Honey And Co: The Food Talks

This is the seventh episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today's guest is Fay Maschler, restaurant critic at London’s Evening Standard newspaper. Fay won a contest for the position of Evening Standard restaurant critic in 1972. This was supposed to last for three months but she has recently celebrated 47 years in the role! Fay’s reviews are legendary and she has been known to put many a chef in their place. We talked about her experiences starting out in the hey day of journalism, the reality of eating out four times a week, when not to write a bad review, and how to deal with death threats when you do! It was such an honour to have Fay with us for this conversation.  It was fascinating to hear about the changes she has seen over the years on the London restaurant scene, how the rise of social media has changed things, the food writers she admires the most, and what we all really, really want to know... where we should be eating right now in London.  Hope you enjoy! This intervi

This is the sixth episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today's guest is Darina Allen, founder of world-renowned Ballymaloe Cookery School in Ireland and bestselling author of 19 cookbooks. We absolutely love Darina and the school and have had many of her graduates working in our kitchens over the years. We chatted to Darina about how she came to run the fabulous Ballymaloe, what it's like be part of a cooking dynasty and what it takes to be a successful cookbook author. It was wonderful to hear Darina talking so passionately about her experiences running a successful family business in rural Ireland, as well as the sustainable ethos at the core of everything that Ballymaloe does, and the values she instills in all her students, especially about the importance of creating an inclusive kitchen culture.  Hope you enjoy! This interview is part of our series Who Run The World? Women in Food. Our final episode will air on 8th March International Women’s Day. Got something to say? Shar

This is the fifth episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today's guest is Lisa Markwell, food editor at The Sunday Times and editor at CODE Hospitality. Lisa has been a journalist for more than 30 years, winning awards as editor of The Independent on Sunday and spending eight years as restaurant critic at the same paper – giving herself the job after the previous critic was fired. She took a ‘gap year’ to undertake the chef’s diploma course at Leith’s School of Food and Wine, before returning to journalism as food editor at The Sunday Times. We talked to Lisa about her experiences of working in the cut-throat world of hard news and how journalism has changed over the last 30 years. It was fascinating to hear how she rose to the top and how she has been able to use her position to change the way women are written about. We loved hearing how Lisa's training at Leith's changed her perspective on the food world and she made a beautiful comparison of running a kitchen with running a ne

This is the fourth episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today’s guest is Romy Gill, what a treat! Romy is a British-Indian chef and cookery teacher and was the owner and head chef at Romy’s Kitchen in Gloucestershire for 6 years. One of the few female Indian chefs in the industry, Romy was appointed an MBE in the Queen’s 90th birthday honours list in 2016 for her services to the food industry. Romy’s debut cookbook Zaika is full of delicious vegan recipes celebrating the zaika or ‘flavours’ of Indian cooking that bring a renewed spicy excitement to plant-based food. We talked to Romy about the barriers she came up against as a woman – and more specifically an Indian woman – opening her own restaurant, from securing funding to getting planning permission and dealing with builders. We also talked about the women who have inspired her and helped her along the way, from her mother to Sheila Dillon, Claudia Roden, Delia Smith and Nigella Lawson. Romy is such an inspiration to women i

This is the third episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today’s guest is multi-award winning food journalist Sheila Dillon, known as the voice of The Food Programme on BBC Radio 4. Sheila started her career in journalism when she reported on the contamination of the New York water supply by pesticides for food magazine Food Monitor, and has been reporting on the most important stories in the industry ever since. As a reporter, writer, producer and presenter on The Food Programme, Sheila has been involved in many important stories in the food world: from BSE to the horsemeat scandal; from the rise of GM crops to the growth of the organic movement; and more recently the health hazards of vegan junk food. As well as telling us about these groundbreaking food stories, Sheila told us fascinating stories about her experiences as a woman in the food world, including her activities with the women's movement, how she was involved in a landmark sex discrimination case for equal pay in Amer

