culinary tourism history

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Culinary Tourism

Lucy M. Long is director of the independent Center for Food and Culture and retired faculty in Popular Culture, Bowling Green State University, Ohio.

• Published: 21 September 2022
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Culinary tourism, also known as food tourism and gastronomic tourism, is simultaneously a scholarly field of inquiry, a niche within the tourism industry, and a human impulse to “eat out of curiosity” and try new food experiences. Two key themes emerge in the current scholarship around food and travel: developing critical frameworks for a cohesive discipline and connecting both the practice and study of culinary tourism to sustainability in the broadest sense of the word to ensure that these projects benefit us all. This chapter offers an overview of these developments, contextualizing them within larger historical events and trends. It demonstrates that culinary tourism emerged out of paradigm shifts in how we think of food and of tourism, and that these shifts then have allowed for food to become the subject of touristic imaginations. It suggests that culinary tourism has also played a significant role in encouraging those shifts and that it now offers both a field of scholarship and an activity that is of growing interest and recognition. It also observes that the historical dimensions of culinary tourism have generally been overlooked but such attention offers a productive area of cross-disciplinary engagement.

Food-focused tourism is an increasingly popular activity among consumers in the twenty-first century. It has emerged as a significant niche within the tourism industry, an effective tool in sustainability and economic development initiatives, and a subject for scholarly study from a range of disciplines. Variously called culinary tourism, tasting tourism, food tourism, and gastronomic and gastronomy tourism, 1 two key themes confront the field. The first is how to study the phenomenon in a coherent and critical way that brings together the many disciplines that address aspects of either food or tourism, especially since this range crosses over the usual boundaries of social science and the humanities as well as “academic” and applied fields. Much of the scholarship has focused on contemporary trends, so one of the challenges is to bring in the historical dimensions of the relevant disciplines. The second is how to channel the practices of culinary tourism toward greater good and “greater engagement with sustainability issues.” 2 Sustainability refers here to the broader issues surrounding the ecological, economic, social, and cultural impacts and implications of tourism and includes discussions around colonialism, exoticism, authenticity, appropriation, identity, heritage, and other issues.

The emergence of culinary tourism reflects changing attitudes in the larger world around both food and tourism, in what can be thought of as “paradigm shifts,” a paradigm being a set of concepts and practices that define a scientific discipline and way of viewing a subject. 3 In this case, such shifts can refer to both the scholarly study of culinary tourism and to changes in social attitudes. These paradigms also have both responded to and should be understood within the context of larger local and global economic, political, and social events and conditions. Historical perspectives on both the scholarship and their contexts contribute to understanding these developments. Other scholars have also noted this point. Greg Richards, for example, in 2015, offered a history of the field, connecting it to the development of the experience economy. 4 In 2019, Sally Everett identified “theoretical turns” in the evolution of research around what she calls “tourism taste-scapes.” 5 I build upon this work to suggest here that culinary tourism itself has played a role in those paradigm shifts, inspiring changes, and even revolutionizing, how we—scholars, tourism and food industries, and the general public—think of food and tourism.

Culinary tourism has evolved as a field of scholarship, an industry, and a domain of human activity. Each of those subjects should be understood within larger contexts of trends around food—its production, consumption, and the critical study of it. Three stages occur in this evolution: the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. Each stage is characterized by larger global conditions and events that may have shaped trends in both food and in tourism. That evolution also explains the relevance of the two themes of defining the discipline and connecting it to sustainability. The review is, unfortunately, limited to English-language publications and therefore focuses on developments in Western cultures, while attempting to recognize the scholarship now emerging by non–English speaking scholars.

This history is not nearly as clear-cut as these stages suggest. As Kuan-Huei Lee and Noel Scott have noted regarding the field, “The evolution of an academic discipline is not a linear and neat process but instead is idiosyncratic and often competitive, leading to a disjointed and fragmented literature that somehow must be comprehended and ordered.” 6 Scholarship on culinary tourism is multidisciplinary, bringing together methods and theories from social sciences as well as the humanities, with emphases ranging from critical theorizing of the meanings of purposely consuming an Other, to impact studies, to development of applications and best practices. Tourism studies, itself a multidisciplinary field, is an obvious home for such scholarship, and there are a number of excellent reviews of this literature from that perspective. Food studies, also multidisciplinary, is another logical home and has encouraged research in it. History scholarship on both food and tourism is particularly relevant to this overview, but these fields are not often blended. 7 This may reflect perceptions of tourism as only a modern activity resulting from industrialization and Western colonialism and therefore lacking a long history as well as a tendency in Western scholarship to dismiss food as a serious domain of study outside of its role in economic development. It also reflects shifts in the field of history itself. Peter Scholliers points out that until the 1960s food was attended to primarily by economic historians studying “food supply, hunger, and prices.” 8 This changed in the late 1950s with the advent of social history and the study of everyday life, although Amy Bentley points to the 1980s for scholars of US history to begin recognizing food as a useful lens for understanding life in the past. 9 Historians have since contributed seminal works that have shaped the field of food studies, providing overviews of the development over time of national food practices and attitudes as well as of the changing uses and roles of specific foodstuffs. 10 Scholars, such as Sydney Mintz with his studies of sugar and the slave trade, offered analyses of historical events and movements through the lens of food, demonstrating the usefulness of the subject for understanding history. 11 While the movements of people as well as foods were oftentimes included in these histories, they were not recognized as tourism, per se, until more recently with studies of specific regions. 12 Be that as it may, culinary tourism can be said to have now developed into a subfield of its own. The subject also draws practitioners as well as theorists, from a wide range of disciplines, offering a rich opportunity for the development of critical theories grounded in practice and ethnographic analysis. The field is now more frequently making use of the perspectives and data offered by historians to contextualize trends and patterns. 13

A history of culinary tourism is complicated by the lack of a single definition for it, a reflection partly of contested definitions of tourism in general. From an industry perspective, it is travel away from home so that hospitality services are needed. 14 From a more critical perspective, it is the seeking of new experiences, escape from the mundane and everyday, or a way of seeing. 15 Culinary tourism similarly can be considered the intersection of food and travel, as “food and drink motivated travel” with recognition that those subjects are frequently also parts of other types of travel and tourism. 16 A more philosophical stance considers it to be an approach to food that does not necessitate travel, although frequently inspires it. Culinary tourism in this sense includes the vicarious exploration of unfamiliar foods or foodways experiences—the “kitchen table” tourism of viewing food network programs, perusing cookbooks, or reading food blogs—as well as any instances of “eating out of curiosity.” 17 Debates around the name of the subject reflect the diversity of approaches taken in studying it.

The development of cohesive definitions and theories is also complicated by the very nature of food itself as a universal biological necessity and everyday activity, as well as a domain for symbolic communications, social interaction, personal expression, aesthetic experience, and negotiations of power and identity. This complex nature of food also should mean that the need to connect culinary tourism to sustainability is obvious.

The production, distribution, consumption, and disposal of food clearly draw from and impact the natural environment. Economic systems are built around food, so that fair and equitable remuneration for it is an obvious issue. Historical studies of the forces shaping those systems are necessary in order to understand how and why they took on the forms they display today—a need recognized by scholars in food systems studies and by historians who find food a useful medium through which to analyze the arc of time in a particular culture. Similarly, food is tied to the ways in which societies are organized and to the institutions that support those societies. Anthropologists, sociologists, and folklorists of a historical bent have explored these processes, but generally have not connected them with tourism. 18 Culinary tourism can impact those institutions as well as the cultures—the groups, the practices, and ethos or worldviews—of those that are involved. Food should be understood as a social, cultural, and personal construction, with fluid and dynamic meanings, making it hard to pin down in terms of identity, ownership, and function. 19 People eat out of hunger, but also out of myriad other motivations, and while the act of eating is universal, what they eat, how, and why is specific to each culture and even to individuals. Food therefore offers the possibility of sharing our individual humanities, potentially disrupting the Othering or emotional and social distancing that can occur in tourism.

Setting the Stage for Culinary Tourism: Prehistory to the 1980s

People have always traveled in order to obtain food, and, as an essential biological need, food has always been a part of travel. Food also has always been a commodity to trade with, profit from, and to use for political and social power, so has been sought after and carried from one place to another. The idea of traveling specifically to enjoy and to satisfy one’s curiosity about a particular dish or cuisine experience, however, is a different phenomenon and separates it as tourism. This type of travel involves looking at new food experiences as voluntary and for purposes beyond just functional or practical—for relaxation, pleasure, edification, or status. Such an approach can occur at any time for an individual, but as a cultural institution, it depends upon economic and political conditions that allow for it.

A number of scholars have recognized this longer global history of travel and eating. 20 Tourism scholar Sally Everett, for example, points to the age of exploration (the fifteenth century) as the beginnings of the Western “search for food as a leisure activity,” and the origin of contemporary tourism. 21 This exploration was tied initially to the spice trade, but the subsequent colonization and exploitation of new lands also meant the exchange of foodstuffs between cultures and continents. These exchanges, particularly the Columbian one, introduced many new ingredients and foodways styles that were incorporated into the receiving food cultures and lost their identity as “foreign,” but they also introduced the idea of novel foods as a domain for recreation and entertainment. Tomatoes and potatoes, for example, were brought from Central America to Europe in the late 1400s and were initially treated as exotic, even eyed with suspicion by some, but then become integral to the iconic dishes of many European cultures. 22 Chocolate and pineapple, however, remained curiosities and usually available only to the wealthy for at least another two centuries. 23

The Industrial Revolutions of the 1700s and 1800s in Europe and the United States created a shift from rural agrarian societies to urban, manufacturing ones, changing many people’s relationship to food. The resulting rise of the industrial food system has been critiqued as creating a distancing of consumers from producers, and the dislocating of food from place. The advantages and disadvantages of this system are a much larger topic, but most scholars agree that it contributed to a devaluing of food itself and of the skills and abilities involved in producing, procuring, preparing, and even consuming it. Similarly, the rise of capitalist economic systems has been critiqued as turning food into a commodity to be esteemed primarily for its monetary value. At the same time, both forces expanded the variety of foodstuffs available, made them potentially more accessible to the common people—laborers and developing middle classes, in theory, offered a degree of security from the caprices of nature (but not the whims of governments and fellow humans).

Those revolutions set the stage for later conditions relevant to culinary tourism. Reactions to the resulting modernity have been drivers toward the natural and “authentic,” oftentimes expressed by a romanticization of “primitive” cultures and more traditional ways of living. The countercultural revolutions of the 1960s and 1970s developed those themes with an openness to new cultures and new experiences as well as a celebration of diversity and nonconformity, all of which helped open up peoples’ palates to new tastes. 24

Similarly, globalization in the latter half of the 1900s both inspired culinary tourism and made it possible. Characterized as “space-time compression,” 25 globalization has frequently given access to ingredients, dishes, cooking styles, and food philosophies from across the globe. Macrobiotic diets based on Indian ayurvedic principles became popular in the US in 1960s countercultural revolution, 26 while American fast-food establishments introduced hamburgers and factory-style food production throughout the world. Although literature and travel writing might have piqued our curiosity before, we can now actually satisfy that curiosity and experience these new foods. At the same time, fear of the homogenizing effects of globalization lead to attention to and valuing of the local. 27

Food, however, was generally not seen in the Western world as a significant aspect of tourism. Although dining at certain establishments and tasting specific dishes had been included as part of the seventeenth and eighteenth century European Grand Tour (see Verhoeven , this volume), responses were oftentimes ambivalent at best, and such travel was available only to the upper classes anyway. 28 Food, in general, in much of the modern Western world was considered more a matter of nutrition and economics than something to be sought after for its own sake. Until the early 2000s, for example, the American tourism industry did not consider food of interest enough to Americans to be a motivator for travel or spending. It was assumed that most Americans wanted food that was familiar, and those who traveled for food itself made up a small elite group who frequented famous restaurants, cities, or countries known for their gourmet cuisines and would not consider themselves tourists. 29

This attitude carried over into academia. Food tended to be relegated to applied fields (home economics, nutrition, culinary arts), but some of the more ethnographic disciplines, particularly cultural anthropology and folklore, at least included it within their purview. 30 Within tourism studies, a 1978 article included food as an aspect of culture, but few other scholars even recognized it as a possible attraction or destination on its own, lumping it instead with other hospitality services. 31 Folklore (known as Ethnology in Europe) developed theories about food’s role in maintaining and negotiating traditions and communities, as well performing personal identity and artistry, reflecting the “cultural turn” of the 1960s that started shifting attention to the meanings of food. 32

At the same time, many of these disciplines were suspicious of tourism as a colonialist enterprise and an arm of neoliberal capitalist governments and therefore failed to examine it closely. While that suspicion has continued somewhat, individual scholars began in the 1990s (and some earlier) crossing disciplinary boundaries to explore the intersections of food and tourism. Geographer Wilbur Zelinsky, for example, introduced the term “gastronomic tourism” in a 1985 article, in which he surveyed telephone book listings of ethnic restaurants in order to map culinary regions in the United States and Canada and explain the prevalence of particular ethnic groups as restaurateurs. 33

1990s: Time of Prosperity and Beginnings of Culinary Tourism

The 1990s were a time of general prosperity in the Western world, meaning that both travel and food were more accessible to more people. Both also began garnering attention from scholars in a variety of disciplines. Eating out became a major source of entertainment and socializing, and certain restaurants were recognized as destinations for travel. 34 Also, migration and immigration had always contributed to bringing “foreign” cuisines to new locales, but there now seemed to emerge a trend in seeking out establishments serving such food. 35 Ethnic restaurants came to the attention of more scholars, although skepticism about the authenticity of commercial transactions may have kept away those looking for cultural representation. 36 Mass media also began attending more to food, building upon the earlier popularity of televised cooking shows, and food magazines enjoyed more popularity as people became more interested in developing gourmet skills and tastes. 37

The increasing interest in trying new foods was also possibly related to the “experience economy” that arose in the West in the 1990s. According to Greg Richards, consumers seeking more meaningful and memorable experiences—which he identified as “first generation experiences,” could find them through food since it easily engages all five senses. 38 Coinciding, however, with this increased availability of new foods were fears of contamination, food safety technologies, and health impacts of certain foods, which tended to dominate much of the popular discourse. 39 These food anxieties and other factors constrained the exploration of food as a touristic subject for mainstream cultures, keeping it within the domain of hospitality services.

Meanwhile the development of the World Wide Web, along with other technological advancements, meant that communicating across long distances was easier and cheaper, making travel to unfamiliar places less challenging. That, along with strong economic growth, made travel more accessible to the middle classes, although trains and automobiles had already established opportunities for travel in the 1800s and 1900s (see Pearson , this volume). Even ocean liners and canal boats had provided mobility previously, arguably from ancient times. Be that as it may, some of the earliest studies on tourism and food tended to focus on the negative impacts. P. Reynolds, for example, found that tourism on the island of Bali in Indonesia had caused a shift in tourist restaurant menus away from indigenous dishes, harming the local food culture. 40 Similarly, David Telfer and Geoffrey Wall found harmful linkages between tourism and food production in that agricultural land was given over to producing tourist foods rather than local crops. 41

These studies also illustrate tourism scholar Dean MacCannell’s identification of the 1990s as the second phase in the development of tourism studies. 42 Earlier scholars tended to define tourism as the “search for authenticity” and focused on how tourism transformed local cultures, reinforced economic inequality, and commodified exotic “others.” Scholarship, he observed, shifted in the 1990s to definitions based on motivations and the seeking of pleasure. This characterizes a number of tourism scholars in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand who began theorizing about the positive potentials of the intersection of food and travel. One of the most influential, C. Michael Hall, expanded upon scholarship on wine tourism to introduce “food tourism” as a genre of tourism having as its primary motivation “the desire to experience a particular type of food or the produce of a specific region.” 43

Also emerging during this decade was food studies as an interdisciplinary field building initially on the work of scholars who recognized food as symbolic communication and a central feature of cultural traditions and social systems. 44 A logical topic for study was the meanings and implications of consuming cuisines of others, which frequently involved some form of travel. For example, scholarship in folklore and cultural studies recognized the role of food as attraction in public and private festive events. 45 Scholars, especially historians of immigration, recognized ethnic restaurants as sites for negotiating identity and a place in the economic and social systems of the US historians in general began attending more to food, recognizing it as a significant domain of everyday life. Studies published in the 1980s by scholars such as Stephen Mennell, Massimo Montanari, and Sydney Mintz were widely read in the 1990s and established food history as a legitimate branch of the field. 46 Few, however, recognized tourism as a significant shaping force of food cultures. Jeffrey Pilcher stands out as one with his 1998 history of Mexican food. In 1997 David Bell and Gill Valentine used “kitchen table tourism” to address the virtual exploration of other food cultures through modern technologies and to identify numerous issues involved in culinary tourism from a cultural geography perspective. 47 A 1998 article offered a sociological perspective on traditional food and cuisine as tourist attractions, 48 while the eleventh conference of the International Commission for Ethnological Food Research in 1996 focused on the role of colonization in food and travel. The proceedings were published in 1998, edited by Irish folklorist Patricia Lysaght, and the articles provided historical as well as ethnographic perspectives on the connections between migrations, immigrations, and the geographic distribution of particular foods and foodways.

