Safeguard.

What we eat, where we eat it, when we eat it, how we cook it, where we cook it, and with whom we share it are all directly determined by culture and contribute to the formation of an individual's identity and sense of belonging to a group, place, or region. It is part of a people's cultural richness and, therefore, part of their intangible cultural heritage. Like other intangible practices, culinary traditions are alive, constantly evolving, and influenced by external factors, which means that these customs, traditions, and knowledge can be lost as they are passed down from generation to generation.

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This loss makes it necessary to take measures to perpetuate its use and raise awareness so that people embrace it. To begin this work, we must first know what we have: what knowledge, techniques, utensils, and traditions revolve around regional cuisine, and begin to document them. This task is the first step toward creating an inventory of Dominican gastronomic heritage; the guiding thread of this inventory will initially be the dishes common throughout the country, later progressing to the recipes specific to each region.

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This is why the Dominican Flavors Foundation, together with the Casabe Foundation, an organization that also strives to strengthen and promote Dominican gastronomy, and with the support of the 16 member universities of the Dominican Chapter of the Pan-American Confederation of Schools of Hospitality, Gastronomy and Tourism (CONPEHT), decided to undertake the "Safeguarding of Dominican Culinary Heritage" project. This project aims to create, in several stages and on a national scale, an inventory of the main recipes for Dominican dishes, drinks, and desserts, with the objective of safeguarding the intangible gastronomic heritage of the Dominican Republic. This publication, or Corpus of Dominican Culinary Heritage, will be the most complete, exhaustive, and practical recipe book ever compiled of traditional dishes that form part of Dominican identity, divided by region, with recipes properly organized and classified.