This topic will certainly spark various controversies because not many people have the necessary expertise to evaluate it.

Thus, the answer is not so easy to provide.
Having an in-depth knowledge of what constitutes "important" art is itself a difficult task, as it requires extensive study and site visits. However, understanding gastronomy in its most complete sense may require even more; mere personal experiences driven by curiosity or passion are not enough. This path of knowledge could turn out to be much more costly than visiting museums and art galleries.

Furthermore, overcoming the initial hurdle—"we all need to eat every day, or we won't stand upright"—is quite different from claiming to be an expert in gastronomy. In theory, we could all be experts, but in practice, it would be like saying we know art after seeing a magnificent painting by Giotto, Michelangelo, Piero della Francesca, Caravaggio, or Picasso in a museum. The risk of being superficial becomes absolute.

We will therefore start with the perspective of a great Italian chef, Gualtiero Marchesi.
From the Foundation's website.
Some of his historic dishes.

A friend of mine since 1976, whom I jokingly called "the master of masters," and later discovered that he truly was, as he was the first chef in Italy to receive the prestigious 3 Michelin stars. I came to understand the true significance of this over time.

I shared two great passions with him for many years: beautiful women and art. I met him at the age of 22 in his restaurant Via Brovesin della Riva in Milan, where a senior advertising colleague took me because he wanted me to understand what it meant to eat well. At that time, I was a young art director working on my first commercial, the launch of Bauli’s pandoro.

I remember being so impressed by his cooking that I returned two weeks later because I wanted to impress a girl I was courting. However, it went terribly wrong. I had no experience "beyond our mother's cooking," and I probably ordered the wrong dishes. After dinner, she said goodbye and left. I was clearly upset, as was evident from my expression. Gualtiero, who was making his rounds in the dining room, asked, "What’s with that expression?" I explained, and he told me one of his sayings, which I don’t remember exactly, but it managed to relax me. In the following years, I often encountered him in art galleries because, like me, he has always had this passion.