Love ‘Chef’s Table’? You can live it with these luxury chef-led tours

You love Angela Cicala’s pastries. What if you could travel with her and her husband Joe, the owners of Cicala at the Divine Lorraine, to the places in Italy that give them inspiration? You’ve been dining on Jeff Michaud’s pasta at Osteria for years, so wouldn’t be nice to go to Italy with him and his wife Claudia, then learn how to make pasta with them? Surely you’ve seen Nok Suntaranon’s episode on Chef’s Table by now — want to go to Thailand with her?

Well, you can. A number of Philly chefs are now offering trips that aren’t just all-inclusive of meals, excursions, and accommodations. They’re taking guests on culinary workshops, touring the farms, cheese caves, and fishing villages that supply them with their favorite ingredients. It’s an appealing proposition: On the road, a chef, seeking inspiration, will theoretically sniff out the best meals, the best markets, the hidden spots for regional specialties that you might not find in your guidebook.

Here are some Philly chefs leading trips in 2025.

Italy

Chefs Angela and Joe Cicala of Cicala run Antico Italian Travel, a company that takes travelers on intimate culinary workshops and luxury culinary tours from the Italian Alps to Puglia (and everywhere in between). The Cicalas’ guests, many of them descendants of Italian immigrants, often use her trips to reconnect with their roots. The Cicalas organize tours open to the public and private tours for up to six people. For their culinary workshops, “Guests can book their own accommodations in the villages instead of us requiring them to stay at an expensive hotel as part of the package, which makes the tours more accessible,” said Angela, who now spends nearly half the year in Italy, while her husband Joe flies back and forth between Philly and Italy. (Joe still works behind the line at Cicala and their Neapolitan pizzeria Sorellina.)

New for 2025, “Joe will be hosting a cooking trip in Sicily outside of Taormina, with a few days of cooking in his family’s village of Fiumidinisi,” Angela said. “They are roasting whole goats in wood ovens up there in the mountains every Sunday and stuffing their mattresses with sheep wool.”

Culinary workshops are around $2,500 for six days (not inclusive of accommodation, airfare, or breakfast) and weeklong luxury tours start at around $6,500 (including accommodation, but not airfare).

Chef Jeff Michaud of Osteria and his wife Claudia run La Via Gaia, another a culinary tour and workshop company that takes guests around Italy and its neighboring nations. Destinations this year include Piemonte and Slovenia, as well as Puglia for the first time. You’ll visit organic farms, make cheese, capicola, and pasta from scratch, and see how local crusty breads are baked. The Michauds frequently bring along their chef friends on these journeys, tapping a roster that includes Philly names like Nick Elmi, Katie Parla, and Greg Vernick. Like the Cicalas, they are also available to host and organize private group trips.

A weeklong journey starts at around $9,000 (inclusive of all meals, tours, and accommodation, but not airfare).

Thailand

You’re going to have to be an armchair traveler to Thailand via Netflix if you want Suntaranon to guide you to her hometown of Trang and through Bangkok’s colorful markets this year, since her November tour is sold out. But Suntaranon’s freshman tour — with Bon Appetit, which is partnered with Academic Travel Abroad — seems to be setting the stage for more trips, as another one is now planned for February 2026.

On the agenda: dining at Michelin-starred restaurants, participating in a cooking class with one of Suntaranon’s teachers, and visiting a fishing village for fresh seafood. Given Suntaranon’s penchant for luxury, rest assured that you’ll be resting your head at night in luxury accommodations (think: the Four Seasons Bangkok and remote glamping locales).

The ten-day long journey in November starts at $7,995 for a double-occupancy room and is inclusive of everything besides international airfare. To be added to the wait-list for the February 2026 tour, please email [email protected]

Vermont

Sommelier and wine educator Dan Solway, of well-established underground supper party series Sante, is partnering with sommelier Charlotte Adams Alsaadi on this food and beverage “Tour de Vermont” June 18-22. “For someone whose goal is to educate people about wine and other food and drink in an accessible and engaging way, there’s really no substitute for visiting a place and experiencing their craft in person. Wine always tastes better when you’re drinking it at the vineyard or in the cellar,” Solway said. He and Alsaadi will be taking guests on visits to winemakers, brewers, and cheesemakers.

“As the quality of local domestic production increases for all types of fermented beverages, we wanted to focus on a region that’s really pioneering some incredible work. This is an area that Charlotte and I both have connections to, both having lived there at some point. This is a stepping stone for us for grander and more ambitious trips down the road,” said Solway.

The five-day long trip costs $1,995 per person with lodging included (or $1,295 without).

Cheese

If you are simply obsessed with cheese, join Tenaya Darlington, aka Madame Fromage, in Belgium, or Di Bruno’s Emilio Mignucci in Northern Italy on a Cheese Journey.

Philly

And for those who want to stay closer to home, consider exploring Philadelphia on a food-focused walking tour with chef Jen Carroll of Carroll Couture Cuisine or Maddy Sweitzer-Lammé of Tiny Table Tours.