MY #TASTEOFTRAVEL



What do you look for when you book a holiday? Is it sun, snow or sand? Do you like to be by the sea or in the countryside? Activities or beach loungers? For me, it's pretty much all about the food. Though I don't necessarily book holidays based on the local restaurants I would never book a holiday that involved visiting somewhere that didn't have good local produce. Because where there's good produce, then there's definitely good food, and you don't need a fancy, Michelin restaurant to eat it in. All you need is the basics - locally sourced, fresh food and you're on to a winner. Celebrity Cruises do just this (and a bit of the fancy stuff too!), and have teamed up with Great British Chefs to create delicious monthly recipes and ideas. Celebrity Cruises were voted Ocean Cruise Line of the Year in the 2014 Food and Travel Awards. They've asked bloggers to put together a menu of the 3 best courses they've eaten while travelling, and whilst I've been to some amazing places in my life, it's actually the fresh, basic food I've eaten while travelling in Southern Europe that's really got my tummy rumbling. So here's my dream travel menu, which due to so much time spent by the coast involves quite a lot of fish and seafood, which I thought was apt for a cruise based menu...

Starters - I've chosen 2 starters that I've loved eating on my travels. Both were in Spain - the first in a swanky, modern restaurant in Seville where we had delicious octopus and Parma ham, so simple, yet done perfectly.  

 

The second starter we ate just outside Seville in one of the suburbs in a small bar where you choose your fish or seafood by the kilo and perch on a wobbly table outside to eat it, washed down with jugs of beer. These prawns were incredible, pink and fresh with rock salt sprinkled on top. We ate tons of them between us and got very messy in the process!

For mains it's more seafood, this time on the south coast of Spain and Portugal. First was clams and squid at the gorgeous Finca Cortesin hotel near Malaga. We sat on the veranda in the dappled sunlight and gobbled down these dishes with a bottle of cold rose last April. It still brings a smile to my face thinking about it now.

 

The other main I've picked is more seafood (it's so hard to pick my favourite when they were all so good and fresh!) that we ate in a beachside bar near Lagos in Portugal. We were there in November but it was still warm and sunny, and bowls full of clams and squid brought a touch of summer to the meal. It certainly made the boy happy!

 

For pudding, one of the most simple, yet stunning and delicious things I've eaten. We were at a wedding in South France a couple of years ago, where weddings seem to last for the entire weekend. We ate like kings, and when we returned for a BBQ on the Sunday, slices of this fruit tart were passed around, and I ate 3 of them! Local, fresh fruit - apricots, greengages, cherries and plums - had been baked on top of the lightest, flakiest puff pastry, and all glazed with homemade jam. It was incredible. So many desserts call for custard, cream or some sort of sauce, but this juicy, vibrant slice stood up by itself. No need for anything, apart from more stomach space!!

So there you have my dream travel menu. I know it's more than you could eat in one sitting, but I do little else than eat when I travel! If you want to get involved with Celebrity Cruises #tasteoftravel, check their site out here, and simply share your three-course travel menu in a blog post, listing your most cherished food memories.

And now I'm off to find myself a holiday to book!