Also introduced in 1998 was the term “culinary tourism,” by folklorist Lucy Long to encompass humanities perspectives on the meanings of eating new or unfamiliar foods. Defined as “intentional, exploratory participation in the foodways of an Other, participation including the consumption—or preparation and presentation for consumption—of a food item, cuisine, meal system, or eating style considered as belonging to a culinary system not one’s own,” 49 culinary tourism could include a variety of others (ethnic, regional, socioeconomic, religious, ethical) and the full range of activities and practices around food, not just consumption. It also drew upon anthropological theories defining tourism as a state of mind or type of “gaze,” that was not dependent upon actual travel. Culinary tourism from this perspective is a negotiation of edibility and palatability as well as exoticness and familiarity, with otherness depending on each individual and the social and cultural groups of those individuals. The article also identified five strategies commonly used in negotiating these realms. This article and others included in the special journal issue were republished as an edited volume with additional essays in 2004.

During this decade there was also a growing concern over the morality of tourism in general. As early as 1992, the United Nations held a conference on sustainable development, concerned that “first world” nations were creating economic systems dependent on those nations for survival and endurance. Tourism was recognized as one of the forces creating dependency, and it was determined that tourism should contribute to the well-being of people and ecosystems rather than for the profit of private industries. Tourism scholars recognized that the sustainability of destinations and attractions was crucial for the sustainability of tourism itself, and some responded to this call by incorporating the concerns into their studies of food and tourism. C. Michael Hall’s 1998 text, Sustainable Tourism: A Geographical Perspective , laid out principles for sustainable tourism and is particularly relevant to food tourism scholarship.

2000s: Introducing and Defining New Paradigms in the Field

The first decade of the twenty-first century saw the emergence of culinary tourism as an exciting new field both for scholarship and the tourism industry. Both seemed to feed into each other, although initially they seem to have been separate endeavors with scholarship preceding practice. Both also were responding to—and helping shape—newer paradigms emerging around food and travel. Food was also expanded to include beverages. Oftentimes focused on wine and vineyards, beverage tourism had previously been treated as a highly specialized attraction for highly cultured “guests” rather than for the “crass commercialism” of mass tourism. Whiskey, alcoholic cider, and beer also were recognized as viable touristic products. 50

Although the idea that food was more than fuel or nourishment was commonplace in numerous cultures, it was only during this decade that it began taking hold of the Western imagination, specifically in English-language nations that dominated the world economy and tourism industry. 51 (Perhaps the notion of traveling to enjoy food was so obvious in those cultures already appreciating it that it did not seem necessary to develop the concept. This would explain why countries renowned for their cuisine—France, Italy, Spain—have been slower to contribute to the scholarship and industry.) Food became recognized—and celebrated—as an expression of artistry and identity. The prosperity of the 1990s had helped establish dining out as a source of entertainment, and “ethnic” cuisines were now included in this trend. 52 Interest in food became a lifestyle “choice,” in which foodies organized their personal and social lives around its preparation and consumption. 53 It could be argued that this was simply a reiteration of earlier “gastronomes,” such as Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin (1755–1836), the French lawyer and politician who famously wrote “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are” and even the Greek philosopher, Epicurus (341–270 BC). 54 Mass media popularized this attention to food with the food network turning chefs into celebrities the equivalent of rock stars. Food memoires became a popular way to combine recipes with a narrative of one’s life, blogging about one’s cooking became a common obsession, and restaurant reviews became general reading for the masses. While these trends characterized the “experience economy” that had started earlier in the 1990s, 55 they also represented the growing realization that food could be symbolic, artistic, social, and personal—a new paradigm. Organizations such as Slow Food, which started in 1986 in Italy, also added to the idea that food was political, and that individual’s food choices had ethical and moral consequences.

Tourism, similarly, was undergoing changes, partly in response to the experience economy, but also as a reflection and driver—of the continued globalization making formerly “foreign” and “faraway” places seem closer, more accessible, and less threatening. Richards characterizes this stage as one of “second generation experiences” in which consumers take a more active role in the creation of an experience. 56 Food was an ideal domain for such creativity. A “new moral tourism” was also emerging, in which tourists became conscientious of their impacts on the cultures and environments they visited. The motto “tread softly” captured the responsibility for individuals to make moral choices. 57 Such concerns had confronted travelers in the past, particularly in response to the countercultural movements of the 1960s and the development of backpacker tourism and volunteer tourism, but the tourism industry seemed to be slow to recognize those shifts until they were identified by scholars and industry movers. John Tribe, for example, wrote that three issues had always been involved in tourism—truth, beauty, and virtue—and that now was the time to address them. 58

These trends were emerging in the wake of the terrorist acts of September 11, 2001. This event challenged the assumption of security felt in most Western nations, particularly in the United States. Travel across borders became, in some places, frightening and more complicated than before, so that many people started looking within their own nations for tourism experiences. Food similarly became a relatively safe new universe to explore without leaving one’s home culture. Novel experiences could now be found easily in restaurants without all the hassle and danger of international travel.

Whether or not “9/11” was a conscious catalyst for the tourism industry, it did seem to set an atmosphere in which food could be recognized as an attraction. In 2003, the World Tourism Organization established policies around local food in tourism and published an international survey of iconic foods for potential tourism development, and in 2004, the US-based International Culinary Tourism Association was established as a professional organization. Such industry initiatives focused primarily on the potential for food to draw tourist dollars and contribute to economic development that would then increase profits. Food posed an innovative and colorful way to create a “brand” or marketing identity for a place, and, although it had previously been a part of the total experience, food was now considered something novel that could be featured as a primary attraction. Similar to wine tourism, which is still frequently treated as separate from culinary tourism, 59 the emphasis was initially on expensive, gourmet dining experiences with well-known chefs and restaurants, usually in locations with already established reputations for their unique and refined haute cuisines. That emphasis was partly driven by the assumption that people who were interested in food were interested only in fine dining experiences, but also those tourists would bring in the most money and be able and willing to pay for other services, such as lodging, souvenirs, and entertainment. These projects, in the United States, at least, seem to have been more connected to the hospitality and tourism marketing industries than to the scholarship of tourism, although there was a symbiotic relationship between the two in many instances.

Popular forms of these early initiatives in culinary tourism were maps, brochures, and websites identifying selected restaurants and events featuring food. Drawing from the successful models provided by whiskey, wine, and other beverage tourism, these were oftentimes dubbed “trails” that tourists could follow on their own. Marketing emphasized restaurants’ reputations in food circles, oftentimes ones having a long history, 60 perhaps describing some signature dishes. It also identified chefs, preferably well-known and with culinary arts background, who were applauded for their originality, creativity, and individuality, so that the food and total dining experience would be unique and only available there. Chefs such as Paula Dean, Bobby Flay, Gordon Ramsay, and Emeril Lagasse became celebrities through television cooking shows and drew culinary tourists to their restaurants and guest appearances in public. Chefs previously had become famous for their skills, Auguste Escoffier (1846–1935) in France, for example, but this decade saw them turned into media stars known to the “masses.” Frequently, the food, restaurant, or chef had no actual historical connection to a specific place—ingredients were not locally sourced, and recipes were not traditional. Food events, similarly, seemed to celebrate place, but oftentimes featured gourmet and innovatively distinctive dishes rather than foods representative of the area. This gradually changed as more tourists became interested in and knowledgeable about food and began searching for “authentic” eating experiences.

A spate of publications in the first few years of 2000s established the intersection of food and tourism as a scholarly subject. These came from a variety of disciplines and offered a variety of names for the field. Tourism scholars, understandably, dominated, exploring typologies of tourist motivations, of tourist activities, and of food products. They also examined the role of food in destination development and strategies for marketing, although this was frequently explored in terms of recent activities and future potential rather than historical patterns or events. 61 Scholars from more culturally oriented fields and the humanities emphasized the meanings and implications of culinary tourism, oftentimes recognizing historical forces as shaping that tourism without in-depth analysis of them. All struggled with defining the field, building upon work done in the 1990s.

In 2001, tourism scholars, C. Michael Hall and Richard Mitchell, used the phrase “food tourism” in an academic journal for “visitation to primary and secondary food producers, food festivals, restaurants and specific locations for which food tasting and/or experiencing the attribute of specialist food production regions are the primary motivating factor for travel.” 62 That name became further established in in 2003 with the publication of an edited volume, Food Tourism Around the World , edited by Hall and other scholars leading the field, Liz Sharples, Richard Mithell, Niki Macionis, and Brock Cambourne. 63 The edited volume explored motivations and models for food tourism as well as its role in regional economic development, recognizing that food is as aspect of culture. Their typology of food tourists based on the intensity of interest in food offered a starting point for further research on tourist motivations, and their inclusion of activities, such as cooking schools, festivals, and food trails expanded food tourism beyond the visitation of restaurants. The authors also emphasize that geographic place is significant to food tourism, stating that even though it can be “exported” it still retains a spatial fixity: “The tourists must go to the location of production in order to consume the local fare and become food tourists.” 64 This volume and other extensive publications by these scholars encouraged cross-disciplinary, research-based approaches in examining tourist motivations and the development, management, and marketing of food tourism products. While much of this work focused on analyzing current initiatives in order to explore opportunities for future projects, their work also draws upon the histories of specific destinations, events, and products. They also recognize the potential impacts of tourism beyond the industry, encouraging a model for ethical tourism.

Another influential edited volume, Gastronomy and Tourism , was published in 2002 by Anne-Mette Hjalager and Greg Richards. 65 Including beverages in the range of products considered, it also examined issues involving travel for food, but went beyond tourism studies to call for an interdisciplinary approach recognizing both gastronomy and tourism as dynamic cultural constructions reflecting specific histories and contemporary interests. Authors in the volume pointed out that tourism and gastronomy were both emerging disciplines with similar dichotomies in practice from small-scale, artisanal production to mass-produced production, so each could learn from the other. One chapter specifically called attention to the need for tourism scholars to better understand food and food studies, 66 while others observed that globalization should be interpreted as a potentially beneficial force, noting that fears of it fail to recognize the dynamic character of both gastronomy and tourism. Ultimately, the volume promoted the potential for gastronomy and tourism to serve as radical, activist disciplines.

A similarly broad perspective was offered in 2002 by Priscilla Boniface. In Tasting Tourism , she drew from cultural studies to understand the nature of tourism in the modern world and how tourism can change the meanings of food. 67 She asked why food and drink have recently become attractions in their own right for Western tourists, placing the question in historical context as a contemporary reaction to industrialization, modernity, and globalization. She observed that this new attention to food represents more than just the discovery of a new niche in tourism, but reflects a shift in the culture of tourism itself that is no longer based on a separation from the quotidian. Focusing on attitudes in Western cultures (particularly those with a British heritage), Boniface saw food tourism as a seeking of authentic experiences through food—resulting from the peculiarities of modern life, yet this very modernity is what makes us recognize and appreciate the past, the rural, and the nonindustrialized. She also identified five “driving forces” acting as motivations for food tourism: anxieties over food safety and social uncertainty; a need to show distinction, affluence and individualism; curiosity and wish for knowledge and discovery; the need to feel grounded amid globalization; and the requirement for sensory and tactile pleasure. 68

A 2004 assessment of the state of food tourism as both an industry and a field of scholarship pointed out that while food offers many possibilities in tourism, it can also be an obstacle. Unpleasant food experiences can lead to cultural misunderstandings, and the use of food as an attraction can actually have harmful effects on the host culture. 69 A 2005 PhD tourism thesis offered a conceptual framework for “tourists’ participation in food related activities at a destination to experience it’s culinary attributes.” 70 Other scholars confirmed the usefulness of food as a tourist attraction, observing that since it is an obvious cultural marker, it is an effective way to establish a connection between tourists and a destination. 71 Although the beginnings of the tourism industry in the 1800s recognized that connection, 72 food historically seemed to have been seen more often as an obstacle to a pleasant journey than an attraction to draw tourists.

Much of this work defined food and tourism as necessitating travel. A different approach came from the humanities with the edited volume, Culinary Tourism , in 2004, which elaborated on the earlier definition of “eating out of curiosity” and offered a framework for examining the exploratory or adventurous eating of individuals and groups outside of as well as within the formal infrastructures of tourism. 73 Culinary tourism from this perspective expanded the types of foodways activities available beyond consumption to include production, procurement, preservation, preparation, and even disposal, all of which could be in public or private settings as well as traditional or invented ones. It also recognized the larger historical and economic forces shaping and enabling touristic activity, but allowed for individuals to create their own meanings of those activities. Seemingly opposite, the theory is compatible with the mobilities theory developed by sociologist and tourism scholar John Urry and others that focused on the flow of people and products between places. Insightful explorations of culinary tourism from this perspective have expanded understandings of the phenomenon as a human impulse. 74 Jennie German Molz, for example, suggested that culinary tourism is a performance of a traveler’s “sense of adventure, adaptability, and openness to any other culture,” thereby demonstrating their cosmopolitanism. 75

These seminal works introduced a number of themes that scholars continued to explore, particularly the definitions of the field and typologies of tourists, food products, and food-related events. Also of concern is the nature of culinary tourism as unique or different from other types of tourism. Since food consumption offers a direct connection between our physical bodies and the ways in which we act in and perceive the world, 76 it can embody the experience of a place in ways that other forms of tourism do not allow. Everett pointed out that through food, tourists can literally and figuratively internalize a destination, making touristic activities more meaningful, 77 and Sims posited that food was a vital part of an “embodied tourism experience,” which increased the satisfaction of tourists, giving that place a competitive advantage as tourism destination. 78 Similarly, a study of Chinese tourists observed that food consumption utilizes all five senses, giving those tourists a perception of a richer experience. 79

Another common theme was that of food as a cultural marker. Historians had demonstrated that food could be used effectively to construct national identity and unity, 80 and folklorists had offered numerous examples of food used to represent and celebrate cultural identity. 81 Culinary tourism, therefore, could valorize, that is, affirm the validity or worth, of a place. 82 Such valorization can go beyond being simply a marketing strategy to significantly impact the public’s perception of a culture. For example, a study of restaurants in Asheville, North Carolina in the Appalachian Mountains in the United States observed that culinary tourism was inspiring the creation of a new cuisine that offered very different images of the region from the usual negative and derogatory ones. 83 Similarly, tourism in Belize caused a shift away from the imported British fare of the upper classes to fresh food and dishes that represented place, creating a market for indigenous and locally sourced foods. 84 Travelers have probably long affirmed the worth of a place or culture after experiencing its food. Geoffrey Chaucer’s fourteenth-century poem, The Canterbury Tales , characterizes individuals and places by the food eaten, and the legend that Marco Polo brought noodles to Italy from China, though proven false, established “the Orient” as a place of wonderful and exotic foods.

The promotion and valorization of food cultures raised questions about the authenticity of food products featured in culinary tourism and whether they were being adapted in order to satisfy tourists, potentially giving an inaccurate representation. One response was to focus on “local foods” that, in theory, contained terroir , a “taste of place,” resulting from the environmental features of a specific place. 85 As one scholar pointed out, though, “locally produced” does not automatically equal an authentic representation of a place since seeds can be brought in from other places. 86 Other scholars pointed out that authenticity is a social construct reflecting a static view of culture and oftentimes used for marketing or ideological purposes. Jennie Molz, for example, analyzed how authenticity was presented in Thai restaurants in the US restaurateurs tweaked not only the food, but also the language of the menu, the décor, and other aspects of the setting to meet consumers expectations. 87

Scholars from a variety of disciplines began looking not just at the impacts of culinary tourism on specific cultures, but also on the ways in which it reflected larger historical structures. For example, a special issue of the journal Food, Culture, and Society explored “a wider range of temporal and figurative journeys,” using travel “as a metaphor for reflection, memory, exchange and otherness.” The authors applied a critical theory approach recognizing that “accounts of eating practices therefore have an intimate and intricate relationship with colonial discourse, and with differential power relations in general.” 88 Kaori O’Connor analyzed food as not only a central tourist attraction but also a metaphor for the tourist identity that has developed around Hawaii, while Daisy Tam used theories of Pierre Bourdieu to develop her own theory of Slow Food that holds the possibility for culinary tourism to enable positive shifts in human’s relationships to others. 89

Culinary tourism was also used as a framework for exploring individuals’ engagements with otherness. Bill Ellis, for example, observed that single women in American cities in the early 1900s participated in culinary tourism by frequenting ice cream parlors. These parlors were seen as dangerous spaces run by an ethnic Other—Italian immigrants. 90 Holly Everett examined tourists’ responses to culinary tourism in rural Newfoundland, finding that their experiences confirmed the stereotypes of the region as lower class and lacking in the self-discipline and morality needed for healthier eating habits.

