food for peace project: October 7th 2023

  Since 2015, the Chef Academy has been bringing rising culinary talent into the spotlight through its chef residency program in Ostuni, The principle is similar to an artist residency, we invite young chefs for a three to six-month residency program where they can spread their wings, define and refine their culinary identity, and express themselves in their name. The Chef Academy has invited both local Italian chefs and chefs from countries around the world: Israel, Estonia, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Ireland, and Ukraine, to name just a few. For us, cooking is about being open to others and to the world. The goal is also to create bridges among different cultures…

The Chef Academy, in partnership with “Jewish Heritage Puglia” and Green Italy Experiences is organizing the next edition of “Cooks for Peace Project” in Ostuni on October 7th 2023. Chefs from different countries will cook together to show how different ideas can be peacefully discussed at a dining table !! 

The Puglia Chef Academy is looking for amazing recipes. Send us your favorite recipes in the following categories: Breads, Main Dishes, Greens and Sides, and Desserts.  The deadline to receive recipes is July 30th, 2023. You can enter as many times as you wish and in as many categories as you wish. But each entry must be separately sent to pugliachefacademy@gmail.com  as a WORD attachment. They will need the following information: Name, Email address, Telephone number, Address, Age, Name of Dish, Category entering, Recipe, 25 words describing the dish, a photograph of how it is served.

• All entries and photographs become the property of the Puglia Chef Academy.
• Winners will be announced on August 31st, 2023.

Throghout the year we hold seminars combined with cooking courses in partnership with Green Italy Experiences. The experience of cooking together helps illuminate a part of the world different from our own. 

This is a variation on an old idea that turns up a lot in feel-good documentaries and on the agendas of well-meaning foundations. If only Israeli and Palestinian children could play together in the same orchestra, all the differences would melt away.  Something similar has been organized by  the TV show  "Breaking Borders" where journalist Mariana van Zeller and the chef Michael Voltaggio team up to travel to parts of the world where intractable tensions dominate life. They bring together representatives of various sides of a festering conflict, and Mr. Voltaggio serves them a grand dinner featuring local dishes. The hope is that good food shared in a hospitable setting might help enemies find common ground.  

Our aim is to bring together the cuisines of different countries as a way of communicating different cultural identities as well as facilitate the much needed transition towards more sustainable consumption patterns...