Paper short abstract:

Local culinary experiences facilitate intercultural interactions by means of social dining events created by European hosts in their homes for tourists. By opening their private life and creating menus reflecting their views of food heritage, they contribute to the circulation of new references.

Paper long abstract:

Tourism and gastronomy imply a dynamic articulation between global and local consciousness and between global and local cultures. Contemporary social and technologic conditions have promoted the emergence of new ways of experiencing such connections that are yet to be studied. Today, travelers in pursuit of culturally immersive meals explore virtual marketplaces offering repertoires of food experiences created by local dwellers, in order to fulfill a desire for “authenticity”.

This study looks into the ways local hosts in Barcelona, Rome and Paris interpret and produce culinary authenticity and mobilize their position as city dwellers to create dining experiences for international tourists in their homes. This research recovers the perspective of 35 local hosts through qualitative interviews and participant observations in Paris, Rome, and Barcelona.

An analysis of the data yields the hosts perspectives on the touristification of their homes implying giving access to strangers by means of constant interplays between the backstage and the frontstage, between the protection and the showcase of their private lives, elements that contextualize food consumption. Their vision of their food culture translates into their menu, and their cuisines become spaces where it is produced and reproduced in order to unfold what they perceive to represent a part of their food heritage that is inaccessible for tourists. By hosting at their homes, cooking, and presenting the personal story behind the recipes, local hosts build new ways of interaction, connection and information about local food heritage in the global stage moving away from archetypes promoted by mass tourism.