Food vacation abroad

[Richard_D]

London.

Does that sound strange to you? It did to the woman who checked my passport a couple of days ago at Heathrow. I've made several trips to London in the last year and she wanted to know why. I told her I come for the food and she didn't believe me. But it's true.

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I have always wanted to go to England just to find out for myself if the food is as bad as some people claim. Your experience makes me think it would be a good idea.

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The UK has a now undesereved reputation for bad food. The UK is definitely one of the best places to get good restaurant food at the moment, and it can be a price (but not always). It's not just London that has good restaurants but there are loads of good places to eat/buy food/go to food festivals in the rest of the UK. The UK has had a real renaissance in the past 5-10 years with an increase in farmers markets, local producers and people generally willing to try new things and pay a little more for them.

I'd also recommend the Basque region of Northern Spain/SW France. Fantastic seafood, hams, morcilla etc. You can eat out cheaply in a relaxed way in small bars trying wildly inventive tapas or go for the full multi-michelin starred experience.

R

[Gifted Gourmet]

Provence, most definitely .

Have been to London and had excellent food fairly recently... much English cooking is now quite unlike what came before.

Paris is, of course, always a given .. never had a bad meal there ... and I have heard some wonderfully enticing things about Ireland nowadays ... so many options ...

[alamut]

Great food vacations, how can you even compare to a cruise ship or a crowded gringo beach? These are my 4 favorite places on the planet to eat. Grant it, I've never been to India, China, Japan, or South America. And I've excluded Western Europe (Italy, France, & Spain) from the list because, while I loved all of the eating I did there, I pretty much found what I though I had expected to find. The same can be said of Mexico (a cuisine every bit as wonderful as Italy). Just the notion of eating at any of these places awakens nostalgic hunger in me.

Morocco: What is Moroccan food? It's not French, not Spanish, not Arabian; its; a little bit of all three. If there's an upside of colonialism it’s the amazing historical fusion of cuisine. Royal cities of Marrakech and Fez provide a perfect counterpoint to the coastal seafood based cuisines of Essouria and Tangier. Go, and get yourself invited to have dinner at somebody's house and have the time of your life.

Thailand: It's way beyond pad thai my friends, way beyond. The formality of traditional mild royal cooking runs headlong into the oh so spicy popular foods. I was only there 6 days several years ago, so my knowledge is limited, but God help me, I want to go back.

South Carolina: Really, I'm serious. The costal region (low country) running from Savanna GA, north to Charleston SC, and encompassing the area of Beaufort and St. Helena's Island is home to some of the finest food on the planet. Of course you got the fresh Atlantic seafood, but the quality of local produce and then renaissance that has taken place in the restaurant scene is simply amazing.

Alaska: Alaskans are all (bless their hearts) more than a little crazy, but they do maintain a crazy passion for their foods. Forget the cruise ship and you'll discover that Alaska has the best uncultivated food on the planet. If you are looking to pick, gather, fish, or hunt your own dinner you'll never be happier. If your not so adventurous, you can simply order off the menu what others have caught.

[Mayhaw Man]

Viet Nam

Italy

North Africa

New Orleans (believe me, it's about as far as you can get from the US right now)

[Irishgirl]

Heading out to Thailand in 17 days!

Just looked at Percy's photo album....Makes me giddy with anticipation!

Must decide where I am going to eat! Bangkok, Chiang Mai, and Phuket.

Thailand/South East Asia Forum here I Come!

[Dianne]

Oh Mayhaw Man, how I wish I was coming to your city to eat. What wonderful food we had there the one time we made it.

Dianne.

[Mayhaw Man]

Oh Mayhaw Man, how I wish I was coming to your city to eat. What wonderful food we had there the one time we made it.

Dianne.

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The airport is open and most of the roads leading into the city are clear. A bit of shopping can yield a very well priced hotel room (before the storm, next to New York and San Francisco, we weren't cheap-but now? If you can find a room? It's a bargain). Our customs procedures are easy, though our customs are a bit strange, apparently, to the rest of the world. But we do have a spot or two where an adventurous world traveler might find a good bite to eat and some friendly natives to talk to.

[bavila]

Second the Nawlins vote. Am happy to have excuses to go there on a semi-regular basis.

Martinique is top of my list right now. Combine French influence with Carribean flavors, and lots of seafood. Yum.

[TarteTatin]

I have a place NOT to go on a food vacation!

Madeira.

Lovely place, 72degrees year round. Great fun visiting the Madeira houses and the little island of Porto Santo. Great Fado music...

It's between the Canary Islands and the Azores, 400 miles off the coast of North west Africa.

But, the food! Ugh.

Espada fish. It looks like an eel. Very ugly.

You can get grilled espada fish. Espada fish on a stick. Grilled Espada fish on a stick. Did I mention you can get Espada fish? Oh, and then there's overcooked, well done meat on a stick, sometimes overcooked chicken on a stick.

We finally found a place for salads one day!

[malarkey]

I want every single vacation I take from now till the end of my life to be ALL about food.

that being said, the list is long. But, France and Spain are at the top of my current list.

It amazes me how many people still think the food in England and Ireland is bad. I was there 10 yrs ago and the food was excellent, all the way from the high end dining we did down to the upscale pub food. Whole fresh Atlantic lobster off the west coast of Ireland...YES.

[MissAmy]

I would have to go with places I've never been. I've lived in China and Japan, and while the food in both places is absolutely fantastic, I've done that. Thailand and Vietnam are magnificent as well. Oh the food in Thailand! Such heaven!

That said, I've only been to France once, very briefly while visiting friends in Germany, and I've never been to Italy. Since graduating culinary school, I've decided that I'm going to save money to spend a few weeks just eating my way through France and Italy. I can't imagine how fabulous it would be, to just eat your way through both of those countries!