Our Top 5 Foodie Travel Trends

As Erma Bombeck once said, "I am not a glutton. I am an explorer of food"—and your travels allow you to explore food all over the world. Here, you'll find some of our favorite ways to immerse yourself in the local cuisine, whether from the deck of a cruise ship or while wandering through an exotic produce market.

Take your taste buds traveling! Your Hideaways Travel Specialist can offer foodie experiences and destinations that will satisfy your soul, based on your gourmet desires and palate. Simply give us a call at 800-843-4433, or email ts@hideaways.com.

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1. Destination Cooking Schools

Why not learn the ropes of cooking local specialties while you're vacationing? A number of hotels and resorts in Europe, Asia, Mexico, and other destinations offer their own cooking schools. You can roll out of bed, have a delicious breakfast, and then don your chef's toque blanche for a creative cooking lesson that will inspire you toward greater things in the kitchen once you return home.

Several of our partners in The Hideaways Collection® offer top-notch cooking schools and classes, including:

• Alila Villas Uluwatu in Bali, which offers a half-day "Journey to Gastronomy" cooking class focused on local Balinese ingredients, recipes, and cooking methods;


• Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons in the U.K., with its superb Raymond Blanc Cookery School, a destination in itself overseen by the Michelin-starred chef;


• Blue Palace Resort & Spa in Crete, offering Greek cooking lessons followed by a Cretan wine tasting; and


• Belmond Casa de Sierra Nevada in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, where the chef and his team guide guests through the techniques of creating regional Mexican dishes at the Sazón cooking school, housed in a magnificent 18th-century mansion.

Learn about one Hideaways member's excellent cooking trip to Tuscany, complete with copious offerings of local wine and cheese, when you read "Doing Europe with a Difference"

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2. Culinary-Themed Cruises

Nothing pairs better with a luxury cruise than fine dining, great wines, and sampling the local food culture of the ports you're visiting. That's why culinary-enriched cruises have become all the rage—you haven't lived until you've sampled local flavors enhanced by sea breezes and exotic ports!

A couple of Hideaways-preferred cruise lines are known for their exceptional on-board cuisine inspired by the world's top chefs. Oceania Cruises offers "The Finest Cuisine at Sea™," curated by Master Chef Jacques Pépin, as well as epicurean enrichment programs that include immersive Culinary Discovery Tours™. Luxury line Silversea Cruises partners with the prestigious Grands Chefs Relais & Chateaux to offer an amazing variety of specialty restaurants, from Asian-inspired Indochine and Seishin Restaurant to Spaccanapoli for Italian and gourmet French cuisine at La Dame by Relais & Chateaux.

For more culinary-themed cruises, take a moment to wander through the delectable pages of the 2017 Culinary Cruise Collection.

3. Fun Foodie Experiences

Occasionally, your foodie travels might revolve around one memorable experience that takes you by surprise—like visiting a truffle farm and meeting its truffle-sniffing dog (no, not pig). Read "Embracing My Inner Foodie and Wine Enthusiast" to learn more about Emmi, the adorable truffle dog.

Outdoor food and produce markets can be a real eye opener in some parts of the world—a feast for the eyes and sometimes an assault on the nose. Get the scoop on one outdoor market in Myanmar when you read "Mysteries Unveiled on the Road to Mandalay". And visiting a Caribbean island known for its spices makes for another fascinating foodie experience, as you'll learn when you read "Spicing It Up in Grenada".

4. Wine, Wine, and More Wine

Staying in a hotel surrounded by vineyards or renting a private villa on the grounds of a winery estate are two wonderful ways to immerse yourself in the local wines. Expect to indulge in plentiful wine tastings and be prepared to ship home some on the local vintages, often at a remarkably reasonable cost.

We recommend L'Albereta, an estate hotel in Franciacorta, Italy, overlooking acres of vineyards and known for its haute cuisine and fine wines; L'Andana, an elegant Tuscan country hotel where you'll enjoy flavorful olive oils and wines from local vineyards and orchards; and Vedema Resort on the Greek island of Santorini, known for its Canava Wine Bar, sequestered within the stone walls of a 400-year-old winery.

5. Weird Food Bragging Rights

Haggis, head cheese, and black (or blood) pudding . . . these are just a few of the weird, disgusting-sounding foods--at least to non-native palates--that will earn you bragging rights if you sample them during your world travels. In China, it might be birds nest soup, made from the gelatinous, saliva-filled nests of local swifts. In Japan, it's the potentially deadly puffer fish, the ultimate delicacy that can only be prepared by expert chefs in licensed restaurants because of its high toxicity. And in Sardinia it's maggot cheese, so named for the sprinkling of live cheese-fly larvae that aid in the fermentation process.

As Hideaways President Mike Thiel discovered, Iceland has plenty of quirky cuisine to sample, from sea-bird eggs to minke whale, rams' balls, and puffin heart. Read his fascinating report on Iceland's weird foods and spectacular natural wonders at "Iceland on a Whim."

Bonus: Foodies'-Delight Cities

Some cities are famous for their cuisine: Paris, Naples, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Barcelona. But you don't need to travel halfway around the globe to get great eats. North America has wonderful foodie cities to explore, like New Orleans, Seattle, Vancouver, and even Milwaukee (think cheese and beer)!

Read about a few of Hideaways President Mike Thiel's dining and fresh-market experiences as he visited close-to-home foodie cities.

• "Vancouver on the Fly"


• "Traveler's Journal: Savoring Seattle"


• "Feasting Beyond 'The Big Easy'"


• "Milwaukee: Mixing Business and Pleasure"