Jennifer Hope Choi plans every trip the same way: open a Google doc, start with food, and build outward from there. As a former Bon Appétit editor, 13-year restaurant industry veteran, and author of a travel memoir, she has strong opinions about Michelin guides (skip ‘em), low-rated restaurants (sometimes worth it), and why you should always follow your optician's food recs.

She also edited Afar’s debut Travel to Eat series, which includes three stories: Jeju black pork and a life-changing soup, Sherpa cuisine in the Rockies, and why Portland, Maine, might be America’s best bakery town.

Meet today's guest

Jennifer Hope Choi is a senior editor at Afar and the architect of its Travel to Eat series. A former Bon Appétit editor and 13-year restaurant industry veteran, she is also an award-winning writer and author of the travel memoir the Wanderer’s Curse. Her work spans food and culture, and the messy, joyful overlap between the two.

In this episode

• How Jen’s latchkey childhood, early Food Network shows, and her Korean grandmother’s pancakes shaped a lifelong obsession with eating

• Why the Google doc comes first: Jen’s method for building food-forward itineraries from Reddit threads, local papers, and stranger recommendations

• The case against Michelin stars, lines around the block, and treating a trip like a personality — and what to do instead

• Inside the three stories of Afar’s Travel to Eat series: a transcendent bowl of Jeju black pork soup, Sherpa cuisine taking root in the Colorado Rockies, and the baking scene quietly transforming Portland, Maine

• Jen’s #1 travel food tip: ask the shop clerk, not the algorithm

Links & resources

• Read the Travel to eat series: ⁠America's best bakery town⁠, a life-changing pork soup, and the rise of Sherpa cuisine in the Colorado Rockies

• Read Jen's memoir, The Wanderer’s Curse
• Follow Jen on Instagram
• Read MFK Fisher's The Art of Eating, Jen’s favorite food book

Chapters

00:00:00 Introduction

00:01:30 Growing Up Food-Obsessed

00:06:30 How to Eat Your Way Through a City

00:11:30 Lists, Stars, and Letting Go

00:21:30 The Travel to Eat Series

00:30:00 Tips for Eating Well on the Road

Be sure to subscribe to the show and sign up for our podcast newsletter, ⁠Behind the Mic⁠, where we share upcoming news and behind-the-scenes details of each episode. And explore our second podcast, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Travel Tales⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, which celebrates first-person narratives about the way travel changes us, and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠View From Afar⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, where we spotlight the people and ideas shaping the future of travel.

Unpacked by Afar is part of ⁠Airwave Media⁠'s podcast network. Please contact ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠advertising@airwavemedia.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ if you would like to advertise on our podcast.

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