Culinary travel - How does it Work?

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Erich Pucher cooks in the Lambrechterhof

Culinary journeys are in

Culinary travel is the trend. These are not just pleasure trips or gourmet trips. Culinary travel is the ultimate version of Slow Travel. Slow travelers want to immerse themselves in the lifestyle of their travel destinations. They also want to take a look behind the scenes. Let's go! Pack your suitcase and let's go on a trip to savor. This type of pleasure trip includes wine trips to Austria as well as a beer trip around the world. This also includes an overnight stay in a gourmet hotel. Exploring Tuscany and Italy from a culinary point of view on a wine tour gives you an insight into local life. On a gourmet cruise or a gourmet tour, a star chef provides highlights for the palate. But it's not just package tours that bring you closer to the culinary delights of a travel destination. A gourmet tour on your own does just as much as a culinary trip. A culinary vacation is sustainable a trip to savor.

 

Restaurants and cafes in Ljubljana on the riverside - culinary trips in Slovenia
Enjoy riverside restaurants and cafes in Ljubljana - a way of culinary travel

Travelers like to savor their trips

The Food Travel Monitor 2020 by the World Food Travel Association shows that 53% of holiday travelers are considered travelers, who savor their trips. Food and drinks are more important for almost two thirds of travelers today than they were five years ago. Those who go on culinary journeys are also interested in other activities. They usually stay longer and spend more. Millennials are interested in food while traveling. Generation Z is developing into super foodies. Those who take a wine tour are also interested in beer and other drinks. And there is more. Pleasure travelers travel sustainably. Traveling locally and authentically plays a role for them.

 

Erich Pucher cooks in the Lamberechhof - pleasure trips in gourmet hotels
Culinary trips to the gourmet hotel - award-winning chef Erich Pucher cooks in the Lambrechterhof

 

Culinary travel means experiencing food on vacation

Experiences that are experienced individually make culinary trips interesting. Why not travel to a chef who offers gourmet evenings in a gourmet hotel? It doesn't have to be a beer trip around the world. What about a weekend with a visit in a brewery? Maybe this offers a gastronomy to experience? Or a wine tour on which you stay overnight with a winegrower? Pleasure trips can have many faces. Perhaps you fancy a gourmet cruise? They are available on board a barge through the canals in southern France. An experience that will be remembered.

Special experiences are guaranteed when you meet locals on your pleasure trip. There are now more and more offers for this in Germany and Austria. You can have castle owners explain life in a castle to you. A beer sommelier explains, which beers go with which dish. Let yourself be shown in an Italian monastery how the nuns lived there. Of course, a look into the monastery kitchen should not be missing. Or go on a herb hunt with a monk. There are many ways to enjoy food while on vacation. Not only when visiting a restaurant.

 

Wine trip with overnight stay in the vineyard
Wine trip with overnight stay in the vineyard

 

This is how a wine tour becomes a culinary journey

If you want to experience wine, there are many options. You can explore a wine region by choosing a road trip on a wine route. If your culinary journey is to be sustainable, try the wines of a region in a hotel in the middle of the vineyards. This is best when wine experiences are offered in the area. This quickly turns a weekend getaway into a wine weekend. A picnic in the vineyards is nice. A culinary journey goes well with wine tastings to make it a pleasurable experience. And if the wine tour is supposed to be something special? Then you look for wine experiences in beautifully located wineries.

Wine experiences with winemakers and in wine regions are something special. Here, too, there are offers that allow you to take a look behind the scenes. Maybe you can even help out with work. What do you think of a vacation at a winery? During the day, you hike through the vineyards. In the evening, you rest in a winegrower's room after a dinner where house wines are compulsory. Are you interested in other drinks? What do you think of learning more about sea buck thorn and its properties?

 

Kelly Woodward from Miami Food Tours - a great way to experience pleasure trips
Kelly Woodward from Miami Food Tours

 

Food trips are active trips

Discovering a country or a city in culinary terms often means getting to know its people. This can be the case, when you visit a cheese producer, who manufactures specialty cheese like his family has done for centuries. In cities you have the opportunity to participate in food tours. These are interesting, if you are looking for restaurants, where the locals eat. We like to book food tours, when we are not familiar with the culinary specialties of a region. They give us an insight into the local cuisine on our food trips.