Many of these concerns fall under the umbrella of sustainability, even though the term itself was not always used. 91 Sustainability in the context of the tourism industry refers to the endurance of both the resources (destinations, attractions, products) used in tourism and to the businesses and entities involved in providing tourist services. Much of the scholarship addressed both. For example, in a widely read article, Sims explored how using “locally sourced products” could benefit both hosts and guests. She suggested that it could help local economies be increasing the “multiplier effect” of tourism, in which secondary services and suppliers would be needed to support the primary tourism provider. For example, a restaurant featuring local foods would, in theory, support, local farmers and producers and would also reduce the carbon footprint of transporting those foods (“food miles”). Furthermore, as consumers and tourists became aware of such environmental concerns, publicly addressing them would give that place a competitive edge over other destinations. 92

Overall, scholars in the latter 2000s, considered culinary tourism to be a growing industry niche with a great potential for benefits: “Travellers are becoming ever more knowledgeable about food and they avidly follow gastronomic trends, seeking out new destinations, where they can sample authentic fare that is native to a particular country or region.” 93 A growing number also saw it as a potentially rich arena for scholarship. Much of the focus, however, was on future possibilities as well as on current developments and impacts, limiting dialogue with historians. An emphasis on ethnographic research also seemed to downplay the historical conditions leading up to the present. Ironically, food history as a subdiscipline was growing and offered a number of publications that would have contributed depth and context to the study of culinary tourism. A journal, Food and History , was established in 2003, and several publications offered encyclopedic historical overviews of foods throughout the world. 94

2010s: An Established Field; Spreading New Paradigms

The third (and current) stage in the development of culinary tourism is roughly the 2010s. This decade, which was shaped initially by the global recession of 2008, reflects the acceptance of new paradigms so that the subject of food as a tourism attraction and destination was no longer even questioned by scholars, the tourism industry, or the general public. Culinary tourism has become a force in spreading of this recognition of food as more than only sustenance. Scholarship around it has developed into a more critical field, primarily based in tourism studies, but drawing from theories and methods from across the social sciences, humanities, and applied fields. A journal devoted to the subject, the Journal of Tourism and Gastronomy Studies , established in 2013, and a plethora of publications in scholarly, trade, and popular media affirm the rising interest. At the same time, all three sectors of the phenomena—tourists, the tourism industry, and scholars—are more aware of issues of sustainability and social equity around culinary tourism, and some are actively working to make it a beneficial force.

The newly accepted paradigms around food as carrier of identity, catalyst for socializing, and medium for self-expression opened up the types of experiences and foods available for touristic interest and development. Along with becoming a major segment in the entertainment industry in the forms of films, cooking shows, and celebrity chef cookbooks, 95 food offered a subject through which individuals could use social media (Instagram, Facebook, blogs, vlogs) to publicly share their experiences, whether it be cooking or consuming. 96 There was now recognition and celebration of food’s power to connect—literally and figuratively—with one’s past as well as with people and places, as attested to by the popularity of the food memoire genre. Many of these focus on ethnic foods, tracing the migration of one’s family to explore the sense of displacement and lack of belonging that the author feels, 97 but earlier ones by chefs and food writers brought attention to the artistry and skill—and hard work and emotional strength—needed to be successful in the culinary world. These media all brought attention to these ways of thinking about food.

Historians also found food to be a fruitful lens for examining groups that had been marginalized because of their ethnicity, race, class, or gender. Culinary traditions oftentimes reflected this status and the various strategies implemented for survival, whether that was economic or psychological. In the United States, Hasia Diner’s work on three ethnic groups in New York City served as a model for further such research; 98 southern historians turned their analytic tools onto their regional cuisine; 99 and African American scholars traced foods of the African diaspora. 100 These insightful works did not engage with tourism as an aspect of those traditions, however, they do reflect the growing recognition of food history as a viable subdiscipline with its own methods and research questions. 101

At the same time, continued globalization, particularly through mass media and social media, exposed more people to each other’s ways of eating, and regional and international migrations increased the restaurants and grocery stores serving foods previously unavailable to the public. 102 Mass media popularized “adventurous eating” and “extreme eating,” following celebrity chefs and food commentators, such as Anthony Bourdain, Andrew Zimmern, and others as they traveled the world eating “strange” new foods.

This new paradigm also recognized the social role that food can play in constructing relationships and communities. Restaurants had always been places to congregate, but that role became even more pronounced and widespread across social class and cultural identity, and while appearance at the right ones could demonstrate cultural capital, they seemed to become more important as public venues to visit friends and meet new people. 103 Intentional communities built around food became popular—Community Supported Agriculture (CSAs), farmers’ markets, cooking classes, dinner groups. 104 Even activities that in the past may have been considered chores were turned into social opportunities, with some grocery stores offering dine-in options, wine tastings, and cooking demonstrations.

There also was more attention given to the potential for food to bridge cultures, bringing people together to learn more about a particular culture or to create understanding between diverse groups. Based on the well-intentioned but oftentimes simplistic notion that eating an Other’s food is a way to get to know them, educational, religious, and civic institutions oftentimes offered events introducing unfamiliar foods in “safe” contexts. Schools, for example, frequently hold “international days,” in which students can taste foods of a variety of cultures. Similarly, gastrodiplomacy, the idea of creating a positive image of a nation through its food, in order to influence political policy, inspired some governments (notably Thailand, Peru, South Korea) to sponsor restaurants and tasting events of their cuisines in other countries. 105 Similar to extravagant feasts offered by kings or chiefs in the past, these initiatives are carefully constructed to present a specific representation of that nation. 106

The paradigm also recognized food’s connection to environmental sustainability, an awareness that had been growing since the 2000s. A number of social movements that encouraged small-scale, collaborative, and community-based food production and distribution—locavore, organic farming and natural foods, seasonal eating, conscientious consumption, vegetarian and vegan diets—also tapped into culinary tourism. 107 Food sovereignty (the right to define what foodways are culturally appropriate) and food insecurity (lack of adequate nutritious food) were recognized as social issues occurring even in the industrial world, and numerous initiatives were launched. Many of these also recognized the need for fair wages and equitable distribution of risks and profits along the food chain. Some of the same projects that offered social communities around food addressed these issues, particularly CSAs and farmers’ markets. 108 Labor historians have much to offer for gaining perspectives on the strategies being developed to address these needs. Also, food sovereignty calls upon a historical past in which a group’s resources were sufficient but were stolen or misused by outsiders. Native American groups in North America, for example, call for recognition of the destruction done to them by European colonization and demand resources to rebuild their culture, including their food production and consumption. Some of these initiatives have tapped into tourism as a means of economic support and cultural validation. 109

Tourism as an industry and a concept among consumers also seemed to be changing in this decade. Tourism scholar Greg Richards characterized this stage as the rise of third generation experiences, “based on the emergence of communities of consumers and producers around specific types of experiences.” 110 Tourists wanted new experiences, not just relaxation, escape, or entertainment. It could be argued, though, that tourism had historically been about offering new experiences, but it was in this decade that the industries around tourism recognized “experiences” as a category of attraction. Also, the new “moral tourism” offered ways in which individual tourists could help benefit the societies they visited by putting money into the hands of individuals, supporting local businesses, and developing equitable relationships with tourism hosts and providers. 111 According to Claire Carruthers, Amy Burns, and Gary Elliott, these new perspectives translated into: “growth in the short-break market niche tourism offerings, wider opportunities for travel, wider travelled and more sophisticated consumers in terms of their tourism consumption habits and the seeking out of more specific type of tourism actively associated with culture, education, lifestyles and unique, enriching and memorable experiences.” 112

Another factor shaping tourism in the 2010s may have been a much larger event: the global recession of 2008 and 2009 that destroyed businesses, certain economies, and the lives of numerous individuals. It also created income gaps and a new “gig economy” that have continued into the present. At the time, it meant that there was less money for tourism. Vacations, if even possible, were taken closer to home, and domestic tourism and initiatives such as “staycations” became more popular.

Ironically, culinary tourism was recognized as an opportunity for economic development, not just by the tourism industry and governments, but also by individual entrepreneurs as an independent business venture requiring relatively little start-up capital. This, to some extent, had always existed in some ethnic communities and among certain families, but as tourism had become an established economic enterprise, it had become a larger industry requiring greater infrastructure and overhead. Smaller businesses and local organizations were now able to find a place at the table. Numerous culinary tourism trails were developed, oftentimes clustered with other establishments in the locale to create “destinations,” many focused on regional development. 113 Although wine tours and trails had been in existence since the 1990s, these trails began featuring other types of food, such as beer, apples, barbecue, and the specialties of a region. 114 There was still an emphasis on more gourmet fare, well-known restaurants, and famous chefs, but the field expanded to incorporate other aspects of foodways as well as a larger variety of cuisines and categories of foods. Comfort food 115 and street foods 116 joined “ethnic” and “regional” foods as tourist attractions, and homes, food trucks, inexpensive “hole-in-the-wall” eateries are now considered by many to be viable venues. The variety of activities expanded tremendously: walking and driving tours of city neighborhoods or towns, usually going from restaurant to restaurant; farm-to-table dinners that frequently include tours of a farm prior to a meal; cooking classes that take diners from shopping at local markets; tours of food production, such as wineries or cheese makers; and food festivals and “tastes of” events highlighting the food of a particular destination. Culinary tourism was also being combined with agri-tourism, cultural tourism, heritage tourism, and even, health and medical tourism.

By 2013, according to one report, 77 percent of all tourists (“leisure travelers”) participated in culinary activities within the three years of the report, translating to 131 million Americans. 117 That number seems to be growing, so that culinary tourism today is found across the globe and is considered one of the most viable areas of development for tourism projects by governmental, educational, and civic organizations as well as by the tourism industry. Perhaps most significant is the development of food tourism by individuals who work, usually via social media, outside official infrastructures to offer food tours, cooking classes, dinners, and other culinary tourism attractions. These are oftentimes personalized to the individual tourists as well as for the specific destinations.

An indication that culinary tourism has been established as a subfield is that there are retrospectives of it. 118 Publications in the 1990s and 2000s pointed out that food had been left out of the conversation in tourism and argued for its inclusion. Scholarship in the 2010s reviewed this past work in order to refine it, offer remedies for lacunae, and suggest future directions. 119 Much of this work approached the subject from a tourism management and marketing perspective, 120 but there is a strong thread of concern for the impacts and the morality of culinary tourism projects. These emphases help to explain the relative lack of attention to history. There tended to be more engagement with history from scholarship, particularly from other culture-oriented disciplines, that used culinary tourism to interrogate tourism itself as a colonialist enterprise and to critique ways in which it could be channeled for beneficial purposes. History was used in this work as context for explaining the present.

While culinary tourism steadily increased in visibility as a scholarly topic starting in the mid-2000s, what could be considered an explosion of publications around 2015 and 2016 confirmed that food is now an accepted subfield, particularly within tourism studies. Much of that research considered both practice and theory, bringing together academia and industry in fruitful ways. The name of the field continued to be debated along with the formal definition of it. Opinions vary as to whether there is a distinction in meaning, but names tend to be associated with different geographic regions: “culinary tourism” in North America and Asia; “food tourism” in Australia and New Zealand, and the British Isles; and “gastronomic” or “gastronomy tourism” in Europe. 121 Typologies of culinary tourists, products, and activities also continued to be refined, as were impact studies on the profitability and feasibility of culinary tourism for regional economic development as well as for the tourism industry itself. The field, however, became much more international, with scholarship and case studies from outside the Western world being included.

The years from 2014 and 2016 were watershed years for publications on food and tourism from a tourism studies perspective. Organizations and individuals with the tourism industry also produced handbooks for how to manage, develop, and design culinary tourism projects. While these were useful for tourism providers, they generally did not offer critical theoretical lens or research-based data that furthered the scholarship of the field. In contrast, in 2015, the Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism was established. The journal’s statement of purpose points to the eclecticism of the field and summarizes some of the areas now recognized as well as those that are lacking:

The academic interest brings together scholarly perspectives from a range of disciplines—from cultural anthropology, sociology, media studies, ethnography, hospitality, food studies, and history, advertising and marketing, to environmental science, rural studies, business management, economics, human geography, and political philosophy. Linked also with many contemporary perspectives in tourism research, including sustainability, ethics,’ social justice and human rights. However, many aspects of gastronomy and tourism also appear grossly underexplored, among these: aesthetics, science, technology, innovation, health and human relations. Moreover, critical and philosophical approaches such as foodways, foodscapes and food movements are often weak on gastronomy and tourism underpinnings, which provide ample scope for innovative contributions in these areas of scholarship. 122

Also published in 2015 was The Future of Food Tourism: Foodies, Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital . 123 The collection of essays offered historical overviews of the field, critiqued theories that have been applied, and looked at issues involved in both the practice and study of food tourism. The chapter “The Past and Present of Food Tourism,” 124 gave an overview of the scholarship, succinctly summarizing major themes, while others addressed connections between the field and public policy, 125 architecture, agritourism, food supply, and intellectual property rights. 126 The experience economy was examined as a context within which culinary tourism has developed as well as a trend that culinary tourism can utilize. 127 The volume is suitable as a textbook for academic programs but also can be used to introduce practitioners to the scholarship on the field.

The following year, Gastronomy, Tourism and the Media , examined a crucial topic: connections between food tourism and trends and innovations in the mass mediated, popular culture food world. 128 This media has created images around the newer paradigms of food and of specific cuisines that then have influenced tourists’ motivations in exploring food as a destination and attraction. The volume also suggested ways in which that media—and the newer technologies that have allowed it—could be used to benefit tourist providers and hosts. The authors offered a concise overview of changes that occurred in both food and tourism, emphasizing that food itself is a dynamic domain of culture. They observed that previous scholarship—and tourism initiatives—had oftentimes treated food as a set canon of dishes, ingredients, and cooking styles that was unchangeable and existing outside of the circumstances, creativity, and tastes of the individuals who prepared and consumed it. Guidebooks, for example, oftentimes provided lists of foods distinctive to an area—“must-see” items that needed to be included for a complete tourism experience (see Schaff , this volume).

One of the first textbooks on culinary tourism was also published in 2016, Sally Everett’s Food and Drink Tourism: Principles and Practice . Much more than a “how-to” handbook like other texts, 129 it offered a multidisciplinary overview of the development of the field and introduced some of the basic concepts, theories, and issues that emerge from the practice of culinary tourism as an industry. As with much of the earlier literature, Everett called for continued examination of what motivates individuals to participate in such tourism, but she also contextualized those motivations within larger historical and cultural trends. Similarly, she pointed to the need for impact studies, not just of the specific destination served, but on the less tangible connections between food and place and on ways in which such tourism affects local and global food supply chains and systems. She also suggested the usefulness of studying the “mobility” of specific products, of how they have been transported and transformed across space and time, and called particularly for more research on social and cultural aspects of food and drink tourism. International in scope and offering astute discussions of current theories, the text would be useful in a number of disciplines in university courses. It also recognizes the role of history in culinary tourism, suggesting ways in which historians’ perspectives could contribute.

These texts and the numerous articles published in scholarly journals established culinary tourism as a subfield within the discipline of tourism studies. There was still a need felt by many scholars, however, to develop more critical theories, not only to push the field into a rigorous discipline, but also to bring it more in line with concerns about all aspects of sustainability: “… without critical perspectives gastronomy tourism represents a largely applied field of inquiry driven by development, managerial, and business aims that render limited questioning of neoliberalized narratives.” 130 Sally Everett in a 2019 assessment of the field drew from other disciplines in order to present “food tourism … as a vehicle which can be harnessed to illuminate the creative cultural examination of place, shifting away from the economic-dominated theorisations that have strangled tourism analyses.” 131

Such critiques tied into the other major theme that ran throughout both the practice and scholarship of culinary tourism—how to ensure that it is beneficial to all parties involved, or sustainability. The concept of sustainability had been recognized, developed, and promoted by tourism scholars, 132 but discussions could still benefit from “increased dialogue across subject areas.” 133 Such dialogue seemed to be happening, albeit currently in a haphazard way. Individual scholars working outside of tourism studies, particularly cultural geography, folklore, cultural studies, literature, and social history, began noticing the phenomenon and finding it a fruitful area to explore. This was due partly to the complexity and ubiquity of food that makes it relevant to most disciplines, but it was also a response to the increasing visibility of culinary tourism projects and the increasing mobility of both people and food. These other voices are adding more cultural and philosophical perspective to the issues.

