Our Staff

Our staff is a very select group of friendly guide leaders that have extensive experience in traveling, eating, and exploring the foodways in their respective regions. They are for the most part fluent in the language of the destinations and in the limited situations where they are not, we will contract with local food-friendly folks as fluent guide assistants and translators. Language will not be a problem on any Atlas adventure. Our guides are primarily accomplished professional chefs, and many have gone on to become professional culinary writers and authors. They are intimately familiar with all aspects of the food and drink, as well as the cultural practices and sights of the regions. Atlas clients will find our guides to be charming, entertaining, and gregarious….. our guides and our trips are the cream of the crop.

Mick Vann

Thailand , Yucatán, Bay Area, and all other trips

Jon M. “Mick” Vann is a retired award-winning professional chef who has been specializing in international cuisine for over 30 years. He has operated a small intensive organic truck farm on his property (and is very familiar with agricultural methodology), and is currently the Staff Horticulturist for the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin . He has been a food writer for the Austin Chronicle newspaper for 6+ years, and has recently released a cookbook on international appetizers, co-authored with Art Meyer, titled The Appetizer Atlas: A World of Small Bites, published by John Wiley & Sons as part of their Professional Chef’s Series (winner of “World’s Best Foreign Cookery Book” at the 2004 Gourmand World Cookbook Awards in Barcelona). Vann and Meyer are also co-authoring a cookbook on world salads.

After his first trip to Thailand Mick fell in love with Southeast Asia , and will travel throughout Vietnam in 2005 researching future trips there. Vann is currently writing a culinary memoir: Savoring Siam : A Chef’s Culinary Adventures in Thailand , with Travel Tips and Recipes, and recipes are being co-developed with his Thai culinary mentor, Chatfeung “Mam” Apisaksiri. Vann has spent months in Thailand traveling all over the country with Mam and her husband (and Mick’s close friend of 30 years) Sap Apisaksari, owners of Austin ’s award-winning Madam Mam’s Thai Restaurant. They revealed to Mick secrets of Thai cuisine that most foreigners are never exposed to, while eating at restaurants that only locals know about. Vann has perfected Thai travel tips and made many valuable culinary contacts while in-country. The Thai trips will be co-guided by Sap’s niece, Kua Apisaksari, who is a Thai Tourism Authority-certified, English-fluent guide with 16 years experience. Mick is currently attempting to learn the Thai language and also speaks Spanish.

The Appetizer Atlas: A World of Small Bites

Mary Margaret Pack

Bay Area, South Pacific, & Hawai’i

M², as we prefer to call her, got sidetracked early with academics: degrees from Rice and UT Austin, with careers as a librarian, researcher, and technical writer. Thankfully, she got wise, and graduated with honors from the California Culinary Academy and interned with the San Francisco Chronicle food section. She currently is a private chef on alternating weeks in the Bay Area, while she writes regularly for the Austin Chronicle cuisines section from her base in Austin . She has contributed to several culinary compendiums, including Scribner’s Encyclopedia of Food and Culture (2003), Cornbread Nation: The Best of Southern Food Writing (2002), and The Dictionary of Culinary Biography (2004).

During her culinary studies she became a colleague of Fijian chef David Vera (now owner of Canoes Lana’i Restaurant, Hawai’i) and became an honorary member of the thriving Island community of the West Coast, leading to her working with and writing about Pacific cuisine. She and chef Vera are currently collaborating on a future cookbook dealing with the cuisine and foodways of the South Pacific.

M² has been a world traveler for the last 30 years, spending extended visits in Mexico , Spain , Morocco , Greece , New England , New York City and the West Coast. She is a joy to be around, and will be leading Atlas tours to San Francisco and the Bay Area, Hawai’i , and the South Pacific, among other places.

Claudia Alarcón       

Mexico , South Africa , Italy , Caribbean

Claudia was born and raised in Mexico City and moved to Austin in 1984, where she received an honors degree in Anthropology, with a minor in Latin American Studies. Her thesis on the history and ritual significance of tamales in ancient and modern Mexico garnered an award from the Oxford Symposium on Food History and was later published in the prestigious food history journal, Petit Propos Culinaires. This has led to her current project: field researching and writing a book on the culinary and cultural history of tamales. She has also studied ancient and modern Maya culture under one of the most important Maya scholars of modern times, Linda Schele, and is now an regular volunteer of the internationally-renowned Texas Maya Meetings, an annual conference held at the University of Texas at Austin .

From her scholarly background you’d never know that she has a sparkling wit and is a barrel of laughs, or that she did hard-time in the trenches of restaurant kitchens for 15 years. She is fluent in Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese, and has traveled extensively throughout Mexico , Belize , Brazil , Guatemala , and South Africa . She is a professional translator with the Texas Department of Human Services, and a freelance food writer for Rumbo, an Austin Spanish-language daily, and the Austin Chronicle. Claudia can’t wait to reveal the culinary secrets of Mexico , South Africa , and the rest to the clients of Atlas Culinary Adventures.

Lenore Tice              

Northeastern Spain & Basque, South America

Lenore has worked in restaurants and catering her entire adult life, and has garnered a reputation as a superb amateur chef, masterful bartender, and party and events planner. She lived in Barcelona for 4½ years, explored throughout Spain , and knows all of the intimate Spanish and Catalan culinary secrets that reveal themselves only to the locals. Blessed with boundless energy, she is currently developing a line of Spanish food products and sauces, running an Austin-based catering operation, and starting her own events planning business.