There is one thing that culinary trips are not: boring trips. With a little planning, you can create a vacation where you will come home with experiences and insights that you did not previously suspect how exciting they are. Get to know the local people. Get involved in their way of life. This creates experiences that remain unforgettable. Regardless of whether you are exploring your travel destination in a gourmet hotel or on a gourmet cruise, or whether you are exploring the area around your holiday destination on your own, there are offers for every taste. Be inventive and approach your hosts. You will see, it is fun to immerse yourself in an unfamiliar way of life.

 

Culinary travel is fun on a wine tour through Hesse - pleasure travel par excellence
There are specialties at the picnic in the vineyard

 

Go on a Journey of Discovery

It is very exciting to put a motto on your culinary journey. You can even do that at home. We were in Burgenland on the way in the footsteps of the Christmas goose. During the trip we bought ingredients for a feast. We cooked this in a restaurant at the end of the trip. Why not get to the bottom of the specialties in Germany? We did that on one culinary country tour through Hessen. We visited producers. They showed us how they make their products.

 

Festively laid table on the Arosa Luna - wine tour
Festive table

 

Enjoy a Gourmet Cruise

We have never been on a gourmet cruise. That must be fun. Instead, we spent one evening on a river cruise on the Rhone with a gourmet dinner. The food was served on a table with a view of the river. It wasn't just the food that was a pleasure. The view of the landscape along the Rhone contributed to the enjoyment of this evening in France. There are also cruises in which gourmet food plays the main role. There is one on the Danube or the Moselle. Both rivers cross wine regions. So what could be better than turning a culinary journey into a delightful experience. Trips to savor are perfect for this.

 

Petar learns to cook from Thomas Hüttl culinary travel
Petar learns to cook under the direction of Thomas Hüttl

 

Why not travel to a Chef?

Have you ever thought about traveling to see a chef? What's better than learning from the experts? We have done this several times on our trips to savor. In Vienna, we learned how to cook Waldviertel specialties in a cooking class. In the Gailtal in Carinthia we learned how to knead pasta. We made a soup from herbs that we collected earlier. There was also a herb menu from the show kitchen in a gourmet hotel. You will find many places where you can take cooking classes. Hotels definitely offer these again and again. There are also offers for this in gourmet regions. It is therefore worth keeping an eye out for.

 

Culinary travel means buying regional specialties
Culinary travel means buying specialties

 

Food Specialties are Souvenirs

Culinary travel also means looking for specialties. Market visits, a shopping spree through specialty shops and visits to farm shops or farm cafés and producers are part of every trip to savor. In some food destinations, even visits to supermarkets are exciting. I am thinking of Newfoundland, where we discovered cod cheeks. Souvenirs, which we bring home from these visits, let us relive the experiences in our kitchen. We therefore enjoy trying out recipes we bring home from journeys, between our trips.

 

Wine Princess, Landsknecht and Councilor - Wine Tour Culinary Travel
Wine princess, lansquenet and councilor squeeze grapes at the Volkach Wine Festival

 

Wine, Beer or Street Food Festivals

Wine tours in Germany don't just mean a wine tour along the Mosel, Rhine, Danube or Main. Wine regions offer even more culinary travel experiences. Food and wine festivals are everywhere. A visit is suitable both for a weekend trip and as part of a wine tour with wine tastings. We asked wine travel bloggers from around the world which wine festivals they recommend. It is also often worth taking a look at the daily newspaper. There you will find references to beer festivals or street food festivals. If you combine a wine tasting on the Moselle with an overnight stay in a gourmet hotel or a Bed and Breakfast, it quickly turns into a culinary journey that is fondly remembered. Or search for the specialties on site.

Conclusion: Culinary Trips are Exciting and Varied

These are just a few of the ways in which culinary travel is possible. There are other options. What do you think of a music festival where specialties are offered? Have you ever cooked with wild herbs? Or dined at a local's home? It is exciting to find out how to combine food and drinks. Have you ever visited a farm to learn more about sustainability? There are even museums dedicated to food and everything related to it.

We agree with our blogger friend Laura from Savored Journeys when she declares: Why I Travel For Food and You Should Too. Culinary travel is definitely fun.

 

Gourmet tours around the world - wine tours
Click on the photo and make a note of “pleasure trips all over the world” on Pinterest

 

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Text: © Copyright Monika Fuchs and TravelWorldOnline
Photos: © Copyright Monika Fuchs and TravelWorldOnline

Culinary travel - How does it Work?

