Hi friends welcome back to food. I'm Kate Bitman. If you haven't taken part in our very quick audience survey and you wouldn't mind doing so you'll find the link in today's show notes and thank you.

You know where to find us with your thoughts, feedback and questions.

That's food at markbitman.com.

We're also online at bitman project.com. We welcomed a new author on the site

last week, Joey Ayala, who wrote about the unseen role of prisons in our food system, a piece that we were thrilled to publish.

And Mark Rice to us from Greece, where he found a very happy food routine.

Bitman Project.com. We'll get back to that conversation in a minute, but first I want to talk about

something that lots of people ask me about when it comes to global cuisines.

There is something magical about eating a

cuisine in the place where it originated. One of the reasons for that is that the

dishes that define it cuisine are built around the produce that's native to a

place.

It's why the feta and tomato and a Greek salad

tastes so perfect in Athens,

or the artichokes in olive oil in Rome are to die for.

They have a certain sweetness and tang that you can get close to but not easily replicate.

And not surprisingly, one of the best ways to get a sense for how something should taste is to visit a region of the world and sample a dish in several

forms from lots of different neighboring areas.

Then you can appreciate the local variations as well.

And the most efficient way to do that, for me at least,

is the first class experience of Regent Cruz.

I was able to do that on our recent all-inclusive tour of Asia.

...