For example, two reference works in food studies included culinary tourism, addressing potential cultural impacts and offering a humanities perspective on both food and tourism. 134 Similarly, the entry on culinary tourism in the 2014 Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics recognizes all four pillars of sustainability: economic, environmental, social, and cultural. 135 It identified some of the issues and suggested ways in which scholars and industry have tried to ameliorate them. The 2015 Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy 136 included an entire section on culinary tourism with case studies from around the world. The seven chapters also addressed issues that have concerned scholars throughout the history of culinary tourism studies, such as definitions of the field, the nature and role of authenticity, food as cultural heritage and identity, and the implications of featuring food as a tourism attraction. They helpfully placed the emerging popularity of food tourism within larger social and historical contexts such as the increased interest in food itself and the increase in migration and immigration that has occurred with globalization.

These texts encapsulated some of the trends occurring in scholarship, but numerous articles were published that have helped move issues of sustainability beyond the more obvious environmental ones. A special issue of the online journal Anthropology of Food , for example, was on “tourism and gastronomy,” 137 and included international perspectives and case studies. 138 These and other publications drew from scholarship in food studies and culturally oriented disciplines to explore the need for equitable distribution of profits, fair pay for providers, and reasonable costs for tourists, bringing sustainability back to its origins as a critique on the spread of capitalism. 139 They also analyzed the potential for culinary tourism projects to contribute in countries with “a harsh economic environment,” 140 as well as in ones with cuisines less familiar to Western travelers, and ones not popularly considered a tourist destination.

Much of this scholarship also addressed the need for respectful treatment of local cultures. Work in the early 2000s observed that culinary tourism could valorize a cuisine, and that possible outcome became more visible when UNESCO began recognizing food as intangible heritage in 2010, designating French and Mexican cuisines as national treasures deserving of protection and preservation. This brought culinary tourism under the umbrella of heritage tourism as well as cultural tourism, and also drew attention from scholars from other disciplines working in heritage studies (see Gordon , this volume). 141 Case studies from diverse locations around the world demonstrated the potential beneficial impacts of tourism on culinary traditions, for example in Crete, 142 Thailand, 143 Japan, 144 and Kenya. One study in Turkey pointed out the effectiveness of harnessing trends in food and collaborating with organizations, such as Slow Food, 145 while other emphasize that food, like culture, needs to be treated at dynamic and fluid. This connection of food to intangible cultural heritage was officially recognized when the UNWTO (United Nations World Travel Organization) proclaimed in 2017: “The intangible cultural heritage of gastronomy differs from that of traditional sites and monuments in that it evolves and develops alongside its respective culture. Thus, we must take into account the emergence of new cultures and traditions and recognize gastronomic tradition as a process of continuous evolution.” 146

This attention to heritage is an obvious area in which more dialogue with historians is needed. There is exemplary scholarship on the development of specific cuisines, 147 and historians have mobilized food as a lens for examining historical events, eras, and nation. 148 Most of these histories do not address the role of tourism, although some recognize it, both as one of the historical forces shaping a culture as well as an institution to be studied on its own. Some scholars are making a direct connection between the two in specific localities. Eugenia Afinoguenova, for example, described how Spain, beginning in the 1920s, utilized food to characterize government-defined regions, promoting both tourism to those regions and drawing from them to construct a national cuisine. 149 Others contextualized contemporary culinary tourism practices in histories of those practices or of specific cultures. 150 Dallen Timothy’s work on heritage cuisines is a good example of these directions in scholarship and connects tourism to colonialism as well as migrations motivated by any number of factors. 151 This work also connected nationalism to tourism from a historical perspective as one of the reasons for the development of tourism initiatives. 152

The focus of culinary tourism scholarship on physical geographic spaces shifted during this decade to the concept of place and place-making, bridging research interests with cultural geographers. 153 Drawing from the work of thinkers such as Yi-Fu Tuan, 154 scholars recognized destinations as being a work of imagination, that then shapes the expectations and experiencing of it. 155 Historical analyses of the forces constructing concepts of a place suggest that these constructions oftentimes then allowed for exploitation or colonialization of that place. Mobilities theories pose these tourist “imaginaries” as the result of networks of communication and travel and therefore, as dynamic, fluid products that can shift meanings for the various individuals involved. The scholarship frequently contextualizes these various imaginaries within their particular histories, but this is an area that calls for more input from historians. It also contributes to more nuanced understandings of issues around authenticity and typicality that are central to tourism in general. By approaching food, as well as tourism, as dynamic and socially constructed, scholarship now acknowledged that a set canon of items representing the “real” or “original” has never existed and that representations of culinary cultures are always reflections of power and history. 156

These approaches fit smoothly into the new “creative tourism,” in which individuals are cocreators of their experiences, 157 actively collaborating with hosts and providers to affect the desired product. Ritual theory, similarly, is providing a useful lens for examining food festivals and events. 158 The concept of “food pilgrimages” has been suggested to describe tourists seeking a more respectful and “authentic” engagement with others’ foodways. 159 Drawing upon anthropological and folkloristic theories, this work examines the ways in which culinary tourism offers emotional and psychological moments of liminality (“time out of time”), creating the possibility of deeper experiencing of the Other.

Such experiencing, some scholars point out, is not only about creating an emotional connection to a destination or attraction, and therefore a successful marketing “brand”; it also can change attitudes among tourists toward another culture to more positive ones along with more open-mindedness to new food experiences in general. 160 Not every culinary tourism project will have these effects, but if designed with sensitivity and knowledge, they can actually challenge inequitable systems of power, as suggested by a feminist approach to culinary tourism, 161 and create very real changes in those systems. As tourism scholar, Sally Everett explains: “Liminal sites of food tourism have been conceptualized as ‘third spaces’ which exist beyond the everyday. … By embracing different disciplinary theoretical and empirical ‘ingredients’, innovative ‘recipes’ for food tourism research can provide different ways with which to revisit dominant discourses and interrogate social relationships and interactions.” 162

The recognition of food as a dynamic construction can also help channel culinary tourism into a better understanding among tourists as well as of the potential it offers. 163 As food scholar, Fabio Parasecoli, points out in his assessment of a food tourism project:

A deeper awareness of the political, non-neutral nature of semiotic processes defining codes and modalities of cultural exchange can help tourists to shift their location not only physically, but also culturally. Having a better grasp of the various signifying networks that make tourists define a phenomenon, in our case a dish or a product, as “typical” or “local” might help them learn how to occupy the subject position of the otherness, without losing the awareness of their own location. 164

From this perspective, culinary tourism can be not only a window into a food culture, but also a mirror, that is a reflection of the tourist’s own history and identity. 165 Why is something an object of the tourist gaze for that individual? What experiences have they had that make some foods exotic and others familiar? How is that individual’s culinary universe defined and what are the historical, cultural, and political factors shaping that universe? Such questions help individuals develop better understandings of the various processes shaping each culture. They can also draw them into exploring the logic of the Other and to recognize its validity as a cultural system. It is perhaps in this reflection of Self, that culinary tourism has the most potential. It can shift not only our understanding of food, but our understanding of ourselves as well. Ironically, this was historically one of the motivations for tourism in general—and perhaps for much travel. The Grand Tour, for example, was meant to introduce a young person to iconic places in Western civilization and help them develop into a proper gentleman (or lady). For some, however, it was also a time of questioning one’s purpose in life and of discovery of new facets of their selves. Culinary tourism, similarly, is becoming an activity through which individuals explore their own lives along with new foodways and food cultures.

2020s: A New “Normal” and Return to “Kitchen Table Tourism”

The new decade beginning in 2020 seemed to be full of promise that culinary tourism industries—and scholarship about it—would continue to grow as they had been. The emergence of COVID-19 as a global pandemic changed those trajectories radically. Some national and local borders closed, limiting travel to and from those areas. Stay-at-home and quarantine mandates further restricted mobility, challenging the economic viability of the travel industry. The hospitality industries supporting travel were also threatened, as were restaurants, since in many areas they had to respond to public health considerations by limiting indoor dining, creating outdoor spaces, or relying on carry-out business. These sudden developments meant that traveling for food or frequenting food and beverage related establishments were no longer a viable recreational activity for many people. Instead, people used the internet, cook books, cooking shows and other media to explore foods, going back to Bell and Valentine’s 1997 discussion of “kitchen table tourism.” 166 This included contacting friends and family for recipes, taking virtual cooking classes, learning new cookery skills, such as pickling or canning, and sharing meals on social media and virtually through real-time internet platforms. Through these means, individuals not only satisfied curiosity about recipes or cuisines; they also seemed to find escape, comfort, recreation, and perhaps a sense of edification or enlightenment.

Culinary tourism businesses were hard hit by the pandemic, but some were able to create innovative services. These included online tours or exhibits of a region or a product, more content added to websites, advertising that emphasized exploring from home, and delivery services, such as a monthly package of fruits, wines, cheeses, or even snacks from around the world. 167 Meanwhile, this turn to food during the pandemic for psychological and social needs seems to be building a base of knowledge and interest that will inspire more culinary tourism in the future.

Concluding Thoughts on Culinary Tourism Scholarship and Practice

This overview of the development of culinary tourism has focused on two themes that dominate much of the scholarship: the need to develop a coherent discipline with critical theoretical models and solid research methods; and more engagement from scholars, tourism providers and tourists with sustainability in the broadest sense of the word to ensure that culinary tourism contributes in beneficial ways. Historians, in particular, can contribute by adding a temporal perspective to what tends to be a very present-and future-oriented field.

The first theme is well on its way to success. Scholars based in tourism studies, not surprisingly, dominate the field, and while much of that work emphasizes management, design, and evaluation of culinary tourism projects, much also delves into the phenomena as a cultural, social, and political domain, drawing on theories and methods from a diversity of disciplines. 168 Scholars from fields outside of tourism have also contributed significant definitions, theories, and case studies. This interdisciplinarity is one of the most exciting aspects of the field. It offers the potential to cross the common divides between the humanities and social sciences, between theory and practice, and between academia and the general public. Everyone who eats seems to be interested in culinary tourism, and is “eating up” new developments in the industry as well as commentary on it in popular media. Furthermore, the global reach of culinary tourism brings international perspectives to the field, contributing new data and issues and frequently challenging Western assumptions about food, tourism, and life in general.

The second theme goes beyond scholarship. Much of the tourism industry as well as host communities and consumers of culinary tourism are aware of issues around sustainability and are actively working toward solutions. The potential for such projects to create connections with places and people is being recognized and harnessed. Destinations become and remain economically successful only as long as their environmental and cultural resources are sustained; preserving those is therefore not only good for business but contributes to the emotional sense of belonging that many modern tourists seem to seek. That belonging in turn can create a feeling of moral responsibility among tourists for the destination that can translate into more economic support. More individuals and civic institutions are now intentionally utilizing culinary tourism in order to educate, bridge cultural and social divides, and create just and sustainable communities. In this way, they are challenging tourism itself as a colonialist enterprise.

Both of these themes reflect paradigm shifts in perceptions of food and of tourism. Understanding the historical contexts and forces for those shifts helps explain their significance and impact. Culinary tourism would not have been able to emerge as a successful industry niche without tourists recognizing food as more than fuel or commodity nor without approaching tourism as anything more than recreation or escape. Neither would it have developed as a field of scholarship without an acceptance of food as a valid subject of study. At the same time, culinary tourism projects and researchers have promoted and spread those paradigms. Culinary tourism also has the potential to further shape how those paradigms are played out. Ultimately, it can be a powerful force for making the world a more sustainable, just, and livable place. Scholars, tourism providers, and tourists can all have a hand in doing so, and many are working toward that end.

Further Reading

Bessiere, Jacinthe , and Laurence Tibere . “ Traditional Food and Tourism: French Tourist Experience and Food Heritage in Rural Spaces. ” Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture 93, no. 14 ( 2013 ): 3420–3425. doi: 10.1002/jsfa.6284.

Google Scholar

DeJong, Anna , Monica Palladino , Roma Garrido Puig , Giuseppa Romeo , and Nadia Fava . “ Gastronomy Tourism: An Interdisciplinary Literature Review of Research Areas, Disciplines, and Dynamics. ” Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism 3 ( 2018 ): 131–146.

Everett, Sally. “ Theoretical Turns Through Tourism Taste-Scapes: The Evolution of Food Tourism Research. ” Research in Hospitality Management 9, no. 1 ( 2019 ): 3–12.

Everett, Sally.   Food and Drink Tourism: Principles and Practice . London: Sage, 2016 .

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Frost, Warwick , Jennifer Laing , Gary Best , Kim Williams , Paul Strickland , and Clare Lade . Gastronomy, Tourism and the Media . Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2016 .

Hall, C. M. , L. Sharples , R. Mitchell , N. Macionis , and B. Cambourne , eds. Food Tourism Around the World . Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann, 2003 .

Hjalager, Ane-Mette , and Greg Richards , eds. Tourism and Gastronomy . London: Routledge, 2002 .

Long, Lucy M. ed. Culinary Tourism . Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 2004 .

Long, Lucy M. “ Cultural Politics in Culinary Tourism with Ethnic Foods. ” RAE-Revista de Administração de Empresas 58, no. 3 (May–June 2018): 316–324. http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S0034-759020180313 .

Long, Lucy M. , ed. Special Issue: Culinary Tourism and the Covid-19 Pandemic.   Visions in Leisure and Business 24, no. 1 ( 2022 ). https://doi.org/10.25035/visions.24.01.01 .

Medina, F. Xavier , Marìa del Pilar Leal , and José A. Vàquez-Medina . “ Tourism and Gastronomy: An Introduction. ” Anthropology of Food 13 ( 2018 ). https://doi.org/10.4000/aof.8448 .

Richards, Greg. “ Tourism and Gastronomy: From Foodies to Foodscapes. ” Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism 1 ( 2015 ): 518.

Tam, Daisy , and Nicola Frost , “ Introduction: Food Journeys-Culinary Travels in Time and Space. ” Food, Culture and Society 11, no. 2 ( 2008 ): 127–132. https://doi.org/10.2752/175174408X317525 .

Timothy, Dallen J. and Ron Amos S. “ Understanding Heritage Cuisines and Tourism: Identity, Image, Authenticity, and Change. ” Journal of Heritage Tourism 8, no. 2–3 ( 2013 ): 99–104.

Yeoman, Ian , Una McMahon-Beattie , Kevin Fields , Julia Albrecht , and Kevin Meethan . The Future of Food Tourism: Foodies, Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital . Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2015 .

1   Lucy M. Long , “Culinary Tourism: A Folkloristic Perspective on Eating and Otherness,” Southern Folklore Quarterly 55, no. 3 (1998) ; Lucy M. Long , ed., Culinary Tourism (Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 2004) ; Priscilla Boniface , Tasting Tourism: Traveling for Food and Drink (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2003) ; Hall, C. Michael , Liz Sharples , Richard Mitchell , Nikki Macionis and Brock Cambourne , eds., Food Tourism Around the World: Development, Management and Markets (Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann, 2003) ; Anne-Mette. Hjalager and Greg Richards , eds., Tourism and Gastronomy (London: Routledge, 2002).

2   Anna DeJong , Monica Palladino , Roma Garrido Puig , Giuseppa Romeo , and Nadia Fava , “Gastronomy Tourism: An Interdisciplinary Literature review of Research Areas, Disciplines, and Dynamics,” Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism 3 (2018): 131146.

3   Thomas S. Kuhn , The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996).

4   Greg Richards , “Tourism and Gastronomy: From Foodies to Foodscapes,” Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism 1, no. 1 (2015): 5–18 ; Erik Cohen and Scott A. Cohen , “Current Sociological Theories and Issues in Tourism,” Annals of Tourism Research 39, no. 4 (2012): 2177–2202.

5   Sally Everett , “Theoretical Turns Through Tourism Taste-scapes: the Evolution of Food Tourism Research,” Research in Hospitality Management 9, no. 1 (2019): 3–12.

6   Kuan-Huei Lee and Noel Scott , “Food Tourism Reviewed Using the Paradigm Funnel Approach,” Journal of Culinary Science and Technology 13, no. 2: 95–115 (2015): 97.

7   LucyM. Long , “Culinary Tourism,” in The Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics , eds. Paul B. Thompson and David M. Kaplan (Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer, 2014) ; Greg Richards , “Tourism and Gastronomy: From Foodies to Foodscapes,” Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism 1 (2015): 5–18.

8   Peter Scholliers , “The Many Rooms in the House: Research on Past Foodways in Modern Europe,” in Writing Food History: A Global Perspective , 59–71 (New York: Berg, 2012), 59.

9   Amy Bentley , “Sustenance, Abundance and the Place of Food in U.S. Histories,” in Writing Food History: A Global Perspective , 72–86 (New York: Berg, 2012), 77.

10   Paul Freedman , ed. Food: the History of Taste (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2007) ; Kenneth F. Kiple and Kriemhild Coneé Ornelas , eds., The Cambridge World History of Food (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) ; Kenneth F. Kiple , A Moveable Feast: Ten Millennia of Food Globalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

11   Sydney W. Mintz , Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History (New York: Viking, 1985) ; Sydney W. Mintz , Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1996).