She is fluent in both Spanish and Catalan, has worked for years as a professional translator, and professionally taught English to Spaniards for years in Barcelona . Lenore has traveled extensively in Mexico , the Caribbean , South America , and Western Europe , and is the daughter of an American Airlines pilot. She is the effervescent life of every party she attends.  Lenore knows Catalan and Basque food, and will be the principal guide for the excursion to Northeastern Spain ( Barcelona to Bilbao ), and a co-guide on trips to South America .

Mike Quinn

Brazil , Italy , Morocco

Hilarious and acerbic Mike Quinn is the consummate culinarian /oenologist and a world-class expert on jazz and ethnic music. He has traveled throughout, and eaten extensively in, Brazil , Mexico , Morocco , and Italy , and came very close to buying a restaurant and moving to Montepulciano in Tuscany . He is partner with Atlas owner Mick Vann in Mick and Mick’s International Supper Club (M & Misc), a business that puts on large prix fixe dinner gatherings that focus intently on different world cuisines and their culture and music. He is the guru and promoter of Austin ’s famous Carnival Brasilero, a nationally known and wildly popular celebration of Brazilian Carnival that has drawn huge crowds in Austin for the last 25+ years. He has written music articles for many publications, including the Austin Chronicle, the Austin American Statesman, American Way , the East Bay Monthly (Berkeley), the Providence Journal, the Hartford Courant and is a regular monthly columnist for JazzTimes magazine. He is fluent in Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian and will lead trips to Brazil , Morocco , and Tuscany .

www.sambaparty.com

George Carter  

New Zealand , Sydney-Melbourne 

George is a raconteur, world traveler, and gentleman farmer from just outside of Taihape, near the southern center of the North Island of New Zealand. After turning the farm over to his kids he will be relocating to the coastal town of Whakatane , on the Bay of Plenty . He spends half his time in New Zealand farming and running amok and half in the States, and goes on an extended solo journey of one sort or another every year. He is an expert on all things Kiwi and Australian and has covered nearly every square inch of all of the territories of both countries.

There is no topic that George isn’t conversant in…he is the consummate Renaissance man, a friend to all he meets, and loves to guide guests around New Zealand and Australia. He speaks the Kiwi and Aussie lingo and is intimately familiar with all of the agricultural practices, knows and loves a great meal when he eats one, and relishes a good drink when he has it. George is an authority on New Zealand and Australian culture and cuisine, and will guide the trips to the North Island of New Zealand and to Sydney-Melbourne.

Annie Johnston

Corsica, Paris, Puerto Rico

Annie has worked much of her life in the restaurant and bar business, is a fine chef in her own right, and is considered a gourmand of the first order (not to mention one of the best bar tenders on the planet). Oozing with charm and affability, Annie’s sparkling smile lights up any room she enters. She has always been drawn to the cuisines and cultures of other lands and has traveled extensively throughout Europe , Mexico , and the Caribbean .

She was a university professor of English for many years in Mayaguez , Puerto Rico and has now lived in Paris , France for a number of years, where she continues to discover daily the culinary treasures found there. She has worked as a translator in several languages, and she speaks fluent Spanish, French, and German. Annie will lead Atlas culinary tours of Paris , Corsica , and Puerto Rico .

The Meyer Brothers: Art and Mike 

New York City

Art is a retired Culinary Institute of America-trained chef and a master baker, a cookbook author, and a food/bakery consultant. Mike is a retired New York cab driver and devout Manhattanite, having lived his entire life in the city. The brothers spent their formative years in Brooklyn , Manhattan Beach , and the Bronx . Together, through the years, they have made exhaustive searches across the five boroughs in search of the ultimate slice of pizza, the perfect hot dog experience, the most appetizing lox, smoked salmon, whitefish salad, bagel, bialy, etc., the most unctuous corned beef sandwich (complete with Kosher dills and sides), tastiest Italian subs, and all manner of New York’s version of ethnic  “street food”. They know the greatest of the red checkered table cloth Italian joints, and the premier Polish sausage shops....in short, they're masters of the neighborhood ethnic eats.

In addition to co-authoring the Appetizer Atlas with Mick Vann, Art has written Texas Tortes, and Baking Across America. He held the title of Lecturer in Organic Chemistry at the University of Texas at Austin for 15 years, and currently teaches chemistry at Austin Community College in his semi-retirement, while he writes his first novel.  Mike has been a social worker for the City of New York for so long that he has recently been able to retire with a nice pension. The boys can’t wait to have Atlas clients experience the real foods of New York .

Wes Marshall

Sites with wine…. as our resident wine guru

Wes Marshall started buying and drinking wine while underage and in high school in the late 1960's. Over the years, he has traveled to nearly every wine-making area in the world, visiting with winemakers and grape growers, and learning about the best pairings of food and wine. He translated his love into a job when he started writing the "Liquid Assets" column in the Austin Chronicle cuisines section.

He continues to travel the world, searching for newer and better wines, with recent extended journeys to Chile/Argentina, and France/Spain.  He admits a biased appreciation for the wines of Southern France , Central Italy , and all of the Iberian Peninsula .  This hasn't stopped him from writing about the wines of the United States , in particular, his home state of Texas .  He is the author of The Wine Roads of Texas: A Guide to the Wines and Winemakers of Texas.  He is also a frequent traveler to the west coast areas, where he is especially fond of the wines of Walla Walla , Washington and the Central Coast of California.

Wes's anti-snob style of communicating about wine doesn’t scare off beginners, but the experts in the group will get the in-depth information they desire. Wes will come along as our resident wine expert on any Atlas destinations that feature wine, and as an added benefit, he personally knows the majority of the wine makers and winery owners, and can obtain tours that few others are allowed. He's accessible, knowledgeable, entertaining, and hilarious.