Dining and Cooking Club - An Innocent Beginning

Quote of the Concept: Food is so primal, so essential a part of our lives, often the mere sharing of recipes with strangers turns them into good friends. ~Jasmine Heiler, about recipezaar.com

For the last six years I’ve been part of a wonderful experiment to learn more about other cultures through food. Four couples decided to meet 6 - 8 times a year to enjoy a dinner based on a theme of a country or region. What has evolved has been an adventure. We’ve experienced collaboration, generosity, friendship, extraordinary food and a window into a deeper understanding of ourselves and other people.

Our beginning was unremarkable in its inception. We met as parent volunteers, for our sons’ scout troop, with eight sons among us. When one of our youngest was accepted to attend school in Japan through the Rotary Youth Exchange, I invited his family over for a Japanese dinner.  My husband had worked in Japan and I’d been able to spend time there as a guest of the Japanese Government through the Fulbright Teacher Memorial Program. That first dinner was our two families eating, laughing, mastering chop sticks to eat soba noodles and sharing stories of our fondness for the people of Japan and their cuisine. Later that week the other three “Moms”, exercising on the walking trail, talked the club into existence.

In this blog I’ll share what we have learned about creating and maintaining a successful club, cooking and enjoying food from cultures around the globe, and how it has enriched our lives in multiple and unexpected ways.

Please contact us with your stories, ideas, recipes, and menus. We look forward to evolving and sharing our journeys as we cook into cultures.