12 For example, see Kevin James , Tourism, Land, and Landscape in Ireland: The Commodification of Culture (New York: Routledge, 2014) ; Anthony K. Stanosis , Creating the Big Easy: New Orleans and the Emergence of Modern Tourism, 1918–1945 (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2006) ; and Anthony K. Stanosis , ed., Dixie Emporium: Consumerism, Tourism, and Memory in the American South (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2008).

13 See, for example, Sally Everett , Food and Drink Tourism: Principles and Practice (London: Sage, 2016) ; Sally Everett, “Theoretical Turns Through Tourism Taste-Scapes” ; Lucy M. Long , “Culinary Tourism,” in The Oxford Handbook of Food History , ed. Jeffrey Pilcher (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012): 389–406 ; Richards, “Tourism and Gastronomy,” 5–18.

The definition of tourism as travel necessitating hospitality services is most often used by tourism industry professionals and scholars focusing on marketing, industry practices, and the economic aspects of tourism. The United Nations World Tourism Organization defines it: “Tourism is a social, cultural and economic phenomenon which entails the movement of people to countries or places outside their usual environment for personal or business/professional purposes. These people are called visitors (which may be either tourists or excursionists; residents or non-residents) and tourism has to do with their activities, some of which involve tourism expenditure” ( https://www.unwto.org/glossary-tourism-terms ).

15 Critical tourism theories utilize these more anthropological and philosophical definitions. John Urry’s 1990 book, The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and Travel in Contemporary Societies (London: Sage) , was seminal to these more phenomenological approaches, as was the work of Nelson H. Graburn ( Tourism: the Sacred Journey, 1977 ; as chapter in Hosts and Guests: The Anthropology of Tourism , ed. Valene Smith , Univerisity of Pennsylvania Press, 1989, 21–36 ) and Dean MacCannell ( The Tourist: A New Theory of Leisure Class , New York: Schocken, 1976). An excellent introduction to these ideas is Sharon Bohn Gmelch , ed. Tourists and Tourism: A Reader (Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, 2010.

  Sally Everett, Food and Drink .

  Long, Culinary Tourism .

18 The reticence to recognize tourism as a factor in the history of food cultures is due partly to critiques of tourism as an inherently colonialist-imperialist activity as well as industry as part of an exploitive capitalist enterprise, but it is also due to a perception of tourism itself being birthed by Western industrialization. See for example, Lisa Heldke , Exotic appetites (London: Routledge, 2003) and Dean MacCannell, Interview: http://turismografias.org/en/2017/11/04/capitalism-is-desperately-trying-to-re-make-all-of-tourism-in-its-own-image . Folklorist-anthropologist Roger Abrahams’ study of how humans categorize themselves from others through their food gives an historical overview, but leaves out tourism, “Equal Opportunity Eating: A Structural Excursus on Things of the Mouth,” in Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity , eds. Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell (Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 1984): 19–36. Folklorist Kathy Neustadt demonstrates the usefulness of historical contextualization in explaining the meanings of a contemporary food tradition in her insightful study, but equates most tourism with commercialization, Clambake: A History and Celebration of an American Tradition (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts, 1992). My own work on culinary tourism from a folkloristic perspective attempted to recognize the role of personal curiosity in exploring other cultures, broadening it to a basic human impulse that has existed historically alongside other pragmatic motivations for consuming new foods or eating while traveling. See Long, “Culinary Tourism: A Folkloristic perspective.”

  Long, “Culinary Tourism” in Encyclopedia of Food .

20   Ken Albala , Three World Cuisines: Italian, Mexican, Chinese (Rowman & Littlefield Studies in Food and Gastronomy, 2012) ; Felipe Fernandez-Armesto , Near a Thousand Tables: A History of Food (2002) ; Freedman, Food: the History of Taste ; Rachel Laudan , Cuisine and Empire: Cooking in World History (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2013) ; Jeffrey M. Pilcher , ed., The Oxford Handbook of Food History (Oxford, 2012) ; Michael Symons , A History of Cooks and Cooking (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1998/2004).

  Sally Everett, Food and Drink , 23.

22 There are numerous scholarly studies of foods of the Columbian exchange. One of the earliest overviews, Chilies to Chocolate: Food the Americas Gave the World , edited by Nelson Foster and Linda S. Cordell (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996).

23   Alan Davidson , “Europeans’ Wary Encounter with Tomatoes, Potatoes, and Other New World Foods,” in Chilies to Chocolate: Food the Americas Gave the World , ed. by Nelson Foster and Linda S. Cordell (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996), 1–14.

24   Warren Belasco , Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took on the Food Industry (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996).

25   David Harvey , The Condition of Postmodernity: An Enquiry into the Origins of Cultural Change (Oxford: Blackwell, 1989).

  Belasco, Appetite .

27   Richard Wilk , Home Cooking in the Global Village: Caribbean Food from Buccaneers to Ecotourists (New York: Berg, 2006).

  Everett, Food and Drink .

Julia Child, for example, one of the most famous Americans to study cooking in France, is never described in popular, not scholarly, literature as a “culinary tourist” even though she explored different European restaurants. This is partly because she was living in Paris but also because she presented dishes from a “refined” culinary heritage that was perceived as out of reach of the general public and therefore not available as a tourist attraction.

For example, scholarly journals: Food and Foodways: Explorations in the History and Culture of Human Nourishment (est. 1985) and organizations (Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery, est. 1983; the US-based Association for the Study of Food and Society, est. 1985).

31   J. R. Brent Ritchie and Michel Zins , “Culture as Determinant of the Attractiveness of a Tourism Region,” Annals of Tourism Research 5, (1978): 226–237.

  Everett, Food and Drink , 50; Long, “Culinary Tourism” in The Encyclopedia .

33   Wilbur Zelinsky , “The Roving Palate: North America’s Ethnic Restaurant Cuisines,” Geoforum 16, no. 1 (1985): 51–72.

34   Ben Fine , Michael Heasman , and Judith Wright , Consumption in the Age of Affluence: The World of Food (London: Routledge, 1996) ; David Grigg , “The Changing Geography of World Food Consumption in the Second Half of the Twentieth Century,” The Geographical Journal 165, no. 1 (1999): 1–11 ; Peter Scholliers , “Novelty and Tradition: The New Landscape for Gastronomy,” in Food: the History of Taste , ed. Paul Freedman (London: Thames and Hudson, 2007): 333–357 ; Peter Scholliers , “Post-1945 Global Food Developments,” in Food in Time and Place. The American Historical Association Companion to Food History , ed. Paul Freedman , Joyce Chaplin , and Ken Albala (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2014).

35   Mintel Group, Gastronomic Tourism International (London: Mintel Group, Ltd., 2009).

36 A 1998 study of ethnic foodways in New York cities by economic historian Donna Gabaccia challenged the more “purist” scholarship that tended to see commercial foods as inauthentic simulacrae ( We Are What We Eat: Ethnic Food and the Making of Americans , Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998). Scholars acknowledging food as a dynamic and fluid performative domain recognized restaurants as venues in which identities and representations could be constructed and negotiated, but that recognition was not widely shared.

37   Warwick Frost , Jennifer Laing , Gary Best , Kim Williams , Paul Strickland and Clare Lade , Gastronomy, Tourism and the Media (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2016).

  Richards, “Tourism and Gastronomy,” 2.

  Scholliers, “Post-1945,” 340–363.

40   Paul C. Reynolds , “Food and tourism: towards an understanding of sustainable culture”, Journal of Sustainable Tourism 1 (1993): 48–54.

41   David J. Telfer and Geoffrey Wall , “Linkages Between Tourism and food Production,” Annals of Tourism Research 23 (1996): 635–653.

42   Dean MacCannell , “The Tourist and the Local,” Tourist Studies 16, no. 4 (2016): 343–350.

43   C. Michael Hall , “Wine Tourism in New Zealand,” in Tourism Down Under II: Towards A More Sustainable Tourism , ed. G. Kearsley (Otago: University of Otago Centre for Tourism, 1996), 109–119.

For example, Food and Culture: A Reader , edited by anthropologists Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik, was published in 1997 by Routledge, establishing the validity of food as an academic subject and offering an overview of theoretical frameworks for studying it and folklore.

45   Jay Ann Cox , “Eating the Other: Ethnicity and the Market for Authentic Mexican Food in Tucson, Arizona” (PhD diss., University of Arizona, 1993).

  Scholliers, “The Many Rooms.” .

47   David Bell and Gill Valentine , Consuming Geographies: We Are Where We Eat (London: Routledge, 1997), 6, 185–207.

48   Jacinthe Bessiere , “Local Development and Heritage: Traditional Food and Cuisine as Tourist Attractions in Rural Areas,” Sociologia Ruralis 38, no. 1(1998): 21–34.

  Long, “Culinary Tourism: A Folkloristic,” 181.

50   C. Michael Hall , Liz Sharples , Brock Cambourne , and Niki Macionis , Wine Tourism Around the World: Development, Management and Markets (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2002) ; Hjalager and Richards, Gastronomy and Tourism .

  Scholliers, “Novelty.” .

  Mintel Group, Gastronomic Tourism .

  Richards, “Tourism and gastronomy,” 5–18.

Translated from French, Physiology of Taste: or Meditations on Transcendental Gastronomy , 1825 (Reprinted with a forward by M. F. K. Fisher, Everyman’s Library, 2009).

It could be argued here that experiencing destinations had always been a driver of tourism (See Graburn, Tourism and Urry, Tourist Gaze ), but the difference is perhaps the use of experience as a marketing category.

  Richards, “Tourism and Gastronomy,” 3.

MacCannell, “Interview.”

58   John Tribe , Philosophical Issues in Tourism (Buffalo, NY: Channel View Publications, 2009).

The separation seems to be based on stereotypes in Western (primarily English-speaking) cultures about the social classes associated with different drinks, so there is an assumption in the tourism industry that tourists interested in wine will be more upper class or upwardly mobile and more experienced in refined dining. That has changed in the last decade, but the industry still caters to wine tourists as separate from culinary and other types of tourists. For example, the wine scholar guild offers tours with an expectation that participants already have some expertise in wine ( https://www.winescholarguild.org/study-tours-for-wine-enthusiasts ). Scholars, on the other hand, now tend to include beverages with food. See Hall and Sharples, Food and Wine .

Examples in the United States include Antoine’s (est. 1840) and Galatoire’s (est. 1905) in New Orleans, Delmonico’s (est. 1837) in New York City.

61   JoanC. Henderson , “Food Tourism Reviewed,” British Food Journal 111, no. 4 (2009): 317–326.

62   C. Michael Hall and R. Mitchell , “Wine and Food Tourism,” in Special Interest Tourism: Context and Cases , ed. N. Douglas and R. Derrett (New York: Wiley, 2001), 308–317.

  Hall, et al., Food Tourism .

  Hall, et al., Food Tourism , 10.

  Hjalager and Richards, Gastronomy and Tourism .

66   Rosario Scarpato , “Sustainable Gastronomy as a Tourist Product: The Perspective of Gastronomy Studies,” in Anne-Mette Hjalager & Greg Richards (eds.), Tourism and Gastronomy (London: Routledge 2002), 51–70.

  Boniface, Tasting Tourism .

69   Erik Cohen and Nir Avieli , “Food in Tourism: Attraction and Impediment,” Annals of Tourism Research 31, no. 4 (2004): 755–778.

70   Sojna Shenoy , Food Tourism and the Culinary Tourist (unpublished PhD thesis, Clemson University, Dept. of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism Management, 2005): ii.

71   Jaksa Kivela and John C. Crotts , “Gastronomy Tourism: A Meaningful Travel Market Segment,” Journal of Culinary Science & Technology 4, nos. 2–3 (2005): 39–55 ; Bendegul Okumus , Fevzi Okumus , and Bob McKercher , “Incorporating local and international cuisines in the marketing of tourism destinations: The cases of Hong Kong and Turkey,” Tourism Management 28, no. 1 (2007): 253–261.

  James, Tourism .

74 See Sarah Gibson , “Food Mobilities: Traveling, Dwelling, and Eating Cultures,” Space and Culture 10, no. 1 (February 2007): 4–21.

75   Jennie Germann Molz , “Eating Difference: The Cosmopolitan Mobilities of Culinary Tourism,” Space and Culture 10, no. 1 (2007): 77–93.

76   Deborah Lupton, D. 1994. “Food, Memory and Meaning: The Symbolic and Social Nature of Food Events,” The Sociological Review 42, no. 4: 664–685.

77   Sally Everett , “Beyond the Visual Gaze? The Pursuit of an Embodied Experience Through Food Tourism,” Tourist Studies 8, no. 3 (2008): 337–358 , 337.

78   Rebecca Sims , “Food, Place and Authenticity: Local Food and the Sustainable Tourism Experience,” Journal of Sustainable Tourism 17 (2009): 321–336.

79   Richard C. Y. Chang , Jaksa Kivela and Athena H. N. Mak , “Food Preferences of Chinese Tourists,” Annals of Tourism Research 37 (2010): 989–1011.

80   Jeffrey Pilcher , ¡Que vivan los tamales! Food and the Making of Mexican Identity (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1988) ; Arjun Appadurai , “How to Make a National Cuisine: Cookbooks in Contemporary India,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 30, no. 1 (Jan. 1988): 3–24.

81   Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell , eds., Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity (Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 1984).

  Okumus, et al., “Incorporating.”

83   Lucy M. Long , “Tourism and the Emergence of an Appalachian Cuisine: Exploring the “Foodscape of Asheville, NC,” North Carolina Folklore Journal 57, no. 1 (2010): 4–19.

84   Richard Wilk , Home Cooking in the Global Village: Caribbean Food from Buccaneers to Ecotourists (New York: Berg, 2006).

85   Amy Trubek , “Kitchen Work: 1920–Present,” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age , ed. Amy Bentley (London: Berg, 2012): 127–144.

86   Brian Garrod , “Foodservice in Tourism and Sustainability,” in Routledge Handbook of Tourism and Sustainability, eds. C. Michael Hall , Stefan Gossling , Daniel Scott (New York: Routledge, 2014), 331–341.

87   Jennie Germann Molz , “Tasting an Imagined Thailand: Authenticity and Culinary Tourism in Thai Restaurants,” in Culinary Tourism , ed. Lucy M. Long (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2004) 53–75.

88   Daisy Tam and Nicola Frost , eds., “Food Journeys: Culinary Travels in Time and Space,” Food, Culture and Society 11, no. 2 (2008): 127–132.

89   Kaori O’Connor , “The Hawaiian Luau: Food as Tradition, Transgression, Transformation and Travel,” Food, Culture and Society 11, 9. 2 (2008): 149–172 ; Daisy Tam , “Slow Journeys,” Food, Culture and Society 11, no. 2 (2008): 207–218.

90   Bill Ellis , “Whispers in an Ice Cream Parlor: Culinary Tourism, Contemporary Legends, and the Urban Interzone,” Journal of American Folklore 122, no. 483 (2009): 53–74.

  Scarpato, “Sustainable.”

  Sims, “Food.”

93 Mintel International Group, 2009, quoted by Claire Carruthers , Amy Burns , and Gary Elliott , “Gastronomic Tourism: Development, Sustainability and Applications—A Case Study of Co. Cork, Republic of Ireland, pp. 361–369. In Philip Sloan , Willy Legrand and Clair Hindlay , eds. The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy . (New York: Routledge, 2015), 361.

94   Fernandez-Armesto, Near ; Jean-Louis Flandrin , Massimo Montanari , and Albert Sonnenfeld , eds., A Culinary History of Food (New York, Penguin, 1999) ; Kiple and Ornales, Cambridge ; Pilcher, Food .

95   Signe Rousseau , Food Media: Celebrity Chefs and the Poilitics of Everyday Interference (New York: Berg, 2012).

96   Bentley, “Sustenance” ; Emily J. H. Contois , “Welcome to Flavortown: Guy Fieri’s Populist American Food Culture,” American Studies 57, no. 3 (2018): 143–160 ; Fabio Parasecoli , Bite Me (New York: Berg, 2008) ; Ian Yeoman , Una McMahon-Beattie , Kevin Fields , Julia N. Albrecht and Kevin Meethan , eds., The Future of Food Tourism: Foodies, Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2015).

97   Vivian Nun Halloran , The Immigrant Kitchen: Food, Ethnicity, and Diaspora (Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2016). Also, a popular trend starting in South Korea in 2010 is homemade internet videos called mukbang , in which an individual eats large amounts of food.

98   Hasia R. Diner , Hungering for America: Italian, Irish, and Jewish Foodways in the Age of Migration (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003).

99   John T. Edge , The Potlikker Papers: A Food History of the Modern South (New York: Penguin Press, 2017).

100   Jessica B. Harris , High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America (New York: Bloomsbury, 2012) ; Adrian Miller , Soul Food: The Surprising Story of an American Cuisine One Plate at a Time (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2017) ; and Michael W. Twitty , The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South (New York: Harper Collins, 2017).

