3 Culinary Destinations Loved By Gourmet Travelers In The Know

Half of global travelers now book restaurant reservations before they even secure their flights, a recent Hilton survey found. And one in five are going on trips specifically to hunt down new restaurants and culinary experiences.

But while previous years saw travelers fighting for tables in Copenhagen or queuing for omakase in Tokyo, food lovers are looking for more experiential ways of discovering food this year.

Specialist travel company Timbuktu Travel has seen requests for food-oriented itineraries double compared to two years ago.

“Foodie travelers don’t just want great restaurants anymore—they want an experience that gives them a true insight into a destination. This type of traveler wants to harvest coffee beans at sunrise, milk cows in the Tanzanian highlands and learn how French colonial pepper cultivation shaped Cambodia’s cuisine, not just a delicious meal,” says Johnny Prince, co-founder and CEO of the company.

Here are some of the world’s most extraordinary culinary experiences, according to Prince.

Sample Spices and Harvest Coffee in Tanzania

Tanzania is one of the world’s most famous safari destinations, but what many holidaymakers don’t realise is that it also has an excellent culinary scene.

“You can sit down to creamy wali wa nazi (coconut milk-infused rice) paired with tender, slow-cooked goat while zebras graze just metres away on safari, and learn to roast coffee beans at 7,500 feet above sea level, experiencing the full journey from bean to cup,” Prince says.

Tanzania’s culinary scene reflects its position at the crossroads of Africa, Arabia and India, where centuries of spice trade created a unique fusion cuisine.

“In Tanzania, you’re tasting cardamom and cinnamon where they actually grow, can learn how vanilla pods are cured, and watch coffee go from cherry to cup on working farms. It completely changes your understanding of these flavors,” Prince adds.

Gourmand travelers can visit working coffee estates in the wild Ngorongoro highlands, home to the world’s largest intact caldera, which has one of the densest wildlife populations on Earth.

Here, guests harvest vegetables at dawn, try their hand at cow milking and watch coffee beans being roasted in traditional clay ovens.

In Stone Town, you can take a spice tour to learn about Zanzibar’s rich history as a trading hub and smell the local cardamom, cinnamon, and cloves. Then visit spice farms and learn how cloves, nutmeg and black pepper shaped the island’s history and continue to flavour its cuisine today.

Then take an evening food walk through Forodhani Gardens night market, where vendors grill octopus, offer fresh samosas and serve Zanzibar pizza.

Urojo soup—a complex broth of coconut, tamarind and spices—is ladled from huge pots where the vendors’ grandfathers once traded with merchants from Oman and Gujarat.

Take Cooking Classes and Wine Tastings in Chile

For Prince, Chile is a country that offers some of the widest variety of culinary experiences in the world. You can go from Santiago’s bustling central market, where vendors sell fresh sea urchin and merkén spice, to remote Patagonian estancias where gauchos slow-roast whole lambs over crackling beech fires as condors drift lazily through the mountain thermals above.

In Valparaíso’s steep, graffiti-covered streets, hole-in-the-wall restaurants serve ceviche made from fish caught that morning in the Pacific swells below. The UNESCO World Heritage port city buzzes with creativity—former shipping warehouses now house innovative fusion restaurants blending European techniques with indigenous Mapuche ingredients.

“The seafood in Valparaíso is better than what you get in most of Europe, and the barbecue culture in Patagonia is unlike anywhere else. You’re talking about techniques that haven’t changed in centuries,” says Prince.

In terms of activities, travelers can take cooking classes to learn how to prepare empanadas and cazuela stews, before visiting world-renowned wineries in the Casablanca Valley for harvest-season grape stomping, guided wine tastings, organic seed and flowers sampling, and vineyard picnics.

In remote Patagonia, you can stay in luxury eco-lodges that serve farm-to-table meals featuring ingredients foraged from the surrounding wilderness. Think king crab caught in local waters, paired with wines from the region’s high-altitude vineyards.

Discover the World’s Most Prized Pepper in Cambodia

While Thailand often steals the Southeast Asian food spotlight and Vietnam gets the street food glory, Cambodia quietly serves up one of the region’s “most interesting dishes”.

“Khmer cuisine blends fresh herbs, river fish and local spices in ways that create flavours you won’t find elsewhere in the world. And the best culinary discoveries can be found beyond Siem Reap’s tourist trail,” says Prince.

In village cooking classes near the temples, elderly women teach visitors to pound kroeung (curry paste) using granite mortars their grandmothers used. Night markets in Phnom Penh buzz with vendors grilling everything from beef skewers to crickets, while the coastal town of Kep reveals Cambodia’s best-kept secret: some of the world’s finest pepper paired with mud crabs pulled fresh from mangrove waters.

Travelers can learn about this prized spice on plantations in Kampot, where French colonial farmers first cultivated what’s now considered the world’s premium pepper.