4
IN THE KITCHEN

Olive oil, eggs, tangled ribbons of freshly made fettucclne, and taste-filled parcels of ravioli are some of the key ingredients of Italian culinary paradise. One of the most satisfying food journeys is learning to create such marvels in your own kitchen.

For food-lovers, the heart of the action is always in the kitchen. When they travel, no amount of sightseeing can equal the chance to visit a local cook’s workplace or private home, learning the secrets behind classic regional specialties or cherished family recipes. For travelers like this, one of the happiest recent developments in tourism is the emergence of small cookery schools that welcome foreign guests for informal, hands-on classes. Kitchen doors are opening everywhere, from Cuba—where enterprising households welcome tourists to their family dinner tables—to South Africa, for an introduction to the east-meets-west flavors of Cape Malay, one of the world’s most interesting fusion cuisines. In Italy, small schools demonstrate the country’s proudly regional traditions, while specialist chefs in Beijing share their expertise in crafting perfect Chinese dumplings. A trip to Yucatán in Mexico is an opportunity to learn how local people transform an astonishing array of spices, fruits, and other ingredients into the fabulous sauces and desserts of the peninsula’s distinctive cuisine.

NEW MEXICO

CHILI LOVE IN SANTA FE

Handle with care: students at the Santa Fe School of Cooking learn the art of roasting hot chilies.

The chili pepper is New Mexico’s official vegetable, and it is chilies that breathe fire into the state’s cuisine.

Native American craftspeople sell their wares beneath the arcades of the Spanish Palace of the Governors. Here, in Santa Fe’s central plaza, the mix of cultures that gives this southwestern city its special vibrancy swirls around you. A few steps away, the Santa Fe School of Cooking shows how the blend works in the kitchen. Try the hands-on, one-and-a-half-hour chile amor (chili love) class, where you will learn how to make red and green chili salsas (sauces), served on piping hot tortillas that you have also prepared yourself. If you have ever faced the vexing question of how to get chili oil off your hands after deseeding and chopping this volatile vegetable, pay attention to the tips on handling chilies. In demonstration classes—which last about three hours and end with a meal—you will learn how to make tamales (corn dough steamed in a corn husk, with or without a filling), nopales (grilled or boiled prickly pear pads), and an array of incredible salsas. Classes are taught by resident instructors or visiting chefs from top Santa Fe restaurants, using ingredients from local farmers and artisans. Don’t want to cook? Take the school’s walking tour of the city, stopping to sample the food at some of Santa Fe’s most notable restaurants, such as Amavi, Coyote Café, and La Casa Sena.

Corn, Tomato, and Black Bean Salsa

Lightly sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil. In a bowl, combine the cilantro, cumin seed, jalapeño, vinegar, and honey. Season with salt and add the corn, tomato, black beans, and sautéed ingredients. Stir, and set aside for 30-45 minutes to give the flavors time to blend.

CUBA

HOME-EATING IN HAVANA

Color abounds in the streets of Havana, including here a red motorcycle outside a blue-painted panadería (bakery).

Enjoy authentic local food in a private home in Cuba’s capital, and learn the secrets of how it is cooked.

Cuba is no stranger to revolutions. And the most recent, on the culinary front, has been universally toasted. There was a time when visitors to the island’s capital, Havana, were restricted to a limited choice of expensive restaurants offering mediocre food. All that changed in 1995, with the legalization of paladares—independent, state-sanctioned dining rooms in private family dwellings. Here, amid the crumbling grandeur of this most atmospheric of Cuban cities, you can eat home-cooked food while also contributing much-needed revenue to individual households. The fare may be simple, such as pollo (chicken) with Moros y Cristianos (literally “Moors and Christians,” black beans with white rice) or puerco (pork) with rice and fried plantains. More sophisticated dishes include tuna in coconut sauce or red snapper in beurre blanc sauce. But even when the food is humble, it is always fresh, wholesome, and cheap. Competition from the highly successful paladares has led Havana’s conventional restaurants to improve their standards. Even so, don’t miss the chance to try a paladar. In houses that are not normally open to tourists, you will learn how habaneros (the city’s inhabitants) cook, and you will experience local hospitality first hand, which is what eating in Havana is all about.

Bending the Rules

By law, paladares are not allowed to take more than 12 diners, and are only permitted to serve rustic food. Seafood is supposed to be served only in hotels and restaurants, but may be available if you ask.

To find a paladar, ask for recommendations from other tourists, or local barmen or taxi drivers—but not from your hotel, because its restaurant is likely to be in competition. If someone offers to take you to a paladar, rather than just recommending one, decline—this is probably a jinetero, or tout, expecting a commission. Paladar owners are heavily taxed, so leave a good tip.

It is a far cry from the green valleys of Wales-a casa de te (teahouse) advertising itself in the wilds of Patagonia.

MEXICO

COOKING YUCATÁN-STYLE

Outside Mérida’s San Ildefonso Cathedral, street vendors sell marquesitas—hot cheese wrapped in waffle-like cylinders.

Jutting from southeastern Mexico, the Yucatán Peninsula is home to some of the most intriguing dishes in the country’s cuisine.