Monika Fuchs

Monika Fuchs and Petar Fuchs are the authors and publishers of the Food and Slow Travel blog  TravelWorldOnline. They have been publishing this blog since 2005. TravelWorldOnline has been online since 2001. Their topics are trips to Savor, wine tourism worldwide and slow travel. During her studies Monika Fuchs spent some time in North America, where she - partly together with Petar Fuchs - traveled to the USA and Canada and spent a research year in British Columbia. This intensified her thirst for knowledge, which she satisfied for 6 years as an adventure guide for Rotel Tours and then for 11 years as a tour guide for Studiosus Reisen around the world. She was constantly expanding her travel regions, but curiosity still gnawed at her: "What's beyond the horizon? What else is there to discover in this city? Which people are interesting here? What do they eat in this region?" As a freelance travel journalist (her articles have appeared in DIE ZEIT, 360° Canada, 360° USA, etc.), she is now looking for answers to these questions as a travel writer and travel blogger in many countries around the world. Petar Fuchs produces the videos on this blog as well as on YouTube. Monika Fuchs from TravelWorldOnline is among Germany's top 50 bloggers in 2021. Find more Information about Monika and Petar Fuchs here.

12 thoughts too "Culinary travel - How does it Work?"

  1. Culinary and enjoyable trips and vacations let you experience the regional specialties particularly well! A nice article with a lot of atmosphere! LG, Hermann Paschinger

    1. Dear Hermann,

      I am very happy if you like the article. I fully agree with you. On culinary trips you get direct access to the local people and experience a region intensely.

      Greetings,
      Monika

  2. Dear Ones, you speak to me from the soul. I also travel relaxed and preferably with the family. We love to immerse ourselves in the culture of a region and a country when traveling, and that is why eating is a must. I think that regional food and recipes provide a lot of information about the country and its people, and I often associate a country and a region with this taste after the trip ... what wine, what ingredients, how it is prepared ... that too a lot to do with wellbeing.
    Best regards,
    Tanya

    1. Dear Tanja,

      What we like about culinary travel in addition to access to regional culture and good food and drink is that you often come into closer contact with the local people. We have made a lot of nice acquaintances in this way that we would never have met without this type of travel. Food Travel is also a sustainable way of traveling, because this type of tourism gives the local population something of the travelers who visit their region. Provided that appropriate options are offered.

      Best regards,
      Monika & Petar

    1. Dear Antje,

      we totally agree with you. Culinary travel is pure enjoyment. We are big fans of this kind of travel.

      Best regards,
      Monika

  3. For me personally, enjoyment is much broader than the culinary arts. Nevertheless, I find courses with regional products particularly exciting.
    I like to think of wine tasting, baking Kaiserschmarrn, making Vinschauer myself or many other culinary tips on my travels.

    Regional, local and therefore directly to the people, delightfully beautiful.

    Best regards, Katja

    1. Dear Katja,

      we agree on this, because for us enjoyment generally also means more. I don't think we're the only ones, as the World Food Travel Association study shows. Enjoyment can be so many things: actually everything that appeals to all the senses and triggers a feeling of wellbeing there.

      However, culinary trips, which this article deals with specifically, are really about food - whether regional, local or international. We find the connection between the culinary art of a travel destination and the cultural heritage of the region particularly exciting. There is often a fascinating connection. Erik Wolf, the director of the World Food Travel Association, sums it up when he says: "The act of traveling for a taste of place in order to get a sense of place." That's exactly what we put on our culinary Search and find trips.

      Best regards,
      Monika

  4. I honestly have to say that as a hobby photographer I am hardly interested in culinary things on a vacation because I prefer to spend time outdoors in nature. While others go out to eat at sunset, I prefer to take pictures of the golden or blue hour. Other than that, eating is more of a food intake for me and I rarely serve something like that and don't really take my time. All the more interesting to read what I might miss here and there.

    1. Then culinary trips are obviously not your thing, although there are also culinary topics that play a role for outdoor travel. How about a snack, for example. There could be some tips for you if you are out and about a lot in nature.

  5. My next trip is to Naples, do I have to say more? :-) I can't wait to explore the home of Neapolitan pizza and take a pizza baking class. In any case, culinary trips are very important to me - especially since I love to try regional specialties and I like to shop locally. As you say, there are hardly any better souvenirs than local delicacies. :) This is how you support the people in the region and remember the trip for a long time.

    1. Hello Sigi,

      I hope you write about your pizza baking course when you return. And ask yourself who originally invented pizza. There are even people who say it was baked in New York for the first time. I would be interested in the opinion of the Italians.

      Best regards,
      Monika

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