Food is such a good way to connect across cultures!  Until of course, you are travelling with a vegan and/or a person with an auto-immune reaction to gluten, in a country whose cuisine is based on lots and lots of bread and meat!  Then it can be hard for an instructor who is a foodie or a group that is food-adventuresome to remain supportive of the odd person out. A good tool for having discussions about food values is the Food Attitudes & Behaviors Survey which is cited under related tools: see Toolbox entry #116 for more info.