Cooking Yucatecan food means building layers of flavor based on ancient indigenous ingredients, such as corn, beans, squash, and chili, with added European, Caribbean, and even Middle Eastern tastes and techniques. Here, in the land of the Maya people, whose food and culture still dominate the peninsula, you will create surprising fusions, such as queso relleno. To make the stuffing for this ball of Dutch Edam cheese, you season meat with a combination of native tomatoes and the classic Spanish—Moorish mix of olives, almonds, capers, and spices. You can sign up for one of the well-known schools, like Los Dos in the state capital, Mérida, or take more informal classes at one of Yucatán’s beach resorts. Among the dishes you will undoubtedly make is cochinita pibil, or slow-roasted pork, named for the technique of cooking meat in a pib, or underground oven. For this, you will make marinades using chili paste and bitter Seville orange juice. Toasted and ground pumpkin seeds are the key to other local dishes, including papadzules—stuffed tortillas bathed in a pumpkin-seed sauce. You will also learn to make dough for Yucatecan tamales, flavored with the bitter herb chaya and wrapped in banana leaves. To round things off, local tropical fruits and native chocolate will be the basis for desserts.

Pastes for Every Dish

Fragrant seasoning pastes called recados are characteristic of Yucatecan cooking. Most often used to season meat and poultry, they consist of a variety of spices, usually ground with garlic and vinegar or bitter orange juice.

■ Recado colorado is a bright red-orange paste, also known as achiote paste, which comes from the seeds, called achiote or annatto seeds, of the bixa orellana tree. The seeds are combined with cumin, cloves, coriander, allspice, and oregano to make a marinade for chicken or pork cooked pibil-style, wrapped in banana leaves.

■ Chilmole, or relleno negro, is made from toasted ancho chilies, which are ground with black pepper and aromatic spices to make a dark paste. The mix is diluted with turkey broth and served with turkey, especially around the Christmas and New Year holidays.

■ Recado para bistec is used, as its name suggests, to season beef. Cinnamon and oregano are two of its signature flavors. Perhaps surprisingly, one of the most famous dishes made with this sauce is a chicken dish, pollo Valladolid. For this, chicken is first cooked with onion, spices, and chili, then rubbed with the recado and roasted or grilled.

CHINA

BEIJING COOKERY SCHOOL

Students chop ingredients under the eye of their teacher at the Hutong Cuisine school in northern Beijing.

Chinese food tastes its best in China, especially when you have cooked it yourself.

In China’s capital you can sample the full range of the country’s finest regional cooking, but when in Beijing you should eat like a Beijinger. Even better, discover what is perhaps the best Chinese takeout of all—not the food itself, but the knowledge of how to make it. Classes at The Peninsula Hotel in the central shopping district of Wangfujing teach you to make the humble but satisfying local dish called jiaozi, the northern-style meat-and-vegetable-filled pasta packages whose southern relatives are familiar on dim sum menus in Chinatowns worldwide, often wrongly translated as “dumplings.” In the spacious open kitchen of the hotel’s popular Jing restaurant, chefs help students mix flour and water to make an elastic dough. The students hand-roll the dough into small balls, which they squash and roll into disks of near-translucent thinness. Typical fillings are mixtures of chopped pork, vegetables, and dark, broad-bladed Chinese chives, although The Peninsula’s chopper-wielding students follow the more subtle recipe used for the jiaozi served in the hotel’s award-winning Cantonese restaurant, Huang Ting. A spoonful of filling is dabbed into the center of each disk, and then the chefs reveal the real secret to making jiaozi, which is the deft pinching motion that seals the disks into neat, rib-edged parcels ready for steaming or boiling.

Other Options

■ Classes at The Peninsula include a dim sum lunch in Huang Ting at which students eat their own handiwork alongside an assortment of tidier items made by the professionals. Recipes for several different items are provided to take home.

■ Located in an old courtyard house tucked away in the hutong (alleys) of north Beijing, Hutong Cuisine offers classes in Cantonese and Sichuan cooking. Students cook four basic Cantonese or spicy Sichuan dishes and eat them at the concluding meal.

■ To make exotic jiaozi in startling surroundings, take a trip to Green T. House Living in the countryside northeast of Beijing. Celebrity chef-designer-musician JinR gives half-day courses in making her famous Green T. fennel dumplings.

Fresh seafood is a staple of Thai cuisine.

THAILAND

THAI SECRETS

An instructor at Bangkok’s Four Seasons school

Thai cookery encompasses an astonishing regional variety, and there are schools to teach every time-honored tradition.

Laboriously prepared, highly aromatic, and exquisitely presented, Thailand’s cuisine is world-famous for good reason, and a plethora of schools, from rustic outfits to long-esteemed institutions, cater for the chefs and connoisseurs who flock to the kingdom to delve into its culinary secrets. Many schools begin with a market tour. Accompanied by your instructor, you pick among an array of exotic fare from the country’s four corners: lemongrass stalks, mangoes, Kaffir lime leaves, mouse-dropping chilies (which provide the infamous kick in Thai food), Phuket lobster, and much more. With your basket full of goods, you return to the school, where you grind, chop, stir-fry, deep-fry, stew, mix, and mince. Typically, each school offers a four-dish course. At Bangkok’s Blue Elephant, you will learn how to prepare Royal Thai cuisine—dishes such as spicy lemongrass soup with prawns or stir-fried noodles with tamarind sauce. At the garden-enclosed Thai House, just north of Bangkok, you can discover “village secrets”—perhaps coconut beef curry and clear melon soup. At Chiang Mai Cookery School, northern dishes with an extra dose of flavor are the specialty, including Chiang Mai curry with chicken and fried fish with chili and basil. On the paradise island of Ko Samui, your endeavors at the Samui Institute of Thai Culinary Arts will have a southern panache—perhaps chu chi curry with seafood or pumpkin coconut milk soup with porkballs. All classes end the same way—with a feast showcasing your new skills.

