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Food Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 Extraordinary Places to Eat Around the Globe Review

When I have the privilege to travel to exotic places abroad, I've generally made it a point to find an opportunity to take a cooking lesson in the local cuisine. I figured out a while back that the most intimate way to get to know a culture is through the food they grow, create, cook and eat. Now comes a book from the editors of one of my favorite magazines, National Geographic Traveler, that focuses on the culinary adventures to be had around the globe. As expected, it's a handsome coffee-table book that takes full advantage of the vast catalog of images and articles long featured in the magazine. It's divided into nine beguiling chapters:

-- "Specialties & Ingredients" focuses on foods which are unique to specific locales, ranging from Vermont maple syrup to the fresh sushi found at dawn in Tokyo's Tsukiji Market to the vanilla bean that originated on the island of Réunion.
-- "Outstanding Markets" spotlights the world's great bazaars such as Thailand's floating markets, Venice's Rialto Fish Market, and in my own backyard, San Francisco's Ferry Building Marketplace.
-- "Seasonal Delights" runs the gamut from French truffles to Finnish crayfish to Maryland's soft-shell crabs.
-- "In the Kitchen" brings to the fore the intimate secrets of the world's cuisines through classic technique and unique ingredients. Recipes are plentiful in this section's sidebars.
-- "Favorite Street Foods" is the section with which I have the most affinity since it highlights exactly the type of food that I would eat as a traveler, the local eats found on mobile food carts, at street kiosks, and in expansive night markets.
-- "Great Food Towns" travels far and wide to identify the culinary capitals from Bologna to Goa to Hong Kong to the inevitable destination, Paris.
-- "Ultimate Luxuries" identifies the rare treats to be discovered by those with deep pockets, for example, kaiseki feasting in Kyoto and luxuriant dining at the Hotel Cipriani in Venice.
-- "The Best Wine, Beer, & More" focuses on some unusual beverages such as Peruvian pisco and Greenland's glacier beer, as well as more predictable choices like Oregon's microbreweries and Sonoma wines.
-- "Just Desserts" looks at the world's confectionary delights such as Belgian chocolates and Florida's key lime pie.

For each entry, the editors provide critical information on when to go, how to plan a particular culinary adventure, and what relevant websites can help with the planning. There are entertaining top ten lists throughout the book in categories as diverse as Extreme Restaurants and Monastic Tipples. My only complaints about the book are that certain areas (Western Europe, Japan) seem to be favored at the expense of more exotic locales and that there aren't as many "a-ha" moments as I would have hoped from a list as comprehensive as this one. Still, the photography is mostly spectacular, and the editors recognize the most important discovery for the reader - that what and where we eat becomes as much a part of our travel as what we see - and the book successfully delivers an exercise in cultural immersion through our individual palates.

Food Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 Extraordinary Places to Eat Around the Globe Overview

For pure pleasure, few experiences are as satisfying as a chance to explore the world’s great culinary traditions and landmarks—and here, in the latest title of our popular series of illustrated travel gift books, you’ll find a fabulous itinerary of foods, dishes, markets, and restaurants worth traveling far and wide to savor.

On the menu is the best of the best from all over the globe: Tokyo’s freshest sushi; the spiciest Creole favorites in New Orleans; the finest vintages of the great French wineries; the juiciest cuts of beef in Argentina; and much, much more. You’ll sample the sophisticated dishes of fabled chefs and five-star restaurants, of course, but you’ll also discover the simpler pleasures of the side-street cafés that cater to local people and the classic specialties that give each region a distinctive flavor.

Every cuisine tells a unique story about its countryside, climate, and culture, and in these pages you’ll meet the men and women who transform nature’s bounty into a thousand gustatory delights. Hundreds of appetizing full-color illustrations evoke an extraordinary range of tastes and cooking techniques; a wide selection of recipes invites you to create as well as consume; sidebars give a wealth of entertaining information about additional sites to visit as well as the cultural importance of the featured food; while lively top ten lists cover topics from chocolate factories to champagne bars, from historic food markets to wedding feasts, harvest celebrations, and festive occasions of every kind. In addition, detailed practical travel information provides all the ingredients you’ll need to cook up a truly delicious experience for even the most demanding of traveling gourmets.

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Customer Reviews

Evenif you don't plan to travel, it's a gorgeous read - Avid Reader - Washington, DC USA
Fabulous book for anyone who loves food. Great photos, good writing and interstign topics - some very obvious choices but some wonderfully obscure ones. There are markets, producers, regional specialties and classes written up. I've already booked in for a chili cooking class written up as I'm headed to Santa Fe and that's one of the great classes mentioned.



A culinary history and survey perfect for any serious culinary collection - Midwest Book Review - Oregon, WI USA
Food Journeys of a Lifetime adds to National Geographic's collection of illustrated gift books and provides a fine itinerary of foods, dishes and restaurants worth traveling to. From Tokyo's freshest sushi to the best vintages of the finest French wineries, this blends a travelogue with a culinary history and survey perfect for any serious culinary collection.



A wonderful coffee table and gift book - Constant Traveler - Rockville, MD USA
Received this as a Christmas present, and it took a week or so to get around to looking through it. When I did, I could not put it down. The photography is beautiful, the descriptions are poetic, and not only are names and places spelled out in detail, but web sites for more information on the featured resaurants/places are quite complete. Makes me want to buy my plane ticket tomorrow.

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Feb 04, 2010 03:10:05