UCMed – Università della Cucina Mediterranea (The Mediterranean Institute of Culinary Arts) is a private non-profit organization (Associazione di promozione sociale) whose aim is promoting the great heritage of food tradition and cooking art in the Mediterranean Basin and the Italian tradition in particular.

UCMed was established in 2009 in the wonderful town of Sorrento, thanks to the initiative of Mr. Mariano Russo as well as other experts in the field of gastronomy, food quality and safety, consumers’ rights, and media. Mr. Russo, a well-known tourism entrepreneur, suggested to host UCMed in his four-stars Conca Park Hotel.

UCMed is perfectly aware of all the complexity that the word “food” assumes in Italy: art, health, tradition, family, landscape, hard work, creativity, quality and, last and least, business. Therefore UCMed’s final mission is to maintain and to enhance every single aspect of this unique mosaic.

Besides being a cultural centre, UCMed is a vocational training centre serving all the professionals somehow connected to the amazing universe of cooking, gastronomy, hospitality, catering, wine and food production and transformation.

UCMed is also the leader of the Campania region largest vocational training pole (49 partners, including 5 public schools): “Campania in 3B“.

UCmed aims to become a meeting point for all the young professionals from the Mediterranean Basin, who want to learn the secrets from the most famous chefs in the world.

Besides the training activity, UCMed is carrying out an educational campaign in schools on healthy foods, focused on the Mediterranean diet, as well as two applied research projects on Corporate Social Responsibility and on Food Safety, in agreement with two major Italian public Universities.

Moreover, UCMed encourages lovers of Italian cooking to allow themselves real food experiences by choosing high quality local products, by learning how to cook these to perfection using different styles and methods. In a nutshell, this is why we organize different food activities, created especially for tourists and beginners, ranging from “Taste and learn” seminars to different level cooking classes and on to field studies on which to discover small but precious food factories and wineries.

For further info about training courses: Hotel Conca Park****, Via degli Aranci 13/bis, Sorrento; email: corsi@ucmed.it