A Question of Balance

The meticulous balance of flavors—sweet, salty, sour, and spicy—lies at the heart of all Thai cooking.

Sweetness is achieved through the use of ingredients such as coconut milk (especially in curries, stews, and stir-fries), palm and coconut sugar, sweet black soy sauce, sweet pickled garlic, and sometimes honey.

Saltiness generally comes from fish sauce, but also through sea salt, Thai oyster sauce, dried fish or shrimp, salted plums, and salt-preserved vegetables.

Lime juice and tamarind juice add tartness to a dish, as do lemongrass, coconut vinegar, and rice vinegar.

Spiciness—the quality most commonly associated with Thai food—is typically achieved by using chili peppers, and sometimes chili paste and peppercorns. Ginger, onions, and garlic also give a kick.

VIETNAM

HOME-LEARNING IN SAIGON

A local woman wearing a conical non la straw hat passes by the fishing harbor in Nha Trang—a color symphony of blue and green.

Experience local hospitality while exploring Vietnam’s rich culinary heritage in the southern city of Saigon.

The boundaries between restaurants and residences are often blurred in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City), so it is only natural that some of the best cookery classes in town take place in the kitchens of Saigonese homes. Among the programs you can choose from, a good option is one that brings together travelers seeking a gastronomic adventure off the beaten track and Vietnamese home-cooks passionate about sharing their culture with others. Each lesson begins at the local market early in the morning, when fruit, vegetables, seafood, and meat are at their freshest. The heart and energy of a city is often found within its markets, and this is certainly the case in Saigon. Students are steered around the market by a seasoned cook accompanied by an English-proficient university student, who serves as a language translator and cultural guide. Whether it is ground pork for crispy spring rolls (cha giò) or saw-tooth herb to garnish beef noodle soup (pho bo), you learn about Vietnam’s diversity of foods by helping to select the day’s ingredients. With bounty in hand, you travel to the cook’s home to prepare lunch. Seeing and experiencing life at this level grants travelers a unique understanding of the customs and rhythms of Saigonese life. Then, after a morning of chopping, measuring, and tasting, you sit down with your teacher to savor the fruits of your labor.

Vietnamese pork fillet in pepper sauce

Fish Sauce

Inside the cupboards of any Vietnamese kitchen, there is sure to be a bottle of nuoc mam (fish sauce). This salty, caramel-colored, utterly pungent condiment is shaken and stirred into practically every dish, from fresh salads to noodle soups. The best sauce is made from anchovies caught and fermented on the island of Phú Quoc.

Nuoc mam is most commonly used in nuoc mam cham (dipping sauce). To make this, pure fish sauce is mixed with water, lime juice, chopped chilies, minced garlic, and sugar. The resulting sour and sweet sauce serves as a dressing for staples such as broken rice (rice in which the kernel has cracked) and vermicelli noodles.

NEW ZEALAND

SEAGARS ON THE SOUTH ISLAND

Dishes of fresh Canterbury lamb with seasonal vegetables make a kingly feast at Seagars Cook School.

Burnish your cookery skills and savor superb produce and fine wines in a scenic region of New Zealand’s South Island.

In the words of Jo Seagar, creating a great meal should be “easy-peasy.” And so it can be, after a hands-on session at her Seagars Cook School, with an array of outstanding local ingredients on hand. Seagars is in Oxford at the center of the fertile Canterbury Plains on New Zealand’s South Island—a rich farming district, famous for its dairy products, with salmon fishing in nearby rivers. The philosophy is “Maximum Effect for Minimum Effort.” Participants in the Lunch and Learn sessions are welcomed with coffee and just-baked goodies, then spend the next three hours being guided through recipes by Jo Seagar. They pick up time- and labor-saving tips before enjoying a shared lunch complemented with local wines. Menus move with the seasons, taking advantage of freshly picked raspberries and asparagus in spring, salad greens and vine-sweet tomatoes in summer, and apples and pears in the fall. The school also offers wine-appreciation and specialty courses, with themes such as bread-making, gluten-free cookery, and cheese-making. If you do not have time for a course, at least visit the kitchen store or café. If you have plenty of time, take advantage of the bed and breakfast accommodations to stay overnight.

Clean and Green

The range of fresh, locally produced ingredients is one of Seagars’ attractions. Canterbury lamb, raised on the alluvial pastures of the Canterbury Plains, is known for its fine-grain sweetness. Also farmed here are deer, especially red deer, for venison, which appears on local menus as Cervena.

