You walk into a restaurant, sit down, and the waiter tells you what you’re going to eat. How does that sound? Are you okay with that scenario? Happy to let someone else pick your food?
For anyone in the travel business, the chances are this scenario isn’t uncommon. While watching MasterChef on TV, Andy posed this question about one particular challenge: ‘I wonder if they get to choose what they have.’ It got me thinking about how I’d feel about that, before I remembered it happens all the time. It’s part and parcel of researching and writing about travel. But as more scenarios where we didn’t get to pick what was put in front of us piled up in my head, I realised it’s more than that.
One of sixteen courses at El Celler de Can Roca in Costa Brava.
The Press Trip #1
On press trips, writers get shepherded around, taken to restaurants and specialist food producers, and fed whatever it is the trip organisers want to showcase. On one instance in Costa Brava, we had the privilege of a sixteen-course tasting menu at the number one restaurant in the world, El Celler de Can Roca. It was an incredible experience. Eating the artistic plates put in front of us wasn’t a challenge. That came barely three hours later when, with bellies still full, we were faced with another slap-up meal at a tapas restaurant in Figueres. To avoid disrespecting our hosts, most of us forced more food into protesting gullets. First world problem maybe, but it felt like one hell of an endurance test at the time.
On tasting menus, anything can turn up.
Tasting menus
Anyone who enjoys tasting menus will have put their tastebuds in the hands of creative chefs. ‘Go on, surprise me’ is one of my favourite ways of eating. Michelin star restaurants tend to favour these, but there are plenty of good value aspirational restaurants with tasting menus. Taking time out from driving from Provence to Setúbal, we stayed in Calatayud and popped into an unassuming restaurant where they talked us into trying theirs (tuna, jamón ibérico, revueltos, snails, secreto ibérico, steak). It cost flimpance (as Andy’s dad used to say) and introduced us to a range of tasty local specialities.
Going local in a shepherds’ village in Slovenia.
Slow travel research #1
Putting together Slow Travel holidays and guides involves being completely open to new culinary experiences. It doesn’t matter which country it is, locals want to introduce visitors to the best of their regional cuisine. It leads to memorable experiences and can be a magical mystery tour of specialities – artichoke and bean stew in an unlicensed konoba on Hvar; pig’s blood rice and crunchy pig ears in the Minho; sour milk buckwheat in a shepherd’s hut in Slovenia. Oh wait, the last was my own choice.
It would have been rude to say no when ‘faced’ with this.
Walking with a guide
We normally walk alone, but on the rare occasion we put ourselves in the hands of a guide, the culinary offerings involved are often up to them. One stand-out memory was on Santo Antao, one of the Cape Verde islands, where halfway along a route we sat down to a feast of food at what was little more than a shack. I can’t say the banquet laid out for us was the most appetising looking, but it was made with love and honesty, and we would never, ever cause offence by baulking at anything we were presented with. Turned out it was a lot tastier than it looked (often the way). The worst thing about it was having to complete the hiking route on a leaden stomach.
Some of my fellow writers weren’t tempted by these razorfish at the Delta de l’ebre.
The Press Trip #2
The comment about not causing offence in the last entry reminded me of a press trip to Catalunya which involved a mix of Spanish, British, and American writers. In one restaurant at the Delta de l’ebre, which specialised in fish and seafood, the owners thought it would be fun to present us with dishes without telling us what they were till after we tried them. Some writers/bloggers refused to touch many of the plates of food, which was both embarrassing and insulting to our hosts. To try to cover up for them, and avoid leaving mountains of untouched nosh, the rest of us risked a Monty Python The Meaning of Life scenario by forcing as much as we could down our straining gullets.
Doing it like a local – so they told us – in Bologna.
Slow travel research #2
Some of the Slow Travel holidays we help put together have a gastronomic theme. It’s impossible to do justice to these unless we open ourselves up to trying everything and anything. Creating a gastro rail journey through Emilia Romagna involved food tours with four specialist guides. It’s Italy, the food is always going to be wonderful, so few people, even relatively fussy eaters, would have a problem with being presented with pastas, cured meats, pastries, ice cream etc. How about horse meat panini?
Possibly my favourite street food, and I’ve got an assertive waiter to thank for knowing about them.
The impromptu experience
And sometimes there are instances where an assertive waiter will ‘suggest’ we try something we had no attention of ordering. Nothing to do with work or research, just because they think we should. It happened in a café in a plaza in Tenerife’s former capital of La Laguna. Attempting to order toasties, the waiter berated us with a ‘Brits always order toasties, why not try our speciality instead. It’s much better.’ And that’s how we were introduced to arepas, Venezuelan filled corn pancakes which are common throughout the western Canary Islands, even though you’ll rarely read about them in travel articles. Even writing this, I crave one.
And that’s what allowing others to choose food for me is all about – exposing me to flavours and dishes I would never otherwise encounter.
