When they think about booking a cooking course, culinary tourists probably put France or Italy at the top of the list.
How many of them choose Turkey, a country with a long culinary tradition and a thriving restaurant scene in Istanbul?
Virginia Maxwell has a suggestion for vacationing foodies in Top five Istanbul cooking courses and food tours (BBC Travel- Lonely Planet, November 12).
Eveline Zoutendijk, a multilingual Dutch, fell in love with the city.
Her school Cooking Alaturka, offers half-day cooking classes to group of 6 to 10 students who guided by chef Feyzi get a chance to learn how to prepare a 5 course meal with 'Ottoman classics, regional specialties and home-cooking favorites' and then enjoy the result of their work with a glass of Turkish wine.
It seems that Brianna of Charlottesville (Virginia) discovered Cooking Alaturka while wandering around Istanbul. She took the plunge (or rather a class) and shared the experience on Forks in the Road in June 2010.
(* illustration from Brianna's piece on Forks in the Road)