The South Island scores again with Pacific king salmon, prized for its firm moist flesh with a very low fat content—try it with locally grown, grated wasabi (Japanese horseradish). The salmon are bred in streams of highly oxygenated meltwater, then sea-farmed.

Kumara (sweet potatoes) arrived in New Zealand with the Maori and today are prepared in a variety of ways, from creamy soups to deep-fried salted chips that often accompany fish. More recent arrivals are olives, with varieties developed locally from 19th-century Mediterranean imports. These are cultivated both for eating whole and for making into oil.

The nearby Waipara Valley, with more than 80 vineyards, is one of New Zealand’s fastest-growing wine regions, where long hot falls result in racy Reislings and spicy Pinot Noirs. Waipara is also known for its Sauvignon Blancs, Chardonnays, and full-bodied Cabernet Sauvignons.

Cooking chapatis in Jaipur.

INDIA

SPICES OF RAJASTHAN

A thali selection of dishes is served in the traditional way on a platter.

Get the authentic taste of the exotic as you learn to cook the way the people of Rajasthan in northwestern India have done for centuries.

The people of Rajasthan are proud of their rich cultural heritage and especially of their food. To learn more, take lessons at one of the numerous cookery schools in the city of Udaipur in the south of the state, many of them housed in the instructors’ homes. Some teachers take you shopping on the backs of their Enfield motorbikes, weaving through streets full of cows and monkeys, past the fabled Lake Palace—once home to the Maharajas of Udaipur, now a luxury hotel—as you pick up ingredients at brightly colored food stalls. Back in the coolness of the teacher’s house, you learn to use the seven essential spices of most Indian cooking: red chilies, coriander, turmeric, garam masala, anise seeds, cumin seeds, and salt. For Rajasthani dishes, you also need aginomoto (lemon salt) and kasti methi (dried fenugreek leaves). Everything is made from scratch. Chapatis are fried in a hot skillet using dough made from brown flour, water, and a pinch of salt. Paneer is like cottage cheese, made with milk and lemon juice and set in a thin cotton cloth. Other dishes include the deliciously oily paneer butter masala, spicy vegetable khichdi rice, and Udaipur’s specialty—beson gatta, dough balls immersed in a tangy lentil sauce. Round off the experience by relaxing on your host’s cushions with a steaming cup of masala chai, before departing with a full belly and a pocketful of recipes to take home with you.

Spiced Paneer

On its own, paneer cheese is almost completely tasteless, but combined with more flavorsome ingredients, its soft, creamy texture forms a delicious complement to the stronger tastes of a dish’s other components. For spiced paneer, spices and herbs are added while making the cheese, which is then good to eat on its own.

Add the spices to the milk and bring to a boil in a large, heavy-bottomed pan. Add the lemon juice as soon as the milk starts to boil, then stir until the mixture curdles. If it does not curdle, add more lemon juice.

Line a colander with a piece of cheesecloth (muslin) and drain. Discard the liquid. Twist the top of the cloth to enclose the soft cheese. Turn the colander upside down over a large plate, then place the cheese on top to drain. Weight with a tin can balanced on a small plate.

After an hour, remove the weight and unwrap the cheese. It is ready to use, sliced into quarters or crumbled.

JORDAN

PETRA KITCHEN

Petra’s ancient Nabataean ruins draw tourists from around the world. In the background is the modern town of Wadi Musa.

The ancient hidden city of Petra delights the eyes by day, and by night a little gem of a restaurant delights the taste buds.

After a day exploring the ruins of Petra in southern Jordan, further exertion is the last thing you are likely to want when you get back to the modern town of Wadi Musa. Even so, it is worth stirring again to visit Petra Kitchen, a small backstreet restaurant where smiling women from a local cooperative work under the supervision of a professional chef. Here, they introduce local dishes and invite you to partake in the preparation before sitting down to enjoy your meal. The fare you help cook reflects Jordan’s history—mainly Arab in style but with hints of the country’s past as a Middle East crossroads, which has seen many a foreign army come and go. It also has the merit of being both nutritious and simple to make. Lamb and chicken feature strongly, as well as salads composed of grains and pulses. Gathered in Petra Kitchen’s single, open, green-tiled room, lined with kitchen equipment, you stand at wooden tables, chopping parsley and tomatoes for mixing with bulgar wheat, herbs, and lemon juice in a tabbouleh salad. Or you stir the national dish, mansaf—lamb cooked until tender and served on a bed of rice and almonds. All is relaxed, informal, and non-technical, and there is pleasure in the companionship of other visitors involved in the common enterprise. Even small children are invited to join in, filling pastry squares with cheese, then folding them into parcels for baking.

Relive the Experience

■ Written recipes are provided for all the main-course dishes, along with the small appetizers or side dishes known as meze. You will be able to recreate them in your own kitchen as a reminder of your Jordan visit.

■ Many of the dishes are of bedouin origin. Try them as they were conceived to be eaten: outside a tent, in front of a campfire, and under the stars. You can experience this at the Ammarin Bedouin Camp, just outside Little Petra, a short drive from Wadi Musa.

■ After sampling hummus in Jordan, you will never eat the shop-bought variety again. Made from mashed chickpeas, sesame-seed paste, garlic, olive oil, and lemon juice, hummus is present at almost every meal.

