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Ciao

At Cooking Vacations you will learn to cook traditional recipes, hands-on, with our team of excellent and well-trained chefs. We bring you the ultimate that Italy has to offer along with the passion we share for food, wine, music & culture. For centuries Italians have mastered the art of cooking, eating and sharing a table,- reinforcing family bonds, enjoying precious time spent together, while sharing the love of food, family & friends.

Authentic Cooking Vacations In Italy
Cooking Vacations provides unique vacation cooking classes, food trips, vineyard tours & wine tastings and marketplace visits throughout Italy. Our staff includes a group of talented chefs, food & wine experts, food-trend researchers, and people in the know, who bring you the best of each region.

Our programs are hosted at exclusive & beautiful properties selected for their location, charm.. Each program includes excursions to well-known and also undiscovered areas including outside markets, ancient villages and historical areas that are rich in culture and connected to the local people. We take you back in time to artisans, wine producers, fishermen, truffle hunters, and bread & pastry bakers.

Our cooking programs capture the art of Italian cooking, while eating, learning and enjoying “la dolce vita,” the sweet life. In Italy, la dolce vita is not a special occasion; it's a way of life! We bring you into the life of the Italian people who share their food & wine with you. For a complete list of cooking programs, click to Programs www.cooking-vacations.com

Nonna Philomena
Great Nonno Pasquale Scuncio

Our Family Started The Concept Of Cooking Experiences
Our family started the concept of cooking vacations in Italy over 25 years ago. It all began when our American and foreign friends visited us in Italy and ended up spending their days in the kitchen with my Nonna Philomena. Our friends wanted to know how Nonna created her handmade pastas, plump ravioli filled with Ricotta, fresh sea bass grilled on lemon leaves and her towering sponge cake soaked in Limoncello. Her beautiful lunches and dinners topped our table each day accompanied by Nonno’s homemade wine. Everyone would follow her steps in the early morning- rolling out pasta, making little meatballs and desserts & gelato filled with seasonal fruits. Soon thereafter, I took our Italian culture, way of life and recipes and created Cooking Vacations. By word-of-mouth, friends and clients filled our family kitchen wanting to see, learn & experience our culture, and share the fun we had in the kitchen. We then expanded the concept incorporating other cooking programs in diverse parts of Italy’s regions. Today, we offer the most authentic cooking classes, chefs, recipes, food trips and marketplace visits in Italy. Our network of food-trend lovers, foodies and people in Italy, bring us the best in food, wine and travel. We are Italian, and we share our love of cooking with you!


	Fifth generation sisters, Chloe Lucia, 5 & Siena, 3, already cooking!		Siena, Our Test Kitchen

Nonna Lucia Scuncio

Nonna Lucia
Nonna Lucia was born in Prata Sannita, Naples Italy. She was a great chef who spent her days in the kitchen. As in most Italian families, Lucia believed that having her family eating around the table was the most important thing in life. She was a beautiful young girl when she left Naples and set sail for America for a better life. She married Pasquale Scuncio at a very young age. She also died soon after at the very young age of 25 in America during the period of influenza. She left behind 3 young children, and Philomena was her daughter and is my Nonna. Her recipes have been passed down and are used in our cooking classes today. Five generations later, we are still gently turning the pages of her worn-out cookbook, smelling the sweet flavors of her Italian recipes, and keeping her passion for cooking alive. Chloe Lucia, fifth generation grand-daugher, is named after her great, great grandmother, and Cooking Vacations is dedicated to Nonna Lucia.

A Note From Lauren
“In my family everyone is always in the kitchen before lunch or dinner-chatting, discussing, toasting with a good glass of wine- and helping to prepare the dinner. The preparation of cooking is just as important as the dinner. The kitchen is the center of conversation, laughter and fun. Italian cooking is a family experience and Cooking Vacations gives everyone the opportunity to experience great food, wine, music, and the feeling of being Italian. As they say in Italy, ‘it is not healthy to eat alone.’

My great grandfather Pasquale and my Nonna Lucia were my inspiration for Cooking Vacations. My grandfather left Naples, Italy in the early 1900's and set sail to New York for a better life. He was alone and did not speak English. He landed in America, married Lucia, had three children and lived to be 93 years old. I remember him well, and while I was growing up, he always kept the traditions of Italian food, wine, music and culture alive in our family. I hope to share this experience with you.”
-Lauren

Lauren Scuncio Birmingham is creator & owner of Cooking Vacations. She is a writer, photographer and owner of Birmingham Associates Communications~a public relations & marketing agency. Her passion for food and wine sparked her to pursue the idea of creating this unique cooking vacation adventure. After spending so much time in Italy and cooking dinners for friends, she created Cooking Vacations in honor of her great grandmother, Nonna Lucia.

info@cooking-vacations.com