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Solo travel is wonderful but – don’t you sometimes wish you could share a meal and have a conversation with someone?
What if (like many of us) you’re too shy to just walk up to people you don’t know and ask to join them?
Eating alone can be fun but… maybe not every single day.
Yet many of us travel because we want to experience local culture, eat local food and meet local people.
What better way to do this than by being a guest in someone’s home?
There's Airbnb for rooms and Uber for rides, but a plethora of social networks have made inroads into that most hallowed of halls: the meal.
I'm talking about social dining, or eating with locals.
Most of these networks function along similar lines: you choose a destination, pick a host family or activity, book online, message back and forth if needed, and pay, either through the website or PayPal.
The experience is usually straightforward – you go to someone’s home and they cook for you. At times, though, hosts like to take whimsical approaches to hosting – they can turn their dinners into themed events, hold them at an unusual venue or focus on certain types of food, like tapas or chocolate.
Eat With
Eat With is probably the largest and most sophisticated social dining network in the world, with 25,000 hosts in more than 130 countries. It's an easy-to-navigate site with plenty of filters to make sure
you pick the dining experience that's right for you. What I liked: Clickable food photographs
organized by destination. Caught my eye: A feijoada in Brazil! I mean, who doesn’t want to try a home-cooked feijoada when in Brazil?
Meal Sharing
Fun Meal Sharing slogan: "To point to anywhere on the map and be
welcomed to a home-cooked meal." What I liked: Facebook sign-up and the
hefty help section. What I liked less: Website not as intuitive as similar sites. Caught my eye: French food. Sailboat. Long Island Sound. I rest my case.
BonAppetour
Well established in Europe, BonAppetour has a strong presence in Asia. What
I liked: Global, site in lots of languages. Hosts are verified. You get 20% off
your first experience. You can buy gift cards for friends and family. 24/7
support – you never know! What I liked less: No easy
way to search for specifics – price or dietary restrictions. Caught my eye:
Storytelling in Lyon.
PlateCulture
PlateCulture is the biggest social dining network in Southeast Asia. What I
liked: Facebook signup, 10% signup bonus. Easy drop-down menu for destinations.
App available. Caught my eye: Cooking class in Bali.
Mamaz Social Food
Once called Voulez-Vous Diner, Mamaz Social Food is a Paris-based service focused on France but with a growing presence in key world cities. What I liked: Their blog is filled with local travel tips. Caught my eye: Special places - a selection of the most stunning homes and most special meals.
Home Hosted Meals
A global network, Home Hosted Meals has hosts in interesting and less-visited
countries. What I liked: Their vision: “We believe that by sharing a simple
meal the people of the world may one day share peace and security based on
acceptance of each other’s way of life.” Clearly lays out options. What I liked
less: Slow process involving emailing host and waiting for the answer. No
search function. A basic site. Caught my eye: This is more about the interaction
than the transaction. Some meals are actually free if you buy the food!
Local social dining
While most of the above networks are global, social dining experiments are starting locally, regionally or within individual countries. For example, Cesarine offers authentic Italian regional cuisine by handpicked chefs, while Eat at a Local's focuses on Portugal and has hosts throughout the country.
Heading off to someone’s home for a meal? There are certain rules – most of them unwritten – that you should consider following.
Not everyone uses a service or a network to arrange meals with locals on their travels. Sometimes, things just happen.
I asked Women on the Road about their own experiences and advice in eating with locals, and here's what they shared.
Bev from Auckland
A meal I had recently was with my Airbnb
host in Lisbon. I arrived as my host was in the midst of a dinner party.
Without hesitation she invited me to join them and poured me a glass of red
wine. I had just arrived in the country and couldn't have felt more welcomed.
Kristina from Michigan
Just make sure there are at least
two other couples/3-4 people in the event the experience is very awkward and
uncomfortable.
Kathy Francis from Charleston, South Carolina
I have had
home hosted dinners on trips to Ecuador and Thailand in which the family prepares the meal and we meet them in
their home. It’s always an open and friendly evening, with both cultures
wanting to learn from one another.
Philippa from Portugal
I have used many many times this webpage to have dinner with
local people everywhere I travel! VizEat: Immersive Food Experiences - VizEat;
From dinning in Barcelona and New York, to even doing a cooking class with a
really cool Italian / Australian couple in their house in Barcelona. It was a
really fun way to meet local or just regular people who are living for some
time in a country and bonding as if you had friends everywhere you go. And... I
really recommend it!
Monique Peubez from the Jura, France
On a trip to the Faroe
Islands, while speaking with a local student outside a church her mum opened a
window and told her daughter to invite me for dinner. They offered me dry whale
meat and mutton! Such a lovely family... since I had some French cheese still
left in my rucksack I offered them some International friendship.
Anne Betts from Packing Light Travel
I love the way the sharing
economy is transforming the way we travel, and how it promotes interaction with
locals. I booked a delicious seafood dinner hosted by a grandmother and her
granddaughter in Barcelona – I loved being welcomed in a Catalan home, the
conversation, observing the interaction between a devoted granddaughter and her
grandmother, the distance from the “tourist trail” and enjoying a home-cooked
Catalan specialty.
Faith Dugan (currently in Asheville)
I’ve had a few wonderful experiences I’ve loved – once I was
invited to the owner’s home of an apartment I was renting. I had only
communicated with her by email. It was a lovely evening filled with wonderful
conversation with her and her husband.
Donna Armer, Beaufort, South Carolina
I book places to stay before I leave the US. I'm able to
correspond with the owner before I arrive. Once I'm sure the place in right for
me, I ask the owner for help in finding local people who are willing to teach
me to make bread or pasta or any local specialty. These exchanges develop a
foundation for a friendship even before I arrive.
Coby Sikkens, Valleiry, France
In Tokyo, where I was for a meeting, some of my Japanese colleagues invited me to their home for dinner. The food was delicious, but I was wearing my office business two-piece suit and sat on the floor behind a low table. As I was unable to sit the way the Japanese did with my legs folded under me, I was allowed to stick them under the low table where they almost showed at the other end. After dinner, I was rescued by someone who found a chair!
Monica Murphy
One meal that comes to mind is a lunch I had at a friend's house in Oman. As with most activities in their daily lives, the men and women eat their meals separately, but I found myself eating in another house, sitting in the floor with the men and taking food from the communal serving dish. The Omanis are very polite and hospitable, and this would be "haram" in their culture - forbidden - but I can think of two reasons for this. First, someone asked if I was hungry and I said I was, because in Arab culture lunch is served later. Perhaps the ladies' meal hadn't been prepared yet. The other reason may have been language. My friend's brother spoke good English while the women could not. We had Biryani chicken, originally from India, a dish a lot of Omanis have for every meal!
Donna from Beaufort, South Carolina, USA
I have never had to use an app or service (thankfully) as I'm not technology savvy enough to do that. Instead, I make friends with people...usually the people I stay with, so I am invited to dinner often. I'm probably what you would call a conservative traveler, meaning I book places to stay before I leave the US. I'm able to correspond with the owner before I arrive.
―Updated 15 August 2019