GREECE

GREEK ISLAND KITCHEN

Making dolmas (or dolmades) is an art in itself as you carefully wrap each vine leaf around its parcel of savory stuffing.

Enjoy a relaxing vacation on a Greek island while learning how to create the subtle flavors of its traditional dishes.

Fish cooked in wild herbs, phyllo pastry pies, meze (appetizers), meat rubbed with lemon-infused olive oil and cooked on a barbecue … these are the flavors of Greek island cuisine. Among many islands with schools offering cookery classes is unspoilt Ikaría in the eastern Aegean. Here, food writer and restaurateur Diane Kochilas, and her husband, Vassilis, run week-long summer courses in the mountain village of Christós Raches, with pine woods on one side and views of the sea on the other. Classes—given in English—take place in their home, designed and built by Vassilis. Each daily three- or four-hour session is organized around preparing a full meal, either lunch or dinner. You will learn how to make specialties, such as Ikarían bread salad, soufico (a vegetable dish in which each vegetable is sautéed individually before being combined in one pot), and Greek meze, including dolmas (stuffed vine leaves) and roasted eggplant salad with feta cheese and herbs. The fruit, herbs, and vegetables all come from the couple’s organic vegetable garden. Diane and Vassilis will teach you how to make phyllo pastry and will organize visits to local artisan wine-makers, cheese-makers, and beekeepers. Accommodation is included, and in the evening, when the cooking is over, you can drink a glass of ouzo as you watch the sun slip into the Aegean.

Pasta Gratin with Greens, Chickpeas, and Feta

Hilopites are Greek egg noodles. They are often cut into small squares and used in soups, but for this delicious recipe leave them long. If hilopites are unavailable, you can use fettuccine instead.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil and cook the pasta until slightly underdone. Remove and drain.

Heat 3 tbsp of the olive oil and sauté the greens over high heat in a large, nonstick skillet until just wilted. Drain, reserving 2 or 3 cups (16–24 fl oz/475–750 ml) of the liquid.

Combine the pasta, greens, chickpeas, remaining olive oil, and reserved liquid from the greens in an ovenproof gratin dish. Sprinkle with feta. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 15 minutes.

Heat the broiler, remove the aluminum foil, and place the gratin under the broiler, about 6 in (15 cm) from the heat source. Broil for a few minutes until the feta browns lightly. Remove and serve.

Capezzana’s chef demonstrates the art of making crostini.

ITALY

TUSCANY’S NOBLE TRADITION

A farmhouse in the rolling Tuscan countryside

In settings of aristocratic grace, two Tuscan vine- and olive-growing estates share the secrets of the region’s famed culinary heritage.

Tuscany in northern Italy is known and loved for its hilltop towns, its artistic and cultural legacy, its wines … and its food. Local signature dishes include hearty game stews suffused with truffles and wild herbs, bistecca alla fiorentina (steak seasoned with oil and rosemary, then cooked over a charcoal fire), and richly flavored vegetable soups, notably ribollita (literally, “reboiled”)—an unlikely masterpiece of recycling, traditionally made with leftover minestrone and stale bread. In Tuscany bread, more than pasta, is the staple, including the flat focaccia and schiacciata breads. And in a landscape studded with olive groves, olive oil is everywhere. Badia a Coltibuono and Tenuta di Capezzana are two family-run estates, where you can immerse yourself in this tradition in spectacular surroundings. High in the forested Chianti hills of central Tuscany, Coltibuono is a former monastery, where Benedictine monks first planted vines nearly a thousand years ago. In the 1980s, cookbook writer Lorenza de’ Medici—from the family that once ruled Tuscany and wife of the estate’s owner—started offering courses there. Capezzana lies farther north, on the slopes of Montalbano, where vines and olives have been cultivated for 1,200 years. You sense that ancient tradition all around as you learn to cook dishes such as pappardelle alla lepre (hare stew) and what wines to serve with them. Make sure to sample Capezzana’s vin santo (holy wine), a dessert wine matured in cherry-wood, oak, and chestnut barrels in the estate’s vinsantaia.

Poverty Crostini Crostini di Povertà

Rich in culture and history, Tuscany was also for centuries a region of comparative material poverty—and evidence of that poverty is still there in its cuisine. Nothing could be wasted, not even stale bread. In this version of the traditional crostini canapés, stale bread soaked in wine is used to make a delicious topping.

Put the stale bread and wine in a bowl, and let the bread soak for 5 minutes. Take the soaked bread and gently squeeze out any excess wine. Pour off the wine, and put the bread back in the bowl. Add the capers, and drizzle the olive oil into the mixture, whisking constantly. Add the tomato paste and parsley, and mix thoroughly. Toast the ciabatta slices, and spread the bread mixture over it.

The fruits and products of southern Italy’s sun-drenched landscape are on display outside a shop on the spectacular Amalfi Coast, south of Naples.

ITALY

EATING WITH FLORENTINES

Florence’s Duomo and Baptistery create an almost theatrical backdrop as diners enjoy the pleasant warmth of a summer’s evening.

When in Florence, eat where and how the Florentines eat, and discover the delights of the authentic local cuisine.

