Cookery holidays in Tuscany
Learning cookery in Italy is a gift for life! Food and wine plays an immense role in the lives of Italians where every dish is created with love and every meal savoured to the full.
A cookery holiday in Tuscany is surely the best way to combine your love of eating Italian food and drinking Italian wine with the opportunity to learn cookery skills the Italian way.
On an Expressions Italian cooking holiday you can choose from short demonstration courses through to week-long intensive courses where more-in-depth skills will be acquired. Here we have hand-picked our favourite Tuscan cooking holiday experiences, each set in a delightful, exclusive hotel and offering a wonderful opportunity to develop your culinary skills to the best of your ability.
Borgo San Felice, 3 nights
Near Castelnuovo Berardenga
Enjoy a simple two hour cookery course at the Borgo San Felice with the emphasis on Tuscan regional cooking. The lessons are in groups of a maximum of four people and take place from 10.30 to 12.30. The Borgo San Felice occupies almost the entire hamlet of San Felice, north-east of Siena in Chianti country. Owned by the San Felice wine makers, the hamlet was converted into an hotel and is now a beautiful Relais & Châteaux hotel.
Prices for a three night break including return flights, car hire, accommodation and a 2-hour cookery course start at about £640 per person, or £690 per person to include lunch on the day of the course
More details on the Borgo San Felice
Castello del Nero, 3nights
Near Florence
Share the secrets and passion for cooking of the chef at Castello del Nero and participate in these lessons held in the hotel's kitchen for 2 to 6 people at a time. Each lesson has a theme; perhaps All about Pasta, a Tuscan Menu or All about Fish. You finish by dining on the food that has been created. You receive an apron and you go away with the recipes that have been cooked. The Castello del Nero nestles in the hills to the south of Florence and is a splendid five star luxury boutique hotel, which has been lavishly transformed from an ancient fortified manor house dating right back to the twelfth century.
Prices for a three night break including return flights, car hire, accommodation and one cookery course start at about £990 per person based on four people taking part
More details on the Castelle del Nero
Relais il Falconiere, 3 nights and 5 nights
Near Cortona
The Falconiere is offering a Cooking under the Tuscan Sun 3-night break including accommodation, a welcome dinner on the first night in the hotel’s famed restaurant, a guided sightseeing tour of Cortona, two cooking lessons with the Michelin-starred Chef followed by a lunch or dinner with matched wines, a visit to the Baracchi wine cellar for wine-tasting and access to the Thesan Spa. The cooking classes are three hours each and will feature Etruscan cuisine and ‘bread, oil and imagination’. The delightful Relais Il Falconiere is the result of a true labour of love on the part of the owners Silvia and Riccardo Baracchi. The palazzo dates back to the 1600s and many original features have been carefully preserved. It stands in utter peace and tranquillity, facing the countryside of eastern Tuscany and the green valley of Val di Chiana.
Price for a three night break including return flights, car hire and all the above start at about £1397 per person based on two people taking part. A three-night break at the Relais including just one cooking class starts at about £995 per person based on two people taking part.
The Falconiere also offers a Cooking under the Tuscan Sun 5-night break including accommodation, a welcome dinner on the first night in the hotel’s famed restaurant, three guided sightseeing tours of Cortona, the market of Camucia and the towns of Montepulciano and Pienza, three cooking lessons with the Michelin-starred Chef followed by a lunch or dinner with matched wines, a visit to the Baracchi wine cellar for wine-tasting, access to the Thesan Spa including one wine therapy. The cooking classes are three hours each and will feature Etruscan cuisine, ‘amusing cooking with a bit of fantasy’ and ‘the joy of home life – pasta and bread’.
6-night breaks are also available (please ask us for more details).
Price for a five night break including return flights, car hire and all the above start at about £2325 per person based on two people taking part.
More details on the Relais is Falconiere