101   Kyri W. Claflin and Peter Scholliers , eds., Writing Food History: A Global Perspective (New York: Berg, 2012) ; Anne Murcott , Warren Belasco , and Peter Jackson , eds., The Handbook of Food Research (New York: Bloomsbury, 2013).

102   Kathleen LeBasco and Peter Naccarato , Culinary Capital (New York: Berg, 2012) ; Athena H. N. Mak , Margaret Lumbers , and Anita Eves ,, “Globalisation and food consumption in tourism” Annals of Tourism Research 39, no. 1 (2012): 171–196 ; Krishnendu Ray , “Exotic Restaurants and Expatriate Home Cooking: Indian Food in Manhattan,” in The Globalisation of Food , eds. David Inglis and Debra Gimlin (Oxford: Berg, 2009), 213–226 ; Krishnendu Ray , The Ethnic Restaurateur (London: Bloomsbury, 2016) ; Andrew F. Smith , Food in America: The Past, Present, and Future of Food, Farming, and the Family Meal. (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017).

103   Michaela DeSousey and Daphne Demetry , “The Dynamics of Dining out in the 21st century: Insights from Organizational Theory,” Sociology Compass 10 (2016): 1014–1027 ; Priscilla Parkhurst Ferguson , “Eating Out: Going Out, Staying In,” in A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age , ed. Amy Bentley (London: Berg, 2012): 111–126 ; Alison Pearlman , Smart Casual: The Transformation of Gourmet Restaurant Style in America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017).

104   S. Margot Finn , Discriminating Taste: How Class Anxiety Created the American Food Revolution (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2017) ; Scholliers, “Post-1945” ; Carmen Sarasua , Peter Scholliers , and Leen Van Volle , eds., Land, Shops and Kitchens: Technology and the Food Chain in Twentieth-Century Europe (Turnhout: Brepols, 2005) ; Alan Warde and Lydia Martens , Eating Out: Social Differentiation, Consumption, and Pleasure (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).

105   Juyan Zhang , “The Foods of the Worlds: Mapping and Comparing Contemporary Gastrodiplomacy Campaigns,” International Journal of Communication 9 (2015): 568–591.

106   Michael Dietler and Brian Hayden , eds., Feasts: Archaeological and Ethnographic Perspectives on Food, Politics, and Power (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2001).

107   Maryam Fotouhinia Yepes , “Vegetarianism for public health and for the environment: major Food and Beverage Implications,” in The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy , eds. Philip Sloan , Willy Legrand and Clair Hindley , eds. (New York: Routledge, 2015), 113–119.

108   Clair Hindley , “‘Sustainable food’: Whose Responsibility Is It Anyway? A Personal Commentary,” in The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy (New York: Routledge, 2015), 29–33.

Food sovereignty appears in various ways. The Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage, Alaska offers dinners and tastings of Native foods as part of their educational programming ( https://www.alaskanative.net ). While food sovereignty is not the focus of the Center’s mission, it does teach some of the skills and knowledge needed to revitalize Native food traditions. A spokesman for the validity and aesthetic viability of Native foods, is Sean Sherman, an Oglala Lakota Sioux chef, cookbook author, and promoter of indigenous cuisine. Sherman founded the indigenous food education business and caterer The Sioux Chef, as well as the nonprofit North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems, Minneapolis ( https://sioux-chef.com ).

  Richards, “Tourism and Gastronomy,” 5.

111   Jim Butcher , The Moralization of Tourism: Sun, Sand…And Saving the Wolrd? (New York: Routledge, 2003) ; Kellee Caton , “Taking the moral turn in tourism studies,” Annals of Tourism Research 39, no. 4 (2012): 1906–1928 ; Dean MacCannel , The Ethics of Sightseeing (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2011) ; MacCannel , “The Tourist and the Local,” Tourist Studies 16, no. 4 (2016): 343–350.

  Carruthers, Burns, and Elliott, “Gastronomic Tourism,” 361–369.

113   DeJong, et al., “Gastronomy Tourism” ; Susana Rachão , Zélia Breda , Carlos Fernandes , and Veronique Joukes , “Food Tourism and Regional Development: Systematic Literature Review,” European Journal of Tourism Research 21 (2019): 33–49.

For example, the 20 best trails listed for 2015 by USA TODAY include trails following Green Chile Cheeseburgers (New Mexico), Mississippi Gulf Seafood, Cajun Boudin (Louisiana), Hoosier Pie (Indiana), Sweet Tea (South Carolina), Kentucky Bourbon, Finger Lakes Sweet Treat (New York), and Oregon Cheese ( https://www.10best.com/awards/travel/best-food-trail/ ).

115   Lucy M. Long , “Comfort Food in Culinary Tourism: Negotiating “Home” as Exotic and Familiar,” in Comfort Food Meanings and Memories , edited by Michael Owen Jones and Lucy M. Long (Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi Press, 2017),126–149.

116   Kristin Winet , “From Street Food to Digital Kitchens: Toward a Feminist Rhetoric of Culinary Tourism (or, How Not to Devour Paris and Eat Your Way Through Asia),” in Food, Feminisms, Rhetorics , ed. Melissa A. Goldthwaite (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2017).

118   Muchazondida Mkono , “The Othering of Food in Touristic Eatertainment: A Netnography,” Tourist Studies 1, no. 3 (2011): 253–270 ; Ramesh Raj Kunwar , “Food Tourism Revisited,” Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Education 7 (2017): 83–114 ; DeJong, et al., “Gastronomy Tourism.” Organizations involved in tourism initiatives also provided overviews of the field of practice, as in Yolanda Perdomo , “Forward,” in Second Global Report on Gastronomy (UNTWO website, 2017): 11–14. http://cf.cdn.unwto .

119   Kuan-Huei Lee and Noel Scott , “Food Tourism Reviewed Using the Paradigm Funnel Approach.” Journal of Culinary Science and Technology . 13, no. 2 (2015): 95–115.

120 See, for example, Alessio Cavicchi and Christina Santini , Food and Wine Events in Europe: A Stakeholder Approach (New York: Routledge, 2014).

Some claim that “food tourism” is all encompassing, while the other names suggest an elitism highlighting gourmet cuisines, but such bias is not built into any of the terms. An illustration of the arbitrariness of the wording is that Poland, according to colleagues there told me (personal communications May 2019) they decided to officially use “culinary tourism” because it translates into Polish more poetically than the other options.

122   Anne-Mette Hjalager , editor-in-chief, Journal of Gastronomy and Tourism , 1(2015) : title page.

123   Ian Yeoman , Una McMahon-Beattie , Kevin Fields , Julia N. Albrecht , and Kevin Meethan , eds., The Future of Food Tourism: Foodies, Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2015) ; Kevin Meethan , “Making the Difference: The Experience Economy and the Future of Regional Food Tourism,” in The Future of Food Tourism (2015): 114–126.

124   Stephen Boyd , “The Past and Present of Food Tourism,” in The Future of Food Tourism: Foodies, Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital , eds. Yeoman , et al. (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2015): 11–22.

125   John Mulcahy , “Transforming Ireland through Gastronomic Nationalism,” in Tickling the Palate: Gastronomy in Irish Literature and Culture , eds. Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire and Eamon Maher (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2014): 159–174.

126   Kevin Fields , “Demand for the Gastronomy Tourism Product: Motivational Factors,” p. 37, in Tourism and Gastronomy , eds, in A.-M. Hjalager and G. Richards (London: Routledge 2002), 36–50.

127   Kevin Meetham , Warwick Frost , Jennifer Laing , Gary Best , Kim Williams , Paul Strickland , and Clare Lade , Gastronomy, Tourism and the Media (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2016).

  Frost, et al., Gastronomy .

129   John Stanley and Linda Stanley , Food Tourism: A Practical Marketing Guide (Boston, MA: CABI, 2015). Erik Wolf, “Culinary Tourism: A Tasty Economic Proposition” (self-published paper, 2002).

  Dejong, et al., “Gastronomy Tourism,” 143.

  Everett, “Theoretical Turns,” 9.

132   C. Michael Hall and S. Gossling , Sustainable Culinary Systems: Local Foods, Innovation, Tourism, and Hospitality (Abingdon: Routledge, 2013).

  DeJong, et al., “Gastronomy Tourism.” .

134   Long, “Culinary Tourism,” in The Oxford ; 389–406); Lucy M. Long , “Tourism,” in Routledge International Handbook to Food Studies , ed., Ken Albala (New York: Routledge, 2013), chapter 31 ).

  Long, “Culinary Tourism,” in The Encyclopedia .

136   Philip Sloan , Willy Legrand , and Clair Hindley , eds., The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy (New York: Routledge, 2015).

137   F. Xavier Medina , Maria del Pilar Leal , and José A. Vázquez-Medina , eds. Special Issue, “Tourism and Gastronomy,” Anthropology of Food 13 (2018).

138   Filipe Augusto Couto Barbosa and Janine Helfst Leicht Collaço , “Eating Identities and Places: Brazilian Tourism Studies on Gastronomy (2007–2016),” Anthropology of Food 13 (2018) ; Maria del Pilar Leal Londoño , José A. Vázquez-Medina and F. Xavier Medina , “Gastronomy and Tourism: Blending Local Essence and Global Logic,” Anthropology of Food 13 (2018) ; Nicole Kilburn , “Culinary Tourism, the Newest Crop in Southern Italy’s Farms and Pastures,” Anthropology of food 13 (2018) ; Medina, et al, Special Issue; Ignacio López Moreno and Encarnación Aguilar Criado , “From the Landscape to the Table: The Role of Social Institutions in the Transformation of the Tourist Experience in the Island of Texel, The Netherlands,” Anthropology of Food 13 (2018).

139   Chiara Rinaldi , “Food and Gastronomy for Sustainable Place Development: A Multidisciplinary Analysis of Different Theoretical Approaches” Sustainability 9, no. 10 (2017): 1–25

140   Theodore Metaxas and Dimitris Kartagiannis , “Culinary Tourism in Greece: Can the Past Define the Future? Dimensions of Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development,” Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship 21, no. 3 (2016).

141   Harry G. West , “Bringing It All Back Home: Reconnecting the Country and the City Through Heritage Food Tourism in the French Auvergne,” in Food Between the Country and the City: Ethnographies of a Changing Global Foodscape , Nuno Domingos , Jose Manuel Sobral , and Harry G. West , eds. (New York: Bloomsbury, 2014, pp. 73–88 ).

142   Nikki Rose , “Responsible Travel as a Means to Preserve Cultural and Natural Heritage: Initiatives in Crete, Greece,” in Philip Sloan , Willy Legrand and Clair Hindley , eds. The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy (New York: Routledge, 2015), 370–375.

143   Wantanee Suntikul , Rodrigues Ng Iris , Ho Weng , Luo Ziao Yan , Lam Iok Cheng , and Chan Weng San , “Sustaining and Spreading Local Food Culture Through Cooking Classes: A Case Study of Chiang Mai, Thailand,” in The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy , ed. Philip Sloan , Willy Legrand and Clair Hindley (London: Routledge, 2015), 86–95.

144   Sankyun Kim and Ashleigh Ellis , “Noodle Production and Consumption: From Agriculture to Food Tourism in Japan,” Tourism Geographies 17, no. 1 (2015): 151–167.

145   Burein Hatipogllu , Volkan Aktan , Demir Duzel , Eda Kocabas , and Busra Sen , “Developing Food Tourism Through Collaborative Efforts Within the Heritage Destination of Foca, Izmir,” in Heritage Tourism Destinations: Preservation, Communication and Development , eds. Maria D. Alvarez , Frank M. Go and Atila Yuksel (Boston, MA: CABI, 2016): 63–75.

  Perdomo, “Forward,” 14.

  Albala, Three World Cuisines ; Ferguson, “Eating Out” ; Pilcher, Oxford History .

148 For a critique of how culinary heritage is connected to food history, see Paul Cleave , “Food for Thought: culinary Heritage, Nostalgia, and Food History,” in Philip Sloan , Willie Legrand , and Clair Hindley , eds., The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable Food and Gastronomy (New York: Routledge, 2015), 34–44.

149   Eugenia Afinoguenova , “An Organic nation: State-Run Tourism, Regionalism, and Food in Spain, 1905–1931,” The Journal of Modern History 86 (December 2014): 743–779.

150 See, for example, Daniel E. Bender and Adrian De Leon , “Everybody was Boodle Fighting: Military Histories, Culinary Tourism, and Diasporic Dining,” in Food, Culture and Society 21, no. 1 (2018): 25–41 ; Traci Arden , “Now Serving Maya Heritage: Culinary Tourism in Yaxunah, Yucatan, Mexico,” Food and Foodways 26, no. 4 (2018): 290–312.

151   Dallen J. Timothy , ed., Heritage Cuisines (London: Routledge, 2016) ; Dallen J. Timothy and Amos S. Ron , “Understanding Heritage Cuisines and Tourism: Identity, Image, Authenticity, and Change,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 8, nos. 2–3 (2013): 99–104.

152   Warwick Frost and Jennifer Laing , “Cuisine, Migration, Colonialism and Diasporic Identities,” in Timothy , Heritage Cuisines , 37–52 ; Gregory Ramshaw , “Food, Heritage and Nationalism,” in Timothy , Heritage Cuisines , 53–64.

153   Stephen Williams and Alan A. Lew , Tourism Geography: Critical Understandings of Place, Space and Experience , 3rd edition (New York: Routledge, 2015).

154   Yi-Fu Tuan , Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience (Minneapolis: Univertsity of Minnesota Press, 1977).

155   Sally Everett , “Production Places or Consumption Spaces? The Place-making Agenda of Food Tourism in Ireland and Scotland,” Tourism Geographies 14, no. 4 (2012): 535–554 ; Chammy Lau and Yiping Li , “Analyzing the Effects of an Urban Food Festival: A Place Theory Approach,” Annals of Tourism Research 74 (2019): 43–55 ; Zhang, “Foods of World.”

156   Mary Beth Colby , “Authentic Dishes, Staged Identities: Thailand’s Cooking Schools for Tourists,” Gastronomica 19, no. 2 (2019): 43–55 ; Claudia Bell , “Tourists Infiltrating Authentic Domestic Space at Balinese Home Cooking Schools,” Tourist Studies (2014), https://doi.org/10.1177/1468797614550958 ; Bipithalal Balakrishnan Nair , Satyajit Siha , M.R. Dileep , “What Makes Inauthenticity Dangerous: An Explorative Study of Ethnic Cuisine and Tourism,” Tourism 68, no. 4 (2020): 371–388. For a critique of contemporary concepts of authenticity, see Matthew Strohl , “On Culinary Authenticity,” The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 77, no. 2 (Spring 2019): 157–167. “Typicality” tends to be used in European scholarship on identifying products that represent a culture. See Giovanni Ceccarelli , Alberto Grandi , and Stefano Magagnoli , eds. Typicality in History: Tradition, Innovation, and Terroir. Part III: Typical Products, Terroir, and Tourism (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2013).

  Richards, “Tourism and Gastronomy.”

  Lau and Li, “Analyzing.”

159   Lucy M. Long , “Food Pilgrim or Food Tourist?” BBC podcast (Febuary 1, 2018). https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05ws29n .

160   David Livert , “A Cook’s Tour Abroad: Long-Term Effects of Intergroup Contact on Positive Outgroup Attitudes,” Journal of Social Issues 72, no. 3 (2016): 524–547.

  Winet, “From Street Food.”

163   Antonio-Miguel Noguales-Pedregal , “Anthropological Contributions to Tourism Studies,” Annals of Tourism Research 75 (2019): 227–237 ; Long, “Cultural Politics.”

  Parasecoli, Bite Me , 144–145.

  Long, Culinary Tourism ; Long, “Culinary Tourism.” In The Encyclopedia of Food .

166   Lucy M. Long , “Virtual Culinary Tourism in the Time of COVID-19,” Visions in Leisure and Business 24, no. 1 (2022): article 4. https://doi.org/10.25035/visions.24.01.01 .

The last one, run by a company called Universal Yums, includes a booklet that “guides your adventure with trivia, recipes, and other surprises.” www.universalyums.com .

168 For assessments of where the field is going from a tourism scholarship perspective, see Ian Yeoman , Una McMahon-Beattie , and Carol Wheatley , “The Future of Food Tourism: A Cognitive Map(s) Perspective,” in The Future of Food Tourism: Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital (Toronto: Channel View Publications, 2015), 237–278 ; Eunice Eunjung Yoo , “Food in Scholarship: Thoughts of Trajectories for Future Research,” in The Future of Food Tourism: Experiences, Exclusivity, Visions and Political Capital (Toronto: Channel View Publications,2015), 225–236. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020 is assessed in essays in Lucy. M. Long , ed. Special Issue: Culinary Tourism and the Covid-19 Pandemic, Visions in Leisure and Business 24, no. 1 (2022). https://doi.org/10.25035/visions.24.01.01 .