Lexicographers have never satisfactorily explained how the Italian word for a chubby straw-covered wine bottle—fiasco—came also to mean a failure or flop. Food- and wine-lovers can ignore such niceties. After viewing the glories of Florence’s Duomo (cathedral) and the ancient Baptistery of San Giovanni, where better to refresh yourself than in a fiaschetteria (a wine shop and bar, selling a few warm dishes) in Piazza dell’Olio a block away? Here, in the friendly Fiaschetteria Nuvoli, you can enjoy a steaming plate of ribollita (hearty vegetable soup), pappa al pomodoro (tomato and bread soup), or trippa alla fiorentina (tripe stew), all washed down with hearty red Sangiovese. The experience is typical of the pleasures to be found in numerous unpretentious eating stops in Florence, as in any Italian city. To track down such places, first venture into side streets off the main tourist routes. Look for an establishment where the decor is unassuming and customers eat at a long bar table standing up or sitting on stools. Avoid menu boards announcing “specials” in four languages—instead, look for a scrap of brown paper on the door listing in handwriting four or five rigorously traditional dishes of the day. Want something even faster and more flavorful? Let your nose guide you to the nearest trippaio, a tiny shop or street cart serving trippa. Besides the great-value food, whose ingredients are often sourced directly from Tuscan farmers, there is another reason to choose these places: you can eat with the locals, from taxi drivers to lawyers, art students to bank clerks, and get a real taste of how Florentines live, cook, and eat.

Street Tripe

Classic trippa alla fiorentina has a stew-like consistency—strips of tripe (the inside lining of a cow’s stomach), cooked with onions, celery, carrots, tomatoes, and extra-virgin olive oil.

For centuries Florence and Rome contended for the title of capitale della trippa—tripe capital. In the end, Florence took the lead with its one-of-a-kind institution: the trippaio. Steel kiosks have mostly replaced the colorful wooden carts of old, but vendors remain jovial and proud of keeping alive this street tradition.

Pair your trippa with a robust red wine. Or try a lampredotto, a juicier type of tripe, inside a bun. Add garlic and parsley sauce and have a bite: you are taking part in an authentic Florentine ritual.

FRANCE

LE CORDON BLEU DE PARIS

Attention to detail is a hallmark of Le Cordon Bleu. Here, an instructor scrutinizes the offerings of one of his students.

Anyone, not just would-be master chefs, can enroll at the world’s most famous food institution, Le Cordon Bleu Académie d’Art Culinaire.

Housed in a quiet street on Paris’s Left Bank, Le Cordon Bleu is to haute cuisine what the fashion houses of the Faubourg Saint-Honoré are to haute couture. And here, in the temple of classic French cookery, some of the world’s most highly qualified chefs offer one- to four-day courses for food enthusiasts wanting to improve their skills in a range of areas, from cooking meat to preparing patisserie. Classes—conducted in French, with an assistant giving an English translation—take place in specially equipped kitchens, starting with a demonstration, followed by hands-on practice using top-quality ingredients. During the demonstration, overhead mirrors allow you to observe the chef’s techniques more closely. It is all part of Le Cordon Bleu’s long-standing mission to share its expertise. Founded in 1895, the school was named for the blue cordon, or ribbon, once worn by knights of the Order of the Holy Spirit, known for their lavish feasts. It was the world’s first cooking school to organize public demonstrations, and that tradition continues in its program of short courses. You can take classes in creating appetizers, terrines, or crêpes, or perfect your technique in the art of making sauces, bread, or chocolates. While for professionals Le Cordon Bleu holds out the coveted accolade of its Grand Diplôme, for amateurs it offers the chance of learning to flambé, sauté, or make the perfect soufflé in the world’s supreme center of culinary excellence.

Ambassadress for French Cuisine

One of Le Cordon Bleu’s best-known graduates, cookbook writer and TV chef Julia Child (1912–2004) first encountered French cuisine when her husband was assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Paris after World War II. It was the start of a life-long passion—“an opening up of the soul and spirit.” She enrolled at Le Cordon Bleu, earning its Grand Diplôme despite differences with the director. Her first TV series, The French Chef, opened in 1963. At 6 ft 2 in (1.9 m) tall, Child was a commanding, idiosyncratic presence who went on to win a massive following as she introduced U.S. audiences to French culinary skills, from the basics of how to cook an omelet to the refinements of making fresh lemon sorbet. She died in her native California, aged 91.

Cheddar cheese is traditionally sold in cloth-bound “truckles,” weighing about 5 lb (2.3 kg), as here at a dairy near Evercreech, Somerset.

A food shop in the picturesque village of Les Baux-de-Provence.

FRANCE

FLAVORS OF PROVENCE

Eggplants are a staple of Provençal cuisine.

The Lubéron in central Provence is famous for its hilltop villages, bucolic landscape, and the sun-soaked flavors of its cuisine.

