Ready, steady, cook...

CV Travel, currently celebrating its 35th year of offering individual houses and exceptional villas, reports a marked upsurge in requests for cook services, to combine self catering freedom with catered convenience.

The company offers experienced cooks with extensive local cooking skills in France, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Mallorca, Morocco and the Greek Islands, where meals can be served in fabulous dining rooms and al fresco terraces, either on a daily basis, for a celebration dinner party or a catered event.

Managing Director Debbie Marshall said “Our clients like the privacy of a villa and our properties are so exceptional, they’re often reluctant to have to leave them to go out to eat. The solution is to book a cook, either to host a special dinner party or celebration, or to provide lunch or dinner up to 6 days a week. Services are optional and flexible and standards of cuisine are exceptional, using local recipes and fresh ingredients, or adapting to special diets”.

Here is a selection of CV’s top villas with cooks…

Al Fresco Andalucia
Local cheeses, hams, freshly baked bread, olives and chilled local wine are all included in the sumptuous picnics prepared by Claire, the cook, at the wonderful Andalucian family house, Casa Gandolfo. Evenings can be spent enjoying local dishes on the al fresco terrace in the wonderful gardens, enjoying local traditional meals, included in the rental price of £2150 per week, for up to 10 guests.

“Dinner is served" in Sicily...
…by the houseman, Leonardo, either in the elegant, candlelit dining room or beneath the palm trees on the terrace, on a balmy Sicilian evening. La Favorita is appropriately named as those who stay here love the cook’s fabulous home cooking, and enjoy a continental breakfast, light lunch and dinner 6 days a week. This service adds the ultimate touch to a stay at this elegant ochre and white hunting lodge, still owned by Sicilian nobility. La Favorita can be rented from £2200 per week for up to 12 guests, including the cook and the houseman.

Marvellous Mezes in Corfu
Come home after a day cruising from bay to bay on Corfu’s idyllic north east coastline to a selection of mouth watering Greek mezes, freshly made taramosalata, deep fried aubergines with tsatsiki, a home made moussaka, freshly caught, grilled fish, or a honey soaked baklava with Greek yoghurt. Greek classics and home favourites are all on the menu at Kokkokila, a wonderful house, sleeping 6, converted from a 1740 shepherd’s lodge, in a tiny hamlet on the hillside above a classic Greek harbour. A week’s rental costs from £560 per person, including flights, private taxi transfers, maid and cook service.

Delicious dinners with a view in Corfu
The pretty and exceptionally well equipped kitchen at Koukouvaya House, (it even has own wine chiller), makes it a pleasant place to rustle up breakfast or lunch. But perhaps the fact that this property has the most exceptional coastal views, wonderful pool and gorgeous terraces, makes it too tempting to stay inside, when rental includes one meal per day prepared by in-house cook, with additional cooking service available on request. Available to rent from £510 per week per person for up to 10 guests, including accommodation, flights, private taxi transfers, maid and cook service.

Mouth watering Morocco
Home made bread, muesli and yoghurt for breakfast and tasty array of vegetarian dishes for lunch will appeal to the health conscious, though the full-time Moroccan chef and pastry cook at Verger de l’Etoile Filante, an exotic palace amid an oasis of palms, will soon put paid to any diet. The Verger estate grows its own organic vegetables and even makes its own olive oil. With staff to totally spoil you, comfort and service are a top priority in this 1001 Nights blend of Morocco, India and the Orient. Included in the rental of the main house for 8, or the entire palace for 15, is a full time cook to produce 3 meals daily, 7 days a week, with a rental price from £4000 per week for the Riad House for 8.

For more information and reservations visit: cvtravel.co.uk