Ms Gauri Devidayal is the founder of The Table and Magazine Street Kitchen, Mumbai

“Japan is a mecca for dining and, for someone who loves food as much as I do, I still can’t believe I haven’t managed to get there yet. I long to be in the bustling Tsukiji fish market eating the most exquisite sashimi, glistening lobes of the freshest scallops, tuna, mackerel and bream. I imagine being served one delicate morsel at a time by a rigorously trained chef who is fixated on the art of perfection. No words are passed across the counter, only a hypnotic sequence of perfect plates of raw fish.”

Mr Russell Norman is the founder of Trattoria Brutto, London

“Alla Vecchia Bettola in Florence is my spiritual home. I imagine it on a Friday night, decibel levels through the roof in the no-frills dining room with stark white tiles and dazzling lighting, but the atmosphere is electric. I’m with friends who, like me, don’t care that the food is mediocre at best. A bizarre dish of penne pasta with vodka, some discs of unsalted bread with chicken liver pâté, but a wonderful T-bone beef chop, deliciously bloody and big enough to feed a small family. The point here at Bettola, like many authentic trattorias, is the mood. Florentines don’t have pubs where they might socialise over a pint. They get together over crostini and Campari in a neighbourhood joint where they can catch up on local gossip and enjoy simple, but tasty plates of local delicacies.”

Ms Sana Javeri Kadri is the CEO and founder of Diaspora Co

“I grew up in India, but went to high school in Italy and this summer would have been my 10-year high school reunion in our little village on the limestone cliffs of the Adriatic Coast. I’m pining for Trieste, the place I used to call home. Ideally, I would share a piping hot slice of [supermarket] Tuttidi’s salsiccia e cipolla pizza with my former roommates. It is a slice of perfection – bubbled crust, just enough sauce, sausage perfectly seasoned with fennel and chilli. Just thinking about it makes me nostalgic and weepy for my 18-year-old self.”

**Ms Letitia Clark is the author of **Bitter Honey** and **La Dolce È Vita

“I read Matthew Fort’s account of travelling around Sicily years ago and I have harboured a dream to visit ever since. I live in Sardinia. There are as many similarities as there are differences from Sicily. The Italian way is a steady flow of meals throughout the day, so I would begin with something sweet at breakfast, such as an icy almond granita and a fresh, warm, orange-scented brioche with the obligatory espresso. A lunch of panelle (local fried chickpea fritters), followed by cold octopus salad and then a dinner of pasta with saffron, pine nuts, sardines and wild fennel and a perfectly crisp ricotta-filled cannolo to round things off. In Italy, we let the beauty of the produce speak for itself and, although the ingredients are the same, there are many regional variations. In Sicily, it is the sprinkling of the Arabic tradition and spices that makes for such interesting eating.”

Mr Santiago Lastra is the chef-patron of KOL, London

“I suppose if someone were to ask me what my death-row meal would be, this would be it. Lobster tacos in Baja California. They are made by locals in Puerto Nuevo. You have to be up before sunrise to get them. By the time you are back on the beach, the sun is rising and there’s a hive of cooking activity – very skilled men preparing the lobsters and cooking them in pork fat, while local women make fresh tortillas, rice, beans and various salsas, which you put together with the tacos. It’s a sensational meal and all washed down with natural orange wine made locally in the Baja valley. This is more than just a dish to me. It represents all the things I enjoy and cherish the most – nature, culture, craft, community, friends, tacos, lobsters.”

**Ms Ixta Belfrage is a chef and the co-author of **Flavour

“It’s a sort of retrospective fantasy of mine to gather my family together for a meal on Ponta Negra beach in Natal, in the northeast of Brazil, where my mother is from. It is the idyllic palm tree-lined Natal of my childhood, before the concrete resorts took over. Back then, there were only a few family-run fish restaurants. Our favourite was a beautiful shack in the sand. The tables were close enough to the sea that the water would lap up around your bare feet. The meal always stretched long past lunch into the evening. We’d eat a Brazilian seafood feast consisting of moqueca (a seafood stew), pirão (a porridge of sorts made by beating coarse cassava flour into hot seafood stock) and of course fresh grilled fish and prawns pulled straight from the sea. What I long for is the hospitality and warmth of the hosts, who treated you like long lost family and fluidly moved between being fishermen, grill cooks and caipirinha shakers.”

**Ms Tara O’Brady is a food writer and the author of **Seven Spoons

“Ooty in Tamil Nadu is a hill station perched high up in the Nilgiri Mountains. I am nostalgic about the south Indian thali lunches served at local canteens. A thali is a cross between dim sum service and a buffet. Servers bring platters and pots around the room and offer a variety of delights to add to your already overflowing thal or plate. The south Indians are culinary wizards with vegetables. You’ll find an abundance of vegetable curries – crispy okra, plush potatoes with mustard seeds and curry leaves, green beans with coconut served alongside idlis (steamed rice cakes) or dosa (a sort of fermented rice and lentil crepe) and rice. I especially crave the steaming bowls of sambar, full of plump drumsticks to split and drag across your teeth as one does with artichokes. In this last year, we have had to be so aware of our surroundings, of our safety, of our proximity to others that I miss the feeling of eating communally, of eating the same food as everyone else there and comparing notes.”