Tasting Tourism: Travelling for Food and Drink

187 Pages·2003·17.66 MB·English

by  Priscilla Boniface

TASTING TOURISM:
TRAVELLING FOR FOOD AND DRINK
New Directions in Tourism Analysis
Series Editors: Kevin Meethan, University of Plymouth
Dimitri Ioannides, Southwest Missouri State University
Although tourism is becoming increasingly popular as both a taught subject and an
area for empirical investigation, the theoretical underpinnings of many approaches
have tended to be eclectic and somewhat underdeveloped. However, recent
developments indicate that the field of tourism studies is beginning to develop in a
more theoretically informed manner, but this has not yet been matched by current
publications.
The aim of this series is to fill this gap with high quality monographs or edited
collections that seek to develop tourism analysis at both theoretical and substantive
levels using approaches which are broadly derived from allied social science
disciplines such as Sociology, Social Anthropology, Human and Social Geography,
and Cultural Studies. As tourism studies covers a wide range of activities and sub
fields, certain areas such as Hospitality Management and Business, which are
already well provided for, would be excluded. The series will therefore fill a gap in
the current overall pattern of publication.
Suggested themes to be covered by the series, either singly or in combination,
include – consumption; cultural change; development; gender; globalisation;
political economy; social theory; sustainability.
Also in the series
Tourist’s Experience of Place
Jaakko Suvantola
ISBN 0 7546 1830 7
Tourism and Economic Development
R.N. Ghosh, M.A.B. Siddique and R. Gabbay
ISBN 0 7546 3053 6
Tasting Tourism:
Travelling for Food and Drink
PRISCILLA BONIFACE
First published 2003 by Ashgate Publishing
Published 2016 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
Copyright © Priscilla Boniface 2003
Priscilla Boniface has asserted her moral right to be identified as the author of this
work in accordance wth the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in
any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are
used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Boniface, Priscilla
Tasting tourism : travelling for food and drink. -(New
directions in tourism analysis)
!.Tourism 2.Food 3.Gastronomy
I. Title
338.4'791
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Boniface, Priscilla.
Tasting tourism : travelling for food and drink I Priscilla Boniface.
p. em.--(New directions in tourism analysis)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-7546-3514-7 (alk. paper)
1. Food. 2. Great Britain--Description and travel. 3. Europe--Description and travel. 1.
Title. II. Series.
TX357 .B657 2003
394.1'0941--dc21
2002038377
ISBN 13: 978-0-7546-3514-7 (hbk)
ISBN 13:978-1-138-25027-7 (pbk)
Contents
List of Illustrations vi
Preface vii
Acknowledgements ix
List of Abbreviations x
1 Food and Drink, From Past to Present 1
2 Food and Drink Become a Leisure Destination 15
3 Food for Thought and Visit 27
4 Ripe Time for Providers 39
5 Initiative and Opinion 53
6 Production and Display Centres and Venues 65
7 Outlets and Markets 79
8 Accommodation 101
9 Feeding and Drinking 111
10 Special Events and Devices, and Resources for Education 121
11 The Wine Dimension 131
12 From Among the Cornucopia 141
13 The Crop Now, and For Sowing in Future 153
Bibliography 167
Index 175
v
List of Illustrations
Visitors hooked on apples, at The National Trust’s Hughenden Manor, UK 87
Bedroom breakfast at Michel Bras’s hotel in the Aubrac, France 88
Pick Your Own fruit in Norfolk, UK 89
Currying the consumer’s favour, London, UK 90
Cider and beer at The Ludlow Marches Food and Drink Festival, UK 91
A. Gold, a new traditional British food shopping experience, London, UK 92
Seeking travellers’ attention: the Laguiole cheese factory, France 93
To meet the visitor, Wilkin’s jam factory, Tiptree, UK 94
Visiting a pub near the waterfront, Maldon, UK 95
Viewing Côtes du Rhône, Avignon, France 96
Restaurant with a message, Stockholm, Sweden 97
Fresh fish ‘shack’ to visit, Aldeburgh, UK 98
Leading visitors to UK vineyards 99
Roadside force of feeling in the ‘cattle country’ of the Aubrac, France 100
vi
Preface
This book is about food and drink tourism, as seen especially through a cultural
‘lens’. Its assumes that a culture represents the particular attitude and way of life of a
person or group, and so it sees culture as conditioning what people do, how they do
it, and why they do it. Therefore, it regards culture – past and present – as an
invariable and inevitable part of food and drink tourism, and as necessary to the
discussion of the subject.
The consideration is about what food and drink tourism consists of. It is about
why food and drink provisions and information points have become tourists’
destinations in their own right rather than remaining only among tourism features
and components. It is about the cultural dimensions and dispositions influencing and
determining, finding input and appearing, in the food and drink tourism domain.
The shape of the book is: in Chapters 1–4 introducing the subject, providing
context and theory and delivering perspective on general dimensions; in Chapters 5–
11 considering practical entities of efforts and visitor provisions, in Chapter 12
looking at some specific food and drinks and how they are acting as subjects of
tourism activity; and finally in Chapter 13 drawing conclusions about food and drink
tourism and seeing implications for its impending shape of format and style.
In span the book is international. Many parts of the world are discussed as
appropriate. Quite deliberately, however, the UK forms the central geographical
area of consideration. The UK is focused upon for these following reasons. It is
currently at a turning point in relation to how it uses its countryside and where
emphases lie between agriculture and types of diversification, tourism most
particularly. Its post-industrial phase is well advanced, and so it demonstrates
strongly efforts to find new ways of gaining income, deployment, and leisure for the
community. It also portrays efforts of diversification for urban processing and
manufacturing plants of food and drink as well as for rural growers and farmers of
the raw food and drink materials. It is the location for debates and initiatives in
relation to food and drink, not least because of the various ‘crises’ suffered such as
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy [BSE], variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease
[vCJD], foot and mouth disease. It has a close concern and involvement in
considerations about quality of food and drink, environmental ethics and human
outcomes of industrial food and drink production practices, and so it is the location
of arrival of a considerable interest in and market for, organic, ‘real’ and locally
obtained food. Also, the UK is a modern gathering point of cultural representation
and this contributes to its being a good entity to be explored. So, the UK is being
treated as a case study, and which portrays currently a picture of wide significance.
The endeavour is that the book should portray all relevant dimensions. The
author is aware, nonetheless, of manifesting a mildly polemical stance and flavour
of idea – a perspective doubtless conditioned through events and cultural
vii
viii Tasting Tourism
dimensions currently presiding. This shade of perspective is of being particularly
approving of the individual, artisan, local and wholesome as contrasted with the
commodified, large and industrial in output and proportion. The author believes that
adopting a view somewhat weighted towards a ‘small and from immediate area are
beautiful’ preference is reflecting a strain of culture and direction now key in the
world.
In essence, the aims of the book are to demonstrate how food and drink tourism is
being operated, to indicate the cultural issues present and having effect, to make
suggestions about the future, and, so, overall, to manifest cause and composition of
what is, and may become, ‘Tasting Tourism’.
Acknowledgements
This book could not have been produced without the assistance of many people.
Professor Mike Robinson has helped greatly in discussing the subject of the book
with the author and in commenting on the draft text. He has proposed many ideas
and lines of consideration that appear in the book. Mike Grover has given much
support. Emeritus-Professor Peter Fowler has provided valuable comment. Valerie
Rose, Pauline Beavers and all the people at Ashgate involved in the publishing of
the book have been kindly efficient. Of the many other individuals and
organizations that have generously helped through giving information and
answering my questions, there are too many to be named separately. To all of you, a
lot of thanks.
ix