On a summer’s afternoon, take a terrace seat at the Café de France in the hilltop village of Lacoste. As you look out over peaceful farms, vineyards, and woods to the neighboring hilltown of Bonnieux, take a sniff of the warm air, heavy with the intoxicating perfumes of Provence: wild herbs intermingled with lavender, rose, and honeysuckle, and perhaps a dash of ripe melons or drying figs. Explore the local markets (marchés paysans), and your senses will be overpowered by the aromas of vine-ripe tomatoes (the “apple of love”), pungent basil, clusters of garlic, bouquets of freshly picked wildflowers, boules of goat cheese, and containers of olives from local farmers who have harvested their crops at the zenith of ripeness. The many restaurants of the region reflect this bounty. Garlic, olive oil, olives, basil, and the abundant herbes de Provence—a varying combination of thyme, fennel, rosemary, chervil, summer savory, and oregano, sometimes with orange peel and lavender added—are used to flavor meat, poultry, game, and vegetable dishes. Depending on the season (and your mood), you might be drawn to omelette with truffles and tomatoes; pistou, a vegetable soup garnished with a paste made from basil, garlic, and olive oil; rabbit or chicken sautéed with olives and white wine; or daube, cubed beef braised in red wine with garlic, vegetables, and herbes de Provence. Whatever you choose, you know it will be fresh.

Herb-roasted almonds Amandes grillées aux herbes

In spring, almond blossom sprinkles the hills of Lubéron, and in fall comes the harvest. Roasted with herbes de Provence, almonds make a delicious aperitif to be enjoyed with, say, a delicate Côtes du Lubéron rosé. Soaking the almonds in water before roasting softens their thin brown skins so that the seasoning is absorbed better.

Place the almonds in a large bowl, cover with cold water, and let stand for 20 minutes. Drain the almonds and add the salt, black pepper, and herbes de Provence. Mix well, and let stand for an hour.

Heat the oven to 400°F/180°C/Gas Mark 4. Cover the bottom of a large baking sheet with parchment (baking) paper. Spread the seasoned almonds evenly over the paper. Roast for 15–20 minutes until the almonds are dry and crisp. Take from the oven and let the almonds cool before serving.

SPAIN

EATING IN ANDALUSIA

As well as their culinary heritage, the Moorish rulers of Al-Andalus left such marvels as Granada’s Alhambra.

Arab influence lingers in the cuisine of Spain’s southernmost region, creating unexpected combinations of flavor.

Andalusia’s culinary canon draws heavily on the North African and Arabic legacy bequeathed by nearly eight centuries of Muslim Moorish rule (A.D. 711–1492). The Moors were skilled agriculturalists, who introduced rice, spinach, chard, semolina (for couscous), eggplant, sugar, saffron, and citrus fruits into the cuisine of Al-Andalus—the Muslim-ruled parts of the Iberian Peninsula—while cumin seed, coriander, fennel, rosemary, nutmeg, and cinnamon became staple herbs and spices used in the preparation of food. Visiting Andalusia today, you encounter Arabic aromas wherever you eat—in combinations such as garbanzos (chickpeas) and spinach laced with cumin seed and paprika, or in counterpoints of salt and sweet, including partridges with dates and cordero a la miel (honeyed roast lamb). In Seville, try boquerones en adobo (anchovies with cumin). In Córdoba, you can sample classic alboronía (eggplant, zucchini, and peppers), and in Ronda a memorable ajo blanco (a cold soup of crushed almonds, garlic, and olive oil). In Granada, Bar Los Diamantes offers nonpareil calamares (cuttlefish) deep-fried with a hint of cumin. Casa Bigote in Sanlúcar de Barrameda is known for its bitter orange sauce served with fish from the Guadalquivir estuary. And if you want to make such dishes for yourself, there is a range of cookery schools to teach you.

Three Courses

The three-course meal has its origins in ninth-century Córdoba, then capital of a powerful Muslim emirate. The man credited with inventing it was the emir’s chief musician, called Ziryab (Blackbird) because of his dark complexion and beautiful singing voice. Trained at the sophisticated court of Baghdad, Ziryab became an arbiter of taste in Córdoba. At the table, he is said to have introduced crystal rather than metal drinking goblets. He also organized the way food was served, devising a sequence in which soups came first, then meat and fish dishes, and finally sweets, fruits, and nuts. From Córdoba, the fashion spread to the rest of Al-Andalus—and Europe.

ENGLAND

SEAFOOD IN PADSTOW

Students at Rick Stein’s Seafood School enjoy the fruits of their morning’s labors, washed down with white wine.

A picturesque fishing port in southwestern England makes the perfect setting for a course in cooking seafood.

One of Britain’s best-loved chefs, Rick Stein set up his acclaimed Seafood School in the town of Padstow, Cornwall, to increase people’s confidence in cooking fish and seafood in a laid-back atmosphere. Amid tastings and discussions, you learn basic fish preparation and cooking techniques, as well as how to make dishes as diverse as risotto nero and Thai seafood curry. The common denominator is sparklingly fresh fish. Classes tend to revolve around lunch, and when the morning’s tuition is over you eat what you cooked with a bottle of wine. If this seems too much like hard work, there are three Rick Stein fish restaurants in town to choose from. The Seafood Restaurant, overlooking Padstow’s harbor and its fleet of brightly colored fishing boats, offers a range of melt-in-the-mouth fish and seafood combinations, including Stein specialties, such as oysters charentaise—a combination of ice-cold raw oysters and hot, spicy sausages. For a more informal setting, Rick Stein’s Café serves anything from a snack to a three-course meal, and Stein’s Fish & Chips is a superior version of the classic British “chippie,” where as well as cod and chips you can eat in or take out squid and monkfish tails.

