This event was held at Talking Stick's Salt River Field.
I tend to compare food festivals to Devoured. AZCentral Food & Wine Experience, you're no Devoured.
The setup was fine. It was held in tents which had a good amount of space and plenty of seating. The restaurants were well represented and there were some especially good items served.
But the value...ugh. Tickets were $90 plus fees each day. For this, you received food samples and 10 beverage samples. 10 2-ounce pours of alcohol. Let me put this in perspective. At Devoured they give you 30 and if you run out of stamps, you can get a new card. After 10 here, you are not able to get a new card (trust me, I asked). So all told you get about 2 beers with your ticket. If you went to anyone of these restaurants and spent $200 for a couple you could have a fantastic meal with plenty of wine. So, that's what I'd recommend you do. Additionally, the beverage options were quite poor. The beer distribution represented was minimal (Shock Top and Stella were two of the 10-12 brands represented). The wine wasn't better. Lots of $8-$12 bottles being poured. If you're at a high-end festival, you'd expect more. How do you get distributors to pour good stuff at a festival? You allow them to sell their items. There was no retail space at this festival.
Also, 1pm-4pm is the running time and they started shutting down about 3pm.
I had a fun day overall but unless I score free or substantially discounted tickets next year, I won't be back.