU teaches beer (and wine) making. And student Jennifer Miller was pouring some of her creations, including a first-rate India pale ale.

Sake sensation: For all the oddball wines and spirits I tried over the weekend — weirdly flavored vodkas, low-cal liquors, wines from places with hardly any wine-making traditions — it was a high-class sake that really tickled my palate. I’m talking about the remarkably clean-tasting TY KU White Ultra Premium Junmai Daiginjo sake (retailing for $130) — a refreshing and ever-so-slightly-sweet wonder of a drink.

Salty sensation: The Salt Sisters — an enterprising online purveyor (saltsistersonline.com) of all things, well, salty — was my pick among the merchants and producers promoting new products.

Not that salt itself is new, but the sisters offer an amazing variety of salts from around the world (think places ranging from Cyprus to New Zealand), plus lines of fusion sea salts (the black truffle would go great over popcorn) and natural smoked sea salts (the Yakima applewood is like a dish of barbecue in a salt shaker).

Items go for as little as $5 — I’ll definitely be ordering some online.

Sweet sensation: I’m a sucker for sweet wines. So I’m wondering how I managed to overlook Austria’s Kracher winery all these years.
Fortunately, I found it for the first time at the festival, where it was pouring about a half-dozen different varieties. We’re talking wines full of flavor notes of all kinds — honey, citrus, flowers — that also are remarkably subtle.

That is, they’re not sweet wines, but wines that happen to be sweet — a crucial distinction.

Chefs do some dishing: Kudos to Esquire magazine for hosting a festival-connected panel on “The Rebirth of Fine Dining,” with such chefs as Daniel Boulud (a big honoree at this year’s festival — see related story) and John Besh (a New Orleans legend).

The discussion served to highlight the challenges that today’s chefs face: Diners are starting to want serious — and seriously pricey — food once again, but they want it served in a casual atmosphere (think caviar and jeans).

Another problem: The real money for chefs isn’t in fine dining, where the profit margins can be as low as 10 percent, but in everyday eats. In other words, chefs make a lot more money on a $12 burger than a $50 beef entrée.

Swag galore: It wouldn’t be the SoBe fest without swag of all kinds, beginning with the tote bag and wine glass that attendees receive as soon as they enter the Tasting Village.

Among the items we collected this year: a container of Kitchen Basic pork stock (“Close to Homemade,” the label says), a Wine Spectator luggage tag, a bottle of hot sauce from the Barbados tourism board, a sample of Viva paper towels (those came in handy!) and a wine stopper with the GMC logo.

Locals on display: Several local chefs and culinary types were on hand during the event. Eric Grutka of Ian’s Tropical Grill in Jensen Beach was serving a delicious seafood dish at the Tasting Village. Michelle Bernstein (of Michelle Bernstein’s at The Omphoy) was cooking at dinner events of all kinds. And Imperial Brands, the Palm Beach Gardens-based spirits maker and importer, was offering samples of its 4 Oranges vodka.

The weekend’s weirdest sight: It’s not every day you get served Champagne from an attractive model, garbed in an outrageous green spandex outfit. Even more bizarre: She was doing the pouring — at the BubbleQ — while suspended upside down from the ceiling.

You gotta love South Beach.