Madeira is the main island of an archipelago more than 400 miles off the coast of North Africa, a place so green that one of the first Portuguese sailors to see it exclaimed that it was just “one large garden”. And a garden it has remained, through nearly six centuries of human habitation, through slavery and sugarcane, through extinctions and evolution and the current cultural rebirth. Your hosts on this one-of-a-kind journey will be the Portuguese culinary icon André Magalhães and renowned PokPok chef and frequent League host Andy Ricker.
We’ll take on Madeira in one Very Big Week on the impossibly verdant main island, one of the few places on earth, as Andy is fond of pointing out, where bananas and wine grapes grow together. There will be traditional cookouts, tuna feasts, seaside resorts, and insider access to the island’s vibrant culinary scene. And there will be drinks. Lots and lots of drinks, from the everpresent rum-and-juice poncha to the namesake fortified Madeira wine, making a comeback of its own.