Learn to cook scallops to perfection.

Crispy Sea Bass

Rick Stein has inspired young chefs across Britain to create recipes such as this one from The Picture House in Bristol.

Rinse the fish and pat dry with paper towels. Season with salt and pepper on the flesh side and liberally with salt on the skin side.

Over a medium-high heat, heat the corn oil in a frying pan large enough for both fillets. It should be hot but not smoking.

Place the fillets in the pan skin side down. Cook until the skin is crisp and golden and the top opaque. For thicker fillets, turn when the skin is crisp and cook for 2-3 minutes. Be careful not to burn the skin. Remove to a warmed plate.

Add the olive oil and capers; fry until crisp. Add lemon juice and dill. Swirl and pour over the fish. Serve with new potatoes.

MOROCCO

MODERN MOROCCAN

The snow-clad peaks of the Atlas Mountains form the backdrop for a view across the beautiful Menara gardens, west of Marrakech.

In an exquisite hotel in the central Moroccan city of Marrakech, learn to make classic local dishes with a contemporary twist.

Subtle blends of 30 or more spices and herbs are the key to Moroccan cuisine, and herbs are where your morning’s session at the Jnane Tamsna hotel starts. In Arabic, jnane means “garden of paradise,” which is what it feels like as Bahija, the hotel chef, leads you through Jnane Tamsna’s beautiful gardens, where herb and vegetable plots are mingled with flowerbeds, olive and lemon groves, and date palms. Meryanne Loum-Martin, a former Parisian lawyer, created the hotel with her U.S. ethnobotanist husband, Gary Martin. “I love mixing influences in food and taking Moroccan cuisine a little bit further in the exploration of spices and herbs,” she explains. Bahija, your teacher, shares this philosophy. From the garden, she takes you to the kitchen—weather permitting, the hotel’s outdoor kitchen with a traditional clay bread oven—where she sets you to work with chopping knives. You roast and grind cinnamon, cumin, and other vital ingredients, and Bahija imparts the secrets of how to use them in dishes such as chicken tagine (stew) with roasted vegetables, b’stilla (a savory pastry), and apple briouat (another pastry). But with Bahija, nothing is quite what tradition dictates. The normal filling for b’stilla is young pigeon; she achieves a lighter touch with fish and preserved lemons. She also gives you tips on how to recreate these dishes at home, such as using spring roll dough in place of the thin layers of Moroccan warka for pastries. When the class is over, you retire to the garden for drinks before sitting down to the lunch you helped prepare.

Preserved Lemons

Preserved lemons will keep for up to a year. Use their juice to flavor salad dressings, soups, or meat, fish, or chicken sauces.

Quarter the lemons nearly to the bottom, sprinkle salt on the exposed flesh, and reshape the fruit. Pack the lemons into a sterilized jar in layers, with the salt, olive oil, and spices between the layers. Press the lemons to release their juices, adding freshly squeezed lemon juice to cover them. Seal the jar and let stand in a warm place for 30 days, shaking the jar every day.

SOUTH AFRICA

CAPE MALAY IN BO-KAAP

Customers line up to buy fresh ginger and other essential Cape Malay ingredients in a Bo-Kaap spice store.

A historic district of central Cape Town has produced its own distinctive East-meets-West fusion cuisine, Cape Malay.

Walk down cobbled streets as the muezzin starts the call to noonday prayer. Men in white robes and fezzes stream past you; shrouded women herd children home from school, and the aroma of spice-rich meals wafts through kitchen windows. This is Bo-Kaap (“on top of the Cape” in Afrikaans), home to Cape Malay cuisine. Freed Malaysian and Indonesian slaves settled here in the 1830s, creating a cooking style that mingles local ingredients and Eastern flavors in a heady mix. Stop at a café on Rose Street for a mug of faloodah, a rose-scented milk and tapioca drink. Following the fragrance of cinnamon, cardamom, and ginger may lead you to Atlas Trading, a family-run store where boxes of henna jostle for space with coconut oil and white cardamom. In restaurants such as Biesmiellah or Bo-Kaap Kombuis—with panoramic views of Table Mountain—you dine with locals, sampling classic Cape Malay dishes, including bobotie, denningvleis, and smoorsnoek. And no visit is complete without a koeksuster pastry. If this has whetted your appetite and you want to learn more about the local food, operators Anduela offer day tours of the Bo-Kaap that include a Cape Malay cookery demonstration and workshop.

Cape Malay Dishes

■ Denningvleis is a hearty sweet-sour lamb cutlet stew, flavored with tamarind and served with saffron rice, almonds, and raisins.

■ Minced meat and sultanas are the core ingredients of bobotie. This gently spiced but complex dish is baked with a savory custard topping and traditionally served with turmeric rice.

■ Snoek is a full-flavored local game fish, often smoked. It is stewed with potatoes, chopped tomatoes, cloves, and almonds to make smoorsnoek.

■ Koeksusters are doughnut-like fried pastries, dipped in a cardamom- and ginger-spiced syrup and desiccated coconut.