cooking vacations & culinary tours

Recreational cooking vacations and culinary tours are more popular than ever. Here are some great resources for planning your next culinary adventure.

shaw guides - The most comprehensive guide to hundreds of recreational cooking classes and workshops all over the world. Searchable by cuisine, location, date. Shaw Guides also publishes a directory of professional culinary schools.

slow travel - While not a cooking site, this website is for travelers who literally want to slow down and appreciate the culture (and of course the food) of the places they visit. The Slow Travel site includes essays, reviews and tips on renting houses & apartments as an alternative to staying in hotels. One advantage of renting a home is that you have access to a kitchen and can shop in local markets and do a little cooking while on vacation.

the international kitchen - A tour company that leads cooking class vacations to France, Italy, and Spain. For travelers who don't want to commit to an entire vacation based on cooking, they will arrange for a one-day class with a local chef.

stile mediterraneo - Run by two sisters in the Puglia region of Southern Italy, this cooking school and custom culinary tour company offers Italian cooking classes along with visits to wineries, Italian language classes, and cultural tours of Puglia.

epiculinary - A culinary tour company offering cooking vacations to Italy, Spain, France, Northern Ireland, Vietnam, Mexico, and the USA.

maureen fant - Rome based food writer Maureen Fant's site with lots of useful culinary links if you are traveling to Rome.

patricia wells - Cooking classes in Provence and Paris with Patricia Wells, the esteemed cookbook author, cooking teacher, and restaurant reviewer for the International Herald Tribune. Even if you don't sign up for a class, click on the "Paris" link on her website and see a list of Ms. Wells' Parisian restaurant and hotel recommendations.

agriturismo italy - as an affordable & authentic alternative to Rome, Florence or Venice, stay at an agriturismo, a family farm in rural Italy. Agriturismos often offer meals cooked with fresh products from the farm, and sometimes cooking classes.

Related: This article about budget cooking vacations from Gourmet File's Daily Special archive.