Cruise ships as giant shopping carts

TRENDS

Cruise ships as giant shopping carts

SARAH TRELEAVEN gives us her first-hand take on why cruising allows foodies to pack flavours from various destinations without the stress of carrying around ever-expanding luggage

The other day, I realized our house had run out of Sicilian Amaro, an Italian digestif. It’s sweeter and has more of a discernable citrus note than other more commonly available varieties. It’s also the perfect thing to drink when you’re too stuffed to eat dessert but you want to linger at the table a little longer.

Then I peered into the fridge and looked deep into the cupboards, noticing our distinct lack of duck confit, walnut pesto, niche honeys and exotic spices. We’re almost completely out of groceries, I told my boyfriend, straddling the line between exasperated and excited, so it must be time to go on another cruise.

I know a lot of people like the casinos, the entertainment and onboard dining options, but the main reason I like cruising is different; I think that one of the best things is the opportunity to collect foodie souvenirs in every port without having to lug them around in an increasingly heavy piece of luggage – which is really just a very specific interaction with the destination. In other words, I like to think of a cruise ship as a very large shopping cart, ferrying me between markets and vineyards and specialty grocers.

More broadly, food tourism is becoming an ever-growing segment of the overall cruising industry – whether that’s onboard cooking lessons and wine tastings, celebrity chef partnerships or shore excursions that span from street food snacking to Michelin-star dining.

But now cruise lines are also expanding their culinary offerings to include things like trips to mono producers, wineries and local markets – the best places for picking up the kinds of souvenirs that can be savoured long after a trip is over.

During Mediterranean cruises, I’ve collected a treasure trove of highly local ingredients, including briny little olives and bars of creamy chocolate so good I’ve refused to share it. In Australia, I’ve stocked up on freeze-dried fruits and Manuka honey to smear on both my toast and my skin.

These little edible curios feel like a way to indefinitely prolong my travels, the chance to return again and again to a near-perfect moment.

China is a veritable cornucopia of unfamiliar sauces to be purchased from colourful supermarkets and local spirits (that have yet to cause blindness) to be collected from roadside stalls. And in Southeast Asia, I bought my share of tamarind paste, craft beer and gummy candies in completely inexplicable shapes.

On a sailing with Windstar, which is offering more and more chef-accompanied tours of local markets, I joined an excursion to Nice’s Marché aux Fleurs. The ship’s executive chef guided us slowly through the stalls, steps from the seaside Promenade des Anglais and offered us sun-warmed strawberries to sample and small pieces of socca, a local chickpea crepe. I struggled to keep up with the group as I filled my backpack with jars of strong mustard and small bottles of Sauternes.

When cruising with Oceania, I visited a winery in Tuscany where I stood under lime trees and got tipsy on bubbly while a dachshund puppy named ‘Pinot’ ran around my legs. Then I cut loose in the gift

Local products displayed in a shop window, Bordeaux, France

shop, stocking up on bottles of delicious effervescent rosé that I’ve since opened to celebrate a birthday, an anniversary and a cross-country move.

Sometimes, when short on time in port, I like to focus on a singular item. In Barcelona, after a very early breakfast that involved grilled pork sandwiches and two types of Prosecco, my boyfriend and I set out to find some smallbatch vermouth – the kind sold not in bottles from a liquor store but straight from the barrel in the back of an endearingly dingy bar or family-owned grocery store.

I was sure I knew the perfect place from a previous visit but I couldn’t remember exactly where it was. We pounded the pavement in El Raval and Sant Antoni, and it was always (in my mind, at least) just around the corner. Along the way, we stopped to snack on vinegar-laced anchovies atop salty potato chips, and to buy a half-wheel of Manchego I almost couldn’t wait to get home and eat.

Hours later, finally feeling defeated and due back on our ship, we turned into a random café to quickly buy a cold drink. And there, in the back corner of that small room, were six large barrels of homemade vermouth, the telltale syrupy red liquid leaking from the spigots.

On my last sailing in China, I carried home handmade XO sauce I picked up during a stop in Beijing. For months, every time I cracked the lid on that small container, the umami-heavy, shrimp-rich aroma would instantly transport me back to the restaurant I got it from, with its hand-pulled noodles, blanched spinach coated in sweet sesame sauce and huge ovens filled with Peking ducks being slowly roasted over date wood.

Spice market

While my attitude towards procuring these objects tends to be ‘full steam ahead,’ the key to making them extra special once I get home requires a certain amount of restraint. Instead of gorging on my treasures all at once, I like to take my aged vinegars and that magnificent Italian butter that inexplicably comes in a tin, my bottles of effervescent Tuscan rosé and packages of mustard-pickle potato chips that are lamentably only available for sale in Monaco, and mix them in with all of the regular groceries.

Then, little by little, I start chipping away at my collection. Months after my cruise, on a gloomy night when I don’t really want to cook, I’ll dig around my kitchen and pull out a cherished tin of cassoulet, a bottle of small-batch soy sauce, or white truffle oil perfect for drizzling on lateseason asparagus – all spoils from previous travels.

In those moments, I can be instantly transported back to a square in Rome or a street in Ho Chi Minh City, to a steaming bowl of pho that somehow pairs perfectly with the humidity or the Aperol spritz that magically takes the ache out of tired feet.

There’s also an extra-sensory level to a memory you can actually consume instead of simply hanging it on a wall or sticking it on a shelf. These little edible curios feel like a way to indefinitely prolong my travels, the chance to return again and again to a near-perfect moment.

At least until the cupboards are bare – and then it’s time to once again set sail in search of delicious memories.