Once upon a time, before culinary writers, bloggers, and Web sites existed, people learned about food firsthand. Travellers returned from exotic lands with strange seeds and spices. Aspiring chefs refined their techniques by watching not Gordon Ramsay but their elders. Home cooks picked up tips from Mom. So in a way, Don Genova, food journalist and educator, is heir to a long tradition that began when one Stone Ager said to another, “You know, if you brush some sap from that tree over there on your T. rex T-bone, supper will really rock.”

Perhaps not touching on T-bones but covering almost everything else edible, Genova will be sharing his gastronomic knowledge at a series of Food Culture classes, May 5 to June 30 at Barbara-Jo’s Books to Cooks (1740 West 2nd Avenue). He developed the content during close to a year of study that led to his gaining a master’s degree in food culture in 2007 from the University of Gastronomic Sciences, in Colorno, Italy. “One goal of going to school was to get a deeper background,” he says over coffee, describing how the course combined classroom study, research trips, and a two-month internship during which he worked on the food-culture course.

While he was still in Italy, Genova says, the University of Victoria contacted him, interested in developing a minor or a continuing-studies certificate in sustainable gastronomy. He taught the resulting course this past February and March.

The classes he took meant exposure to instructors from all over the world. “We learned some pretty obscure stuff—why so many French restaurants ended up on one particular street in Belgium in the 19th century, about branding of products, about tradition that’s so apparent in Europe and not apparent here.” Opting to live in Colorno rather than livelier Parma, 20 kilometres away, also gave him more face time with visiting professors like Corby Kummer, food editor at the Atlantic Monthly.

“Field trips were the highlight,” Genova says, describing a stay on Crete, where he watched goats being milked and saw phyllo pastry made from scratch. A visit to Spain involved learning about sausage and cheese production, and a session with molecular gastronomist Ferran Adrià of El Bulli. France was Burgundy, more cheese, and Charolais beef.

As for producers of prosciutto and Parmigiano, they were right in Genova’s Italian neighbourhood. Getting up close and personal with the sources, origins, and entire cycle of authentic European food has given Genova a far broader perspective on what’s happening back home in Canada. “Part of what I talk about [in the lectures] is food security,” he says, citing Barcelona, which “puts great stock in its public markets, which are administered by the city but run by the stall holders”.

The founders of the University of Gastronomic Sciences are Slow Food and the regional governments of Emilia-Romagna and Piedmont, so it’s fitting that the first session of Genova’s course focuses on food culture and the Slow Food movement, and that the guest speaker is Slow Food Vancouver president Christina Beaudoins. Next up is olives. “We’ll taste four or five olive oils, and different kinds of olives,” Genova says, describing how he likes to heat olives with rosemary, thyme, and orange and lemon peel. Yes, there may be a cooking demo. For a session entitled Cheese and Terroir, he and Allison Spurrell of Les Amis du Fromage will delve into history and production. Feasting, Fasting and Wine takes participants on a trip from the Middle Ages to modern times. Bruce Swift of Swift Aquaculture, who practises a closed-cycle polyculture involving coho salmon and wasabi in Agassiz, joins Genova for a session called Sustainable Seafood.

This series of classes brings home how deeply Vancouver’s food culture has evolved in recent years, with Oyama Sausage Company’s Jan van der Lieck presenting samples of his charcuterie against the wider context of Genova’s photos and video of Italian Parma ham and culatello di Zibello production. A Food Security lecture questions whether we can, in fact, find it locally, regionally, or even nationally, with input from Devorah Kahn, food-policy coordinator for the City of Vancouver. The series concludes with Food and the Media, which looks at the influence that advertising and media coverage have on our tables, with documentary filmmaker Nick Versteeg providing an insider perspective.

And if a year of food studies is calling, know this: Genova only spoke poco Italian when he started the course, but can now understand it. Classes are held in English, and you can get more information at www.unisg.it/eng/. And surprisingly, while there, he even lost weight.

In the series Food Culture: From Fast Food to Slow Food, individual classes are $65, which includes the companion book or DVD; the package of eight is $480. For more information, see www.bookstocooks.com/. Call 604-688-6755 to register.