HRM – KITCHEN TEAM: ENAC Puglia’s experience in Poland
A week of international training, cultural exchange, and culinary discovery: this is the experience that the students of ENAC Puglia enjoyed in Poland as part of the HRM – KITCHEN TEAM project, an Erasmus+ initiative dedicated to training in the catering and hospitality sector.
The adventure began with their arrival in Gorzów Wielkopolski, a Polish town in the Lubusz region. After settling into their hotel, the students took their first walk through the city center, beginning to immerse themselves in a new culture and a context completely different from their own. It was a first taste of what would be an intense week, full of discoveries and international relationships.
The heart of the experience focused on practical cooking workshops, where the young people from Puglia had the opportunity to cook side by side with their Polish and Ukrainian peers.
At the Lubusz Chamber of Crafts, they prepared and decorated catering snacks, discovering different techniques, new aromas, and traditional local recipes. It was a moment of authentic cultural exchange, where the universal language of food broke down linguistic and cultural barriers, creating genuine bonds between the participants. In the following days, the training continued at the ZSG (Zespół Szkół Gastronomicznych) school, where the students took part in a more structured international cooking workshop. Cooking together means sharing knowledge, comparing different approaches, and enriching each other: not only technical training, therefore, but also personal growth and transferable skills that are fundamental for their professional future.
A particularly significant moment was the workshop at the bakery in Gorzów, where students learned how to make bread and rolls according to Polish tradition. Kneading, shaping, and baking bread is an ancient art that requires patience, precision, and passion: values that the students were able to experience firsthand, guided by local artisans.
The trip also included a stop in Szczecin, an important Polish port city, where the group visited a local artisan pastry shop, discovering the region’s confectionery specialties and observing traditional processing techniques up close.
The experience was not limited to Poland. As planned, the students traveled to Germany, to the Schwedt/Oder and Angermünde region, to visit two farms at the forefront of sustainability and short supply chains.
After the farm visits, the day in Germany ended with a convivial moment at the UBV in Schwedt, where Italian, Polish, Ukrainian, and German students cooked and ate together. It was an opportunity to put into practice what they had learned during the visits, but above all to strengthen the bonds created during the week and celebrate cultural diversity through food.
This Erasmus+ mobility program was not only an opportunity for technical training in the catering sector, but also a real journey of personal and intercultural growth.