This is the second episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Today’s guest is Claudia Roden, the goddess of Middle Eastern food writing. Claudia is a cookbook writer and anthropologist, her career spans over 50 years. Originally from Egypt, Claudia grew up in Cairo and studied in Paris and London. In 1956 when her parents fled Egypt to London, Claudia began collecting recipes from the Jewish diaspora arriving from all over the Middle East as a way to make a connection between refugees and their homelands. This led to multiple bestselling cookbooks including the international award-winning The Book of Jewish Food, and she revolutionised western attitudes to Middle Eastern cuisines in 1968 with her bestselling cookbook, A Book of Middle Eastern Food.  We talked to Claudia about her unusual route to a career in food writing, how attitudes to women working have changed over the last 50 years, the women who inspired her, and how travelling alone as a woman was treated with suspicion yet o

The first episode of our Who Run The World? season celebrating women in food. Since the start of Honey & Co women have reigned supreme; they run our kitchens, our front of house and our offices, and we finally feel that the industry is starting to catch up with us. Women are now leading the way across the industry, not just as chefs but as food critics, as writers, as culinary teachers, tv and radio presenters and so much more. So, with International Women’s Day on the horizon we wanted to dedicate a whole season to some of the women who inspire us every single day! Today’s guest is Andi Oliver, she’s the most vivacious and beautiful person we’ve had the chance to meet this year. The interview with her is absolutely hilarious. We talked about her career in a punk band, and how she made the transition to chef and then to food broadcaster. Her show The Great British Menu is one of our absolute favourite shows, you should watch it - we spend hours arguing over what we would make! Listen to find out more abou

Alison Roman is a columnist for the New York Times Food section and Bon Appétit contributor. She is the author of the bestselling Dining In. Alison has worked professionally in kitchens such as New York’s Momofuku Milk Bar and San Francisco’s Quince. We talk all about her new book, Nothing Fancy, where Alison makes any night of the week worth celebrating. She believes it’s not entertaining, it’s having people over. We apologised to leeks, fawned over anchovies and much more! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Mike is an Israeli chef and restaurateur known for his landmark Philadelphia restaurant, Zahav, where we had the pleasure of speaking to him while we were in town. We spoke to Mike about growing up in a Jewish household in the US, the food of Israel, his introduction to kitchens and how he and his business partner, Steven Cook, have kept expanding their restaurant world to include Abe Fisher, Dizengoff, Percy Street Barbecue and more... See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Nancy is a native Californian, but has lived in Japan since 1988 and is a renowned expert in Japanese food. Nancy’s cookbooks include Japanese Farm Food, Preserving the Japanese Way and her newest book is called Japan: The Cookbook - Nancy has painstakingly reworked traditional material gathered from gifted home cooks and translated, tested and adapted the recipes. We talk to her about how to source good ingredients for Japanese home cooking, small-scale farming in Japan and much more... See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The third and final instalment of our special smoke series to celebrate the third birthday of our grill restaurant Honey & Smoke. In this episode we had the wonderful Gill Meller join us all the way from Dorset.  First we head into the kitchen with Sarit and Itamar to cook up some lamb chops and plums on the grill, a favourite here at Honey & Smoke over the last 3 years and talk about their love of fire growing up!  Then they chat to Gill Meller, the chef, cookbook author and fellow fire-lover who joined us to celebrate our 3rd and final party for the 3rd birthday of Honey & Smoke! Gill talks about his experiments with fire and cooking outside growing up, bringing this to River Cottage and the different techniques he uses, from nailing fish to planks to wrapping food in clay. We ate a gorgeous meal including focaccia bread with bacon & herbs, homemade cheese with herbs, clay baked onions, grilled cabbage with carraway & garlic butter and wood roast lamb shoulder and finished with gorgeous

The second instalment of our special smoke series to celebrate the third birthday of our grill restaurant Honey & Smoke. In this episode we had the incredible Ben Chapman, co-founder of award-winning restaurants Kiln, Smoking Goat and Brat come cook a Thai-inspired grill menu for us.  First we go behind the scenes at Honey & Smoke to cook one of our most popular dishes over the last three years - grilled octopus and prawns with a rich bean stew. Then we chat to Ben! We talked all about creating a Thai grill menu at Kiln using a range of simple tao barbecues; his story of becoming a chef; the travels, cooking and learning that led to combining British grown ingredients with Thai recipes. Such a fascinating conversation!  We sat down for a sensational menu including delicious liver grilled in sage, raw Jersey beef laap, jungle curry of kippers, mackerel mashwi and Tamwoth belly kapi curry. It was sensational - so vibrant, spicy and smoky. Each chef brought a completely different perspective to cooking o