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Culinary Tourism

CULINARY TOURISM: “Eating Out Of Curiosity”

—“the intentional, exploratory participation in the foodways of an Other”  (Long, 2004) “Exploring the world through food.” Also known as gastrotourism and food tourism.

The phrase “ culinary tourism ” was coined by folklorist Dr. Lucy Long to explore the meanings, motivations, and implications of seeking food experiences different from our usual ones. She introduced it at scholarly conferences in 1996 and first used it in print in 1998. It was later the title of Long’s edited volume (2004) and has since been adopted internationally by the tourism industry to refer to highlighting food as a tourist destination and attraction. Long has also applied her concepts to food-related programs throughout the world, to educational strategies in museums (particularly the Smithsonian Institution Folklore Festival), and to tourism initiatives. She developed a model for culinary tourism in the Bowling Green Tourism Trail (Ohio) that focuses on introducing tourists to the food culture of the area.

Long’s model of culinary tourism offers ways in which tourism can be used for cultural education and interpretation as well as for economic, social, and environmental sustainability. This “eating out of curiosity” also offers a way of exploring the world. Food opens up new cultures for us. It offers a window into the lives of other people, other times and regions, religions, belief systems, and social classes. Such exploration can be done through cookbooks, cooking shows, grocery stores, family recipes, and everyday meals in our own kitchens as well as through travel, fine dining restaurants, and exotic or gourmet foods. This understanding of culinary tourism also makes us aware of the power food has to carry memories, affirm relationships, construct identity, and encourage artistic self-expression.

Most of us approach new foods with a certain amount of curiosity: will it taste good; will it make us sick; can it really be eaten? But some of us also approach new food as an adventure, as an opportunity to try new experiences. This spirit of adventure characterizes culinary tourism. “Eating out of curiosity” introduces us not only to foods that are new to us, but also to a way of exploring the world. Food opens up new cultures for us. It offers a window into the lives of other people, other times and regions, religions, belief systems, and social classes. And such exploration can be done through cookbooks, cooking shows, grocery stores, family recipes, and everyday meals in our own kitchens as well as through travel, fine dining restaurants, and exotic or gourmet foods.

“Culinary tourism is about food as a subject and medium, destination and vehicle, for tourism. It is about individuals exploring foods new to them as well as using food to explore new cultures and ways of being. It is about groups using food to “sell” their histories and to construct marketable and publicly attractive identities, and it is about individuals satisfying curiosity. Finally, it is about the experiencing of food in a mode that is out of the ordinary, that steps outside the normal routine to notice difference and the power of food to represent and negotiate that difference.” ( Long, 2004)

Culinary Tourism , edited by Lucy M. Long, Univ. Press of Kentucky, 2004.

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What is Culinary Tourism? Exploring Culture Through Food

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What is culinary tourism? Also known as food tourism or gastronomy tourism, it is all about exploring a destination through its flavors. It’s a way to get a taste—quite literally—of a place’s cultural and culinary identity.

When you decide to take a trip based on the foods and beverages that a region is known for, you’re diving into a delicious realm of travel that satiates more than just your appetite. It’s a sensory adventure where your taste buds lead the way as you discover local dishes, traditional techniques, and the stories behind every bite.

Imagine yourself wandering through vibrant street markets, sampling exotic spices, or sitting at a table with locals enjoying a home-cooked meal.

Culinary tourism unfolds in cooking classes, wine tastings, and farm-to-table experiences. It’s a chance for you to connect with a region’s history, people, and traditions.

You don’t need to be a food expert to indulge in culinary tourism; all you need is curiosity and an appreciation for good food. As you plan your next getaway, why not let your cravings be your compass and turn each meal into an opportunity to create unforgettable memories?

What sets culinary tourism apart is its participatory nature. You’re not just eating; you’re engaging with the food landscape, meeting producers, chefs, and fellow food lovers.

This kind of travel encourages immersive experiences, such as picking fresh ingredients at an organic farm or learning to make pasta in an Italian grandmother’s kitchen. The stories and skills you bring back from your journey become souvenirs that last a lifetime.

Whether it’s savoring a new taste or understanding the intricate process of making traditional dishes, culinary tourism offers an authentic slice of life wherever you go.

Explore Italy as a food destination: 10 Best Italian Cooking Vacations 2024: Buon Appetito .

Exploring Culinary Tourism

Culinary tourism is about pursuing unique and memorable eating and drinking experiences. Whether you’re munching on local street food in Mexico or enjoying a fine dining experience in Paris, you’re participating in a flavorful journey.

Definition and Scope

Culinary tourism, also known as food tourism or gastronomy tourism, taps into the desire to explore a culture through its flavors. Your culinary adventures can range from local cooking courses to winery tours, encompassing any travel experience where the primary goal is to discover new tastes and food traditions.

According to the World Food Travel Association , this form of tourism is not limited to gourmet food but includes a complete range of experiences.

History and Evolution

The concept of traveling to various destinations to experience the food they offer has historical roots.

Over time, it’s evolved from leisurely aristocratic tours of the 19th century, focusing on European haute cuisine, to a much broader scope today. You’ve got food bloggers, TV shows, and festivals that further popularize this form of tourism, making it accessible to food tourists of all types seeking a taste of authenticity.

Types of Culinary Tourism

You’ll find a delectable array of culinary tourism types to satisfy your appetite for adventure:

• Food Festivals:  A chance to try a variety of dishes at one go, usually themed around specific types of food or cultures.
• Cooking Classes:  Hands-on opportunities to learn the intricacies of a region’s cuisine.
• Restaurant Tours:  Guided tours focusing on a series of eateries known for authentic and innovative culinary creations.
• Street Food Tours:  Dive into the heart of the city’s food scene with a food tour dedicated to street food.
• Winery/Brewery/Distillery Visits:  Explore the world of drinks from production to the first sip.
• Farm or Market Tours:  Get a fresh perspective by tracing the journey of ingredients from source to plate.

The Culinary Tourism Experience

Culinary tourism spotlights the delicious intersection between exploring new destinations and savoring their unique food offerings. Your journey will lead you to taste the essence of the region’s culture and history expressed through its cuisine.

Savoring Local Flavors

Immerse yourself in the rich tapestry of local gastronomy by indulging in regional specialties. Authenticity is emphasized, whether it’s a street food stall serving fresh, spicy tacos or a renowned restaurant famed for its delicate pastries. You’ll uncover the heart of your destination’s culinary identity, from traditional dishes passed down through generations to contemporary interpretations that fuse different cultural influences.

• Local Specialties : Tasting iconic regional dishes.
• Seasonal Offerings : Enjoying food made from ingredients at their peak.
• Distinctive Food : Discovering what sets the local cuisine apart.

Culinary Tours and Activities

Get a taste of the local scene through organized  food tours . These guided experiences often include a curated selection of eateries, each chosen to represent a facet of the culinary landscape. From bustling markets to high-end bistros, you’ll gain an overview of the destination’s dining spectrum. And don’t miss out on the chance to attend  cooking classes , where you can don an apron and learn to recreate the flavors of your travels in your own kitchen.

• Food Tours : A guided tour through diverse culinary stops.
• Cooking Classes : Hands-on learning to prepare local dishes.
• Market Visits : Experiencing the hub of local food culture.

Interactive Food Experiences

Step into an interactive realm where you’re more than just a spectator. Engage with local chefs during cooking classes as they share their secrets and techniques. Pull up a chair at communal tables where meals are shared and stories told, or roll up your sleeves to participate in a cooking workshop. Throughout these experiences, the dynamic of food and drink intertwines with education and community, offering you a deeper connection to the locale.

• Chef-Led Workshops : Deep dives into culinary crafts.
• Tasting Sessions : Sampling a variety of local offerings.
• Food Festivals : Celebrating with fellow food enthusiasts.

Economic and Social Aspects

Food tourism plays a crucial role in shaping destinations’ economic and social landscapes. Tourists contribute significantly to the area’s financial well-being by indulging in local cuisine.

Local businesses, including restaurants and farms, benefit directly from travelers seeking authentic dining experiences, leading to job creation and community development.

In addition to economic impacts, culinary tourism encourages sustainable practices within the food tourism industry. Destinations frequently promote locally grown and harvested foods, which reduces long-distance transportation and minimizes consumption’s carbon footprint.

Moreover, culinary tourism fosters community and cultural connections. Sharing a meal opens doors to understanding the local culture and strengthens bonds within the community.

Global and Regional Cuisines

Exploring the world through taste lets you experience the heart of a culture. Each region’s unique flavors and cooking traditions are showcased in their cuisine, which is often a point of pride.

When you set off on a culinary adventure, you’re not just trying new foods; you’re literally tasting the culture’s history and geography on a plate.  Cuisine  transforms into an edible map where regional specialties provide a sense of  taste of place . For instance:

• Italy : Think beyond spaghetti. Each region boasts its own signature, like the creamy risottos of the north and the zestier, olive-oil-rich dishes of the south.
• Japan : It’s not just sushi and ramen. Delicate flavors and meticulous presentation reflect the country’s aesthetic and philosophical ideals.
• Mexico : Dive into the tapestry of Mesoamerican and European influences with dishes ranging from the complex Oaxaca moles to the coastal areas’ fresh seafood ceviches.
• France: Its cuisine is a cornerstone of the world’s fine dining. From classic sauces to perfectly-executed tartes, you’ll enjoy the artistry of French cooking.

Educational Aspects

Exploring the educational aspects of culinary tourism, you’ll have the opportunity to expand your knowledge and skills in food preparation and production. Through hands-on experiences and expert insights, you’ll get an in-depth look at the culinary world.

Culinary Workshops and Cooking Classes

You’re in for a treat with  culinary workshops and cooking classes  where professional chefs share their secrets. You’ll learn:

• Techniques : Master the art of slicing, dicing, and sautéing.
• Recipes : Take home new recipes to impress friends and family.
• Presentation : Discover the importance of plating for a visual feast.

Brewery and Winery Tours

Next up,  brewery and winery tours  allow you to dive into the beverage industry. You’ll experience:

• Processes : Understand the steps of brewing beer or crafting wine.
• Tastings : Develop your palate through guided tastings.
• Pairings : Find out the art of pairing drinks with food.

Learning About Agriculture and Local Produce

During your journey, paying a visit to farms or markets lets you appreciate  agriculture and local produce . Here’s what’s on the menu:

• Farming Methods : Gain insight into organic and sustainable practices.
• Local Ingredients : Discover the freshest, locally sourced ingredients.
• Seasonality : Learn how to cook with the seasons for optimal flavor.

In conclusion, culinary tourism is more than just indulging in a region’s food and drink; it’s about immersing oneself in the local people’s culture, traditions, and lifestyle.

Whether you’re tasting a farm-to-table meal in a rural setting or savoring a gourmet dish in a city’s bustling heart, you’re participating in a global phenomenon that fosters sustainability, boosts local economies, and deepens cultural connections.

So, the next time you ask yourself, “What is Culinary Tourism?” remember that it’s an adventure of taste that connects us to the heart of a destination and its people, making travel experiences truly unforgettable.

• 7 Best Tuscany Cooking Vacations 2024: A Taste of Tuscany
• 10 Best Cooking Classes in Rome for Italian Cuisine Lovers

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Culinary tourism: The growth of food tourism around the world

Culinary tourism is a popular type of tourism throughout the world, but what exactly is culinary tourism? Is it different from food tourism? Why is culinary tourism important? And where are the best places to travel for culinary tourism? Read on to find out…

What is culinary tourism?

Importance of food tourism, culinary tourism activities, culinary tourism in bangkok, culinary tourism in tokyo, culinary tourism in honolulu, culinary tourism in durban, culinary tourism in new orleans, culinary tourism in istanbul, culinary tourism in paris, culinary tourism marrakesh, culinary tourism in mumbai, culinary tourism in miami, culinary tourism rio de janeiro, culinary tourism in beijing, food tourism- further reading.

Culinary tourism, also often referred to as food tourism, is all about exploring food as a form of tourism. Whether that be eating, cooking, baking, attending a drinks festival or visiting a farmers market – all of these come under the concept of culinary tourism. It’s something you don’t even really need to travel to do. Heading to your nearest big city or even the next town over, specifically to eat at a certain restaurant, classes as food tourism! And food tourism has taken a new twist since the COVID pandemic too, when many people would cook or eat a variety of different foods from around the world in attempt to bring an element of travel to their own home! Who said you need to travel far to be a culinary tourist, huh?

Food tourism is a vitally important component of the travel and tourism industry as a whole. When booking a trip, people tend to consider a variety of factors – and food is high on the list of priorities. The World Food Travel Association says that money spent on food and drink while travelling accounts for 15-35% of all tourism spending. Culinary tourism is important in that it generates so much money for local economies.

Culinary tourism is also an important branch of tourism in that it can promote local businesses, as well as help to shine a light on different cuisines. For so many cultures, their cuisine is a huge part of who they are. Culinary tourism helps to celebrate this, by attracting interested tourists who are keen to try something new and share it with the world. In this way, it definitely helps to boost community pride and is a great example of cultural tourism .

This type of tourism is also important to tourists. It provides a chance to try new foods and flavours, and discover new cultures through their taste buds. Visitors who engage in food tourism come away with new recipes to try, new foods to introduce their friends to, and memories that they will always associate with their sense of taste.

There are many activities which come under the remit of culinary tourism, or food tourism. I mentioned some above, but let’s take a closer look.

• Eating and drinking out: going to restaurants, cafes, bars, pubs, tea shops and so on. These are all examples of culinary tourism. 
• Food/beverage tours: you can book onto organised food and drink tours when visiting a new city. These are run by guides who will take you to various foodie spots throughout the city – usually small businesses – to try local delicacies.
• Farmers markets: visiting a farmers market at the weekend to buy fresh produce is seen as a form of food tourism.
• Cooking classes: another activity you can get involved with on your travels is a cooking or baking class. You’ll often make, again, a local delicacy whether that be pierogi in Poland or pasta in Italy . Tasting sessions: brewery tours and vineyard visits (and other similar excursions) where you get to take a look at how something is made and then try it for yourself are another form of culinary tourism.

Best cities for food tourism

Most cities, major or otherwise, have excellent examples of food tourism. In fact – this goes right down to tiny towns and villages, some of which have incredible restaurants or bars that are real hidden gems. Below you’ll find some of the world’s best cities for culinary tourism, however, with examples of the sort of thing you can do there!

Thai food is some of the best food around, and Bangkok has a lot of restaurants suited to all budgets. Eating out in Bangkok is a brilliant example of culinary tourism. One of the best things you can do here is try the local street food! Wang Lang Market is one of the most popular places for street food, with fresh food filling the lanes from snacks to full-on meals. Silom Soi 20 is another great spot in central Bangkok, perfect for the morning.

Looking for somewhere really unique to eat in Bangkok? Head to Cabbages and Condoms , a themed cafe decorated with (you guessed it) condoms. The restaurant say they were ‘conceptualized in part to promote better understanding and acceptance of family planning and to generate income to support various development activities of the Population and Community Development Association (PDA)’.

Tokyo is a very popular city, and one of the best ways to experience food tourism here is to book onto a food tour. Tokyo Retro Bites is a fantastic one, giving you a feel of old-style Tokyo at the quaint Yanaka Market. This is a walking tour which includes drinks and 5 snacks, lasting 2 hours. It starts at 11.30am meaning it’s a great chance to have lunch somewhere a bit different!

This beautiful Hawaiian city has so many fun places to eat (and drink!) while visiting. One of the best things to do in terms of culinary tourism is to eat somewhere you wouldn’t be able to eat at home – and try new flavours or dishes. Honolulu is the perfect place to do this. Some interesting eateries include:

• Lava Tube – based in Waikiki, this 60s-kitsch style bar offers pina coladas served in giant pineapples, $5 Mai Tais, delicious food and plenty of fun decor.
• Suzy Wong’s Hideaway – this is described as a ‘dive bar with class’ and is a great bar to visit to watch sports games.
• MW Restaurant – this is a really famous and creative place to eat in Honolulu – the mochi-crusted Kona Kanpachi comes highly recommended and helped shoot the chef, Wade Ueoka, to fame.

Hailed as the world’s best food city, a list of places for food tourists to visit has to include Durban in South Africa . Bunny Chow is a local delicacy that you cannot miss while visiting Durban. It is now available elsewhere, but the original is usually the best so be sure to try some while in the city. The dish is half a loaf of bread hollowed out and filled with curry – delicious. This article shares 5 fantastic spots to get Bunny Chow in Durban !

