Spring of 2023 I found myself invited by my partners family to join them on a 3-week trip to Spain and the opportunity to complete a quarter of research, travel and writing was laid out before me. I contacted Sarah Williams who would become an integral teacher and guide for the years to come. With her help I created my first ILC: Tasting Spain a Food Adventure: The Food and Culture of Catalan, Basque and Andalucia. I had always wondered how people travel, meet people who are doing amazing things with food and history and culture and write about them. I set out to research the areas in Spain that were on our itinerary and one of the writers I came across was Claudia Rodan, a cookbook author but so much more, she is a historian, a storyteller a documentarian of a story of a place and its people told through food. I was inspired tremendously by her and connected to her in that we were both setting out on a food adventure in similar times of our lives, 50 years apart. I gathered some courage and decided to extend my trip and after 3 weeks of traveling with companions in the north of Spain I would venture out on my own for the first time and travel solo to the South of Spain for 10 days. The Query was coming to life. Remember at this point I was thinking it was impossible to create my education and career path around The Query, yet here is a quote from this trip that shows it was there all along, guiding me:
“It is always interesting to me to follow the humble beginnings of a dish that then becomes an integral part of a culture. I would like to choose a few of these foods and follow them through time.”
This quarter, this project was a turning point, I got more than a taste of adventure and discovery and I wanted to share it with everyone. I created a WordPress of my experiences and the food and culture of Spain through writing, recipes and images. I learned that just 4 weeks of travel could produce endless research and writing to share. And on a little drive across Spain, olive trees whisking by The Query firmly planted the interest I would choose to continue my education at Evergreen and beyond.
Tasting Spain: A Food Adventure, the food and culture of Catalan, Basque and Andalusia