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Culinary Expert
Congratulations!

You have the distinct honor of being your group's culinary expert. You're probably thinking:
"What's in store for me?" Actually, you have a creative and fun part of the trip process. Here's
what you can expect:

Your Responsibilities
Process
Tips

Your Responsibilities:

1. Your job is to research traditional dishes for the specific regions that you and your group will
visit.

2. You will be responsible for the planning and budget of where and when your group eats. You
will record this information in a daily journal (in Spanish).

3. Also, you will be responsible for preparing a sample of a Spanish dish for your group's final
presentation.
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Process

1. You have been given a food budget and some cities. Use any of the resources to find some
restaurants, cafés, etc. where you and the group can dine. You may want to look at their hours
and prices and keep track of this information.

2. Begin to keep your travel journal. Your point of view should be as the culinary expert:
Where did you dine? What did you have? What time was it when you had your meals? How
much did it cost? Keep track of how much you spent day by day. Did anything interesting,
unusual, or comical happen? Include any relevant information for your area of expertise.

3. MIDPOINT: Get together with the other culinary experts in the class. Compare the
information that you have gathered so far: specialty dishes of the city or region, cool
restaurants or cafés, what's been hard or easy so far, other interesting facts, etc. Also, check
each other's information using the travel journal rubric and the grading rubric for culinary
expert.

4. Go back and make any necessary changes for your part of the trip.

5. On the final day of your travel journal, reflect on what you would have kept the same, what
you would have changed, and any other information that stood out.

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Tips

As a culinary expert, you should know:

Most restaurants are either a la carte or menú. A la carte means that you must pay for
each individual item that you order. Think of the school cafeteria when you don't order
the "Type A" lunch. Menú means that you will probably get 3 different courses: an
appetizer (soup or salad), the main course, and a dessert.
Time is the other most important thing to keep in mind. In the U.S., we expect our meals
to arrive in a hurry. In Spain, expect to take 30 to 40 minutes just to have a drink at a
café. A meal should easily take you an hour or more. Our impatience is regarded by
Spaniards as rude. Don't be an "ugly" American.

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