As one of the culinary capitals of the US, New Orleans is incredibly popular with foodies. The city is a hotspot for food tourism, thanks to the various cultural roots here: Cajun, Creole and French. There is a whole range of tastes to try. You could spend your time here *just* eating and still not scratch the surface when it comes to the amazing restaurants, cafes and eateries in NOLA. Some foods you have to try include:

• Po’boys: fried shrimp, generally, but sometimes beef or other seafood – served on a fresh crusty roll.
• Gumbo : this is a stew, again usually containing seafood, alongside bell peppers, onion and celery.
• Crawfish etouffee: a French crawfish stew served over rice.
• Muffuletta: a Silician-American sandwich served on a specific type of bread.
• Side note, you can do a haunted pub crawl in NOLA . Would you?!

Being split across two continents, it is no surprise that Istanbul as a city has a huge range of delicious food-related activities. From kebabs sold on the street to 5 star restaurants serving the finest hummus, Istanbul is a fantastic destination for food tourism. Book onto the ‘Two Markets, Two Continents’ tour – you’ll visit two markets, as the name suggests, on the two continents. The tour includes a Bosphorus ferry crossing between the two districts of Karaköy (Europe) and Kadiköy (Asia). You’ll enjoy breakfast, tea and coffee, meze, dessert and so much more during this 6.5 hour tour .

The city of love – and the city of bakeries! Fresh baguettes, simple croissants, delicious eclairs… the list goes on. There are so many of them dotted around, whether you want something to grab and snack on while you head to the Eiffel Tower or if you want a sit down brunch, you’ll find one that suits you perfectly.

And that’s not all. Paris, also famous for its snails, soups and frogs legs, has so many fine dining opportunities. You’ll be spoilt for choice in terms of Michelin star restaurants: Boutary, ASPIC, 114 Fauborg and so many more. There are also some fantastic food tours in Paris . If you have the cash to splash out, fine dining in Paris is a brilliant culinary tourism activity…

Moroccan food is delicious. And you can try making it yourself during a cooking class in Marrakech ! Visit a traditional souk and try your hand at some tasty recipes – you never know, you might have a hidden talent. Some tours even include shopping for ingredients, so you can visit a traditional market too; these are a sensory dream with so many smells, colours, sounds and sights.

India is another country where street food is king. Mumbai has plenty to offer, and one culinary tourism activity you can do is to spend an afternoon trying as many dishes as possible while simply wandering through the city. If you’ve never tried a vada pav before, this is the place to do so: it’s essentially deep fried mashed potato in a bun with various chutneys, and it is exquisite. Many people are surprised to learn that one of the most popular British foods – chicken tikka masala is not commonly found in India, but fear not, there are many other dishes that are just as goods or if not better!

Miami is known for its food – and Cuban food is a big deal here. Take a traditional Cuban cooking class , or head to one of the many, many Cuban restaurants here . There is something for every budget, and your tastebuds will certainly thank you. It is also close to Key West, a wonderful place to visit for a day or two. They’re big on sea food here, and walking tours which incorporate seafood are high on the list of recommended things to do in beautiful Key West.

You cannot go to Rio and not try cahaça. This is Brazilian brandy made from sugar canes, and it is a big deal over here. Culinary tourism isn’t limited to food – it includes drink too, so head to one of Rio’s many bars and try a caipirinha. You can even book an organised pub crawl , which includes free shots and drinks, around the city. This is perfect if you want to explore at night knowing you’ll be safe and always have transport on hand.

Peking duck is the highlight of Beijing food. Quanjuede is world-famous for its Peking duck, and it’s not too expensive. There are branches worldwide now, though, and much of culinary tourism is about experiencing something you won’t be able to elsewhere. Speak to the locals when you’re there and ask where their favourite place is for Peking duck. That way you’ll know you are supporting a great local business; as mentioned, food tourism is great for boosting the economy this way!

If you have enjoyed this article about culinary tourism, or food tourism, then I am sure that you will love these too!

• What is pilgrimage tourism and why is it important?
• What is red tourism and why is it growing so fast?
• Overtourism explained: What is it and why is it so bad?
• Enclave tourism: A simple explanation

What is Culinary Tourism ?

A tourist takes meals and snacks while traveling. But they do not care about what they eat. It can be local food or food that they are familiar with. So it doesn’t count as a culinary tourism trip. But if a tourist travels to a destination mainly to experience local food in that destination, then it becomes a culinary tourism trip.

Culinary Tourism’s main goal is to give travelers a chance to explore the local area and learn about local food trends, cooking techniques, and food history. It has an educational perspective as well. Food creates curiosity and through that, a tourist is encouraged to learn about the culture of a particular cuisine and the locals involved in producing and preparing it as well.

Examples of culinary tourism includes a wide range of activities related to cooking and dining. Dining events, cooking competitions, winery and brewery tours, restaurant tours, tours to food manufacturing plants, conferences with culinary professionals are some of them. But different destinations have their own ways of culinary tourism, not just limited to these activities.

If a person likes french food then he or she can enroll in a cooking class in Paris as a guest. If one loves Italian or Mediterranean food, there are farmhouse cooking vacations where you stay there for some period and learn about their culture and food. Some other destinations offer dining experiences where the tourist is met with local restaurant chefs and let them take part in cooking lessons and seminars.

With the boom of social media more and more people are seeing pictures and videos of travel-related foods and drinks that make them want to travel to that destination and experience it. Therefore this tourism trend is growing day by day and more and more destinations are adjusting their hospitality businesses to suit this.

Culinary tourism is also called Gastronomy Tourism or Food Tourism. But basically they are all the same with very little differences. According to Technavio Research Report , global culinary tourism market will grow by a CAGR of 9% by 2023. Travel agencies are now adjusting their packages to meet culinary tourism needs. Or else one can search the internet to find culinary tour packages all around the world.

Other Topics : What is Organic Culinary Tourism ?

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Culinary Tourism as an Avenue for Tourism Development: Mapping the Flavors of the Philippines

• First Online: 28 September 2022

Cite this chapter

• Eylla Laire M. Gutierrez 5 ,
• John Paolo R. Rivera 5 &
• Fernando Martin Y. Roxas 5  

Part of the book series: Perspectives on Asian Tourism ((PAT))

267 Accesses

1 Citations

Culinary tourism has emerged globally at a rapid pace. Food has become a deciding factor in choosing a destination and a central part of a travel experience. The Philippines is brimming with heirloom recipes, food-centric festivals, olden cooking practices, and home to world-class homegrown culinary talents that contribute to the emerging popularity of Filipino food. Likewise, in the Philippine National Tourism Development Plan, Filipino cuisine is identified as a key tourism product. However, many culinary experts deem that Filipino cuisine still lacks the kind of identity and branding needed for it to be sought by travellers. Hence, this chapter provided an overview of Filipino cuisine through culinary mapping, to gain a better understanding on how it can develop a strong identity against the backdrop of global cuisines. Our analysis contributes to furthering the identity of Filipino food, strengthening the culinary tourism industry, and improving the understanding of Filipino cultural heritage through cuisines.

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Gutierrez, E.L.M., Rivera, J.P.R., Roxas, F.M.Y. (2022). Culinary Tourism as an Avenue for Tourism Development: Mapping the Flavors of the Philippines. In: Aquino, R.S., Porter, B.A. (eds) Tourism in the Philippines. Perspectives on Asian Tourism. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-4497-0_4

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33 Facts About Novocherkassk

Written by Cicily Bullington

Modified & Updated: 11 Sep 2024

Reviewed by Jessica Corbett

• Cultural Heritage Facts
• Historical Facts
• Russian Culture Facts
• Soviet Union Facts
• Tourist Attractions Facts

Novocherkassk, located in southern Russia, is a city steeped in history and cultural significance. With its rich heritage spanning centuries, Novocherkassk offers a fascinating glimpse into the past while also embracing modernity. This vibrant city has plenty to offer, from its architectural marvels and historical landmarks to its bustling markets and renowned cuisine.

In this article, we will explore 33 fascinating facts about Novocherkassk that will give you a deeper understanding of this remarkable city. Whether you are planning a visit or simply curious to learn more, these facts will take you on a journey through time and introduce you to the unique charm of Novocherkassk.

Key Takeaways:

• Novocherkassk, a city in Russia, is rich in Cossack heritage, vibrant arts, and traditional cuisine. Visitors can experience warm hospitality, cultural events, and picturesque landscapes, making it a must-visit destination.
• The city of Novocherkassk offers a blend of history, culture, and natural beauty. From traditional Cossack festivals to thriving arts and culinary scenes, there’s something for everyone to explore and enjoy in this enchanting city.

Novocherkassk is a city in Russia located in the Rostov Oblast.

Nestled in the southwestern part of the country, Novocherkassk is known for its rich history and cultural significance.

The city was founded in 1805 by Tsar Alexander I.

Under the tsar’s decree, Novocherkassk became the capital of the Don Cossack Host, an autonomous region within the Russian Empire.

Novocherkassk is home to the Don Cossack Choir.

This prestigious choir has gained international recognition for its captivating performances of traditional Cossack folk music.

The city is renowned for its Cossack heritage.

The Cossacks played a significant role in the history and development of Novocherkassk, and their influence can still be seen today in the city’s architecture and way of life.

Novocherkassk is famous for its annual Cossack Festival.

During this vibrant event, visitors can experience Cossack traditions, enjoy cultural performances, and taste delicious Cossack cuisine.

The city is home to the Novocherkassk Polytechnic Institute.

This esteemed educational institution offers a wide range of technical and engineering programs, attracting students from all over the country.

Novocherkassk is located near the Don River.

The Don River , one of the longest rivers in Russia, provides ample opportunities for water-based activities such as boating and fishing.

The city has a rich culinary scene.

Visitors to Novocherkassk can enjoy delicious local dishes like borsch, shashlik, and pirozhki, which are all deeply rooted in Russian cuisine.

Novocherkassk is known for its vibrant arts and culture.

The city boasts numerous theaters, art galleries, and museums, showcasing the region’s history and talent.

Novocherkassk is surrounded by picturesque landscapes.

The city is situated amidst lush green fields, rolling hills, and scenic countryside, providing visitors with breathtaking views.

Novocherkassk is home to several important historical landmarks.

One of the notable sites is the Cathedral of the Holy Ascension , an architectural masterpiece that stands as a symbol of the city’s religious heritage.

The city has a thriving manufacturing industry.

Novocherkassk is known for its production of machinery, textiles, and food products, contributing significantly to the local economy.

Novocherkassk is a hub for traditional Cossack arts and craftsmanship.

Visitors can explore local workshops and witness skilled artisans create intricate Cossack embroidery, pottery, and woodwork.

Novocherkassk has a continental climate.

The city experiences hot summers and cold winters, with temperature extremes ranging from below freezing to sweltering heat.

Novocherkassk played a significant role during the Russian Revolution.

In 1962, a worker’s strike in Novocherkassk led to a violent uprising against Soviet authorities, resulting in casualties and a subsequent crackdown.

The city is known for its traditional Cossack horse shows.

Spectators can witness impressive displays of Cossack horsemanship , including daring stunts and intricate formations.

Novocherkassk has a well-connected transportation system.

The city is linked to major Russian cities by rail and has an extensive network of roads, making it easily accessible for travelers.

Novocherkassk is a center for Cossack political and cultural organizations.

The city serves as a gathering place for Cossack leaders and enthusiasts, fostering a sense of community and preserving Cossack traditions.

Novocherkassk hosts the annual Cossack Games.

Participants from various Cossack communities compete in traditional sports and activities, showcasing their physical prowess and skills.

Novocherkassk has a vibrant music scene.

The city hosts numerous music festivals and concerts featuring a variety of genres, ranging from classical to modern.

Novocherkassk is surrounded by fertile agricultural land.

The region produces a diverse range of crops, including wheat, sunflowers , and vegetables, supporting the local economy and ensuring a steady food supply.

The city has a strong sense of community.

Residents of Novocherkassk prioritize family values and actively engage in social activities that foster a close-knit society.

Novocherkassk is home to the Don State Technical University.

This prestigious institution offers a wide range of academic programs and is recognized for its contributions to scientific research and innovation.

The city has a diverse range of religious institutions.

From Orthodox churches to mosques and synagogues, Novocherkassk embraces religious diversity and promotes mutual respect among different faiths.

Novocherkassk is known for its traditional Cossack hospitality.

Visitors can expect warm welcomes, generous hospitality, and a chance to experience the unique Cossack way of life.

The city has a bustling open-air market.

Here, locals and visitors can browse through a wide array of goods, including fresh produce, handmade crafts, clothing, and souvenirs.

Novocherkassk has a well-preserved historical center.

Strolling through the city’s streets, one can admire beautiful architecture, charming squares, and old-world charm.

The city is a gateway to the Don River region.

Novocherkassk serves as an ideal starting point for exploring the stunning natural landscapes, wildlife, and recreational opportunities along the Don River.

Novocherkassk is known for its traditional Cossack cuisine.

Food enthusiasts can savor authentic dishes such as beshbarmak, pelmeni, and vareniki, which are all staples of Cossack culinary tradition.

The city has a rich folklore and storytelling tradition.

Novocherkassk’s folklore includes captivating legends , myths, and tales that have been passed down through generations, preserving the region’s cultural heritage.

Novocherkassk is a center for Cossack dance and music.

Local dance troupes and music ensembles showcase the vibrant traditions and energetic performances that captivate audiences.

The city has numerous parks and green spaces.

Residents and visitors can enjoy leisurely walks, picnics, and outdoor activities amidst the city’s well-maintained parks and gardens.

Novocherkassk hosts the International Cossack Games.

Every few years, the city welcomes athletes from around the world to compete in various traditional Cossack sporting events, celebrating the spirit of competition and camaraderie.

As you can see, Novocherkassk is a city steeped in history, culture, and traditions. From its Cossack heritage to its vibrant arts scene and rich culinary traditions, there is something for everyone to discover and explore in this enchanting city. Whether you’re interested in history, nature, or simply experiencing the warmth of Cossack hospitality, Novocherkassk has it all.

Nestled in the heart of Russia , Novocherkassk is a city that boasts a rich history, vibrant culture, and countless attractions. From its picturesque landscapes to its historical landmarks, there is no shortage of things to see and do in this charming city. Whether you’re a history buff, a nature lover, or simply seeking a unique travel experience, Novocherkassk has something for everyone.

With its bustling markets, traditional Russian cuisine, and friendly locals, Novocherkassk offers visitors a true taste of Russian culture. Explore the stunning architecture of the Cathedral of the Ascension, take a leisurely stroll along the Don River, or immerse yourself in the city’s lively arts scene. No matter how you choose to spend your time in Novocherkassk, you’re sure to be captivated by its charm and beauty.

So whether you’re a seasoned traveler or planning your first trip to Russia, make sure to include Novocherkassk on your itinerary. It’s a city that will leave a lasting impression and provide you with unforgettable memories.

Q: What is the best time to visit Novocherkassk?

A: The best time to visit Novocherkassk is during the summer months of June to August when the weather is pleasant and outdoor activities are in full swing.

Q: How can I get to Novocherkassk?

A: Novocherkassk can be easily reached by air, train, or bus. The city has its own airport, and there are frequent train and bus connections from major cities in Russia.

Q: What are some must-visit attractions in Novocherkassk?

A: Some must-visit attractions in Novocherkassk include the Cathedral of the Ascension, the Ataman Palace, the Don Cossack History Museum, and the Central Market.

Q: Is it easy to find accommodation in Novocherkassk?

A: Yes, Novocherkassk offers a range of accommodation options to suit every budget, from luxury hotels to budget-friendly guesthouses.

Q: What are some local dishes to try in Novocherkassk?

A: Some local dishes to try in Novocherkassk include borsch (a traditional Russian soup), shashlik (grilled meat skewers), and pirozhki (filled pastries).

Novocherkassk's rich history, cultural heritage, and stunning landscapes make it a truly captivating destination. Visitors can explore the city's connection to the mighty Don River , which has shaped its development and identity. Novocherkassk is also a hub for traditional Cossack culture, with vibrant festivals, horse shows, and the mesmerizing art of Cossack dance . For those interested in exploring other fascinating cities, Berlin offers a wealth of historical and cultural treasures waiting to be discovered.

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Rostov-on-Don is a port city and the administrative centre of Rostov Oblast and the Southern Federal District of Russia. From ancient times, the area around the mouth of the Don River has held cultural and commercial importance. Ancient indigenous inhabitants included the Scythian, Sarmat, and Savromat tribes. It was the site of Tanais, an ancient Greek colony, Fort Tana, under the Genoese and Fort Azak in the time of the Ottoman Empire.

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Rostov is the capital of Southern Russia, with a population of close to 15,000 Jews. Prior to WWII it was a thriving hub of Jewish life. Tragically, during the war it was also the site of the worst mass execution of Jews in Russia, where over 20,000 Jews perished over the course of two horrific days. Today the community is springing back to life, with one of the most active youth groups in Russia, a Jewish day school, an overnight camp, a dynamic women's club, a busy humanitarian aid service, and new programs every year.

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