The first pair of countries that the piloting participants will visit is Portugal and France.
 
In Povoa de Varzim beteewn 5^th and 7^th of March 2020 the hosting partner Proandi will organize training session focused on the Community development and eating culture since the roots of Portuguese cuisine lie in both native peasant cookery and the ingredients obtained through trade routes established many centuries ago. The passion about preparing and consuming high quality food is deeply affecting the Portugal social and cultural life forming communities of gastronomy trends developers and followers.

The world famous French cuisine will be in the focus of the second training session in this first pair of countries. Of course, it will be hosted by the French project partner – Greta du Vellay and will be oganized in the period 9^th-11^th of March 2020 in Le Pyu en Velay. The Heritage value of gastronomy is the naturally fitting topic that will be learned by the trainees here following the fact that the French gastronomy was added by the UNESCO to its lists of the world's "intangible cultural heritage".

 

The second study trip of our trainees will be to Spain and Italy.
 
The first training session dedicated to the Gastronomic tourism and Mediterranean cuisine will be hosted by the Spanish partner FASE and will continue from 17th till 19th of April 2020. The piloting participants will visit the city of Zaragoza where will get acquainted with the specificities of the gastro-tourism. Spanish food is currently the second most preferred food of Europeans, resulting in quickly developing culinary industry and encreased tourist attractiveness of the destination. The trainees will also experience the Mediterranean cuisine from the front rows being involved in master classes on essential methods, ingredients, and recipes from the region delivered by award-winning chefs. The training will be also supported by the second Spanish partner – GastroAlianza being established as a knowledge alliance of
gastronomy and gastronomic tourism.

Even though Italy is mostly knows for it’s world spreaded cuisine and dishes like pizza or pasta we chose it as a hosting country for the training session focused on the Food chain management, since agro-food industry is a substantial part of the Italian economy. Following the established traditions in the local food production and also the developed trade channels for export of Italian products worldwide, Italy has great experience in preparing specialists who are successfully managing the food chain figuratively speaking “from the planting of the seeds to the serving to the table”. Here our trainees will spend the also 3 days between 21^th and 23^th of April 2020 hosted by the Italian partner IFOA.

 

The last trip of the trainees will take them to the Balkans where they will be welcomed by the project partners in Turkey and in Bulgaria.
 
During the last decades following the growing demand for new interesting and unconventional for the Europeans places for vacation, Turkey has become quite famouse and attractive tourist destination. One of the key success factors for the intensification of tourism was naturally the quality and delicious food prepared in the region. In addition to the  preserving of the culinary traditions the many educational and training institutions situated in the Mugla region are also focusing on the Innovations in culinary sector. Thus this topic was chosen by the hosting Turkish partner  - Muğla Provincial Directorate of National Education. For the training session here in Turkey the Bodrum resort will welcome the piloting participants between 10^th and 12^th of May 2020.

Last, but not least, the project coordinator International College together with the second Bulgarian partner – Varna University of Management will organize the final training session in Bulgaria. The uniqueness of the Bulgarian cuisine will be demonstrated through national branded foods and dishes such as yoghurt, “banitsa”, etc. while the trainees will learn the basics of the artisan food preparation. Since one of the currently emerging gastronomic trends in Bulgaria is to re-create authentic recipes and food production methods from the Bulgarian cuisine using modern technologies and approaches, the chef instructors from Culinary Arts Institute at VUM will lead the topic Technologies in the kitchen.  The last training session for the ppiloting will be held between 14^th and 16^th of May 2020.