A dinner by acclaimed Spanish game chef Luis Alberto Lera, held during the CIC Executive Committee meeting, made the case that wild, locally sourced game can reach the very highest standards of fine dining.
During its Executive Committee meeting at the Monastery of San Pelayo in Castilla y León, the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC) hosted a gastronomic dinner devoted entirely to wild game, demonstrating that game meat, sourced locally and prepared with skill, belongs among the finest cuisine Spain has to offer.
The dinner, entitled Celebrating Wild Game, was created by Chef Luis Alberto Lera, one of Spain’s foremost exponents of game cookery, and organised by the CIC Working Group for Gastronomy. It brought members of the Executive Committee together with Spanish national and regional authorities in the surroundings of a sensitively restored monastery.
Every course drew on the wild species and produce of the surrounding region. The menu moved from a vegetable broth with mallard and roe deer marinated with watercress, through pickled quail, a stewed wild boar snout and wood pigeon from the nearby Tierra de Campos, to red-legged partridge with cherries and almonds, closing with pine nut ice cream. It was accompanied throughout by wines of the host region, drawn from Rueda and Ribera del Duero, including a José Pariente and a Protos, a Vega Sicilia 2021 and a Hacienda Monasterio Reserva 2020, opening with a Champagne of the house of Devaux.
The purpose of the evening reached well beyond the table. Game meat is a wild harvest: free-ranging, natural, and among the most sustainable proteins available, drawn directly from well-managed landscapes with very little that separates the habitat from the plate. In sourcing every dish from the wildlife of the immediate region, the dinner illustrated both the low food miles of locally harvested game and its place within the One Health approach that links the health of people, animals and the environment. Above all, it showed that game meat, so often undervalued, can be elevated to the very highest level of gastronomy.
Miguel Loya, who leads the CIC Working Group on Gastronomy, highlighted what a privilege it had been for the CIC to collaborate with one of the world’s finest and most original game chefs.
“This dinner shows what we mean by the wise use of nature. Every dish came from wild species harvested in this very region and prepared by a master of his craft. Game meat is healthy, natural and sustainable, and this evening it stood proudly among the finest cuisine Spain has to offer,” said Luis de la Peña, CIC President.
The dinner formed part of the CIC Executive Committee’s meeting at San Pelayo, held over two days on 24 and 25 July 2026, during which three Spanish regions, Castilla y León, Aragón and Extremadura, joined the organisation with the support of the Spanish Government. Together, the accession of the regions and the celebration of local wild game underlined a single conviction: that wildlife and habitat are best conserved when they carry real value, cultural as much as economic, for the communities that live closest to them.
Media contact
Tristan Breijer MBA FRGS FRSA MCIJ
Director of Communications and Public Affairs
CIC – International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation
Email: tristan.breijer@cic-wildlife.org
Mobile: +44 781 408 7423
Website: www.cic-wildlife.org