It's Bonfire Night and our grill house Honey & Smoke is three! To celebrate the third birthday we had not one, not two, but three parties. We invited three fire-loving chefs, Olia Hercules, Ben Chapman and Gill Meller to cook over fire with us and to talk about their life in food and flames. In this series we are doing things a bit differently, so first we head into the kitchens of Honey & Smoke to cook up one of our most popular dishes for you: a recipe for grilled pears with almond tahini, coriander and smoked almonds. Then we chat to our first guest Olia Hercules who brought us beautiful smoke dried pears from Ukraine. We talk about Eastern European stereotypes of beetroot and cabbage, memories of cooking fish broth over fire for summer picnics, traditions of smoking fruit in wood fired ovens, and her dad's incredible keffir recipe which makes the most tender grilled chicken. After a wonderful conversation we sat down together with the crowd to enjoy Olia's gorgeous Eastern European grill inspired

Following a slight career detour singing in a successful pop band, Donal Skehan realised food was his true calling and started his popular blog “The Good Mood Food Blog” which chronicled quick cooking dishes and cheap meals. This soon led to cookbooks, tv appearances, a youtube channel and more. Celebrating honest, hearty home cooked food Donal has established himself as a trusted cook and food writer with a loyal global following. We talk to Donal about how his pop career became a food one and much more! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Sandor Ellix Katz is an American food writer and fermentation revivalist. His books Wild Fermentation and The Art of Fermentation, along with the hundreds of fermentation workshops he has taught around the world, have helped to catalyse a broad revival of the fermentation arts. A self-taught experimentalist who lives in rural Tennessee, the New York Times calls him “one of the unlikely rock stars of the American food scene.” We spoke to Sandor about his life in a commune, what he's discovered recently and much more! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Tim Anderson is a chef, food writer, and MasterChef champion. Born and raised in Wisconsin, Tim studied Japanese food culture at university and lived in Japan for two years. After moving to London, he won MasterChef in 2011 and his epic Japanese soul-food restaurant, Nanban, opened in 2015 in Brixton. We talk to Tim about his new book Tokyo Stories and seemingly endless food offerings of Tokyo on every level... See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ep5 of our mini-series in partnership with the V&A to celebrate their fantastic exhibition FOOD: Bigger than the Plate. Recorded live at the V&A museum, in the last episode of the series, we chatted to three artists from the Eating section of the exhibition: Karen Guthrie, Jasleen Kaur and Michael Rakowitz, all who are challenging the way we think about eating and especially to think about cooking and eating as creative acts. Visit the exhibition: Listeners can get 40% off tickets to the exhibition using promo code: FOOD40  @vamuseum  #plateup   More information on the artists:  Karen Guthrie - House of Ferment https://www.somewhere.org.uk/ Jasleen Kaur - The Five Ks and Tala Curry Measure http://jasleenkaur.co.uk/ Michael Rakowitz - Spoils, Enemy Kitchen -  http://www.michaelrakowitz.com/  To be the first to hear about new recordings of Honey & Co: The Food Sessions, follow @honeyandspicedeli on instagram or sign up to our mailing list. If you enjoyed this episode please help us reach more people

Ep4 of our mini-series in partnership with the V&A to celebrate their fantastic exhibition FOOD: Bigger than the Plate. Recorded live at the V&A museum, in this episode we chatted to artist Kathrin Böhm of Company Drinks about her part in the trading section of the exhibition. Company Drinks is a community enterprise in Barking & Dagenham in East London that brings people together to pick, process and produce drinks.  Visit the exhibition Listeners can get 40% off tickets to the exhibition using promo code: FOOD40 @vamuseum  Company Drinks: @goingpickingKathrin Böhm: @k_athrinbohm #plateup See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ep3 of our mini-series in partnership with the V&A to celebrate their fantastic exhibition FOOD: Bigger than the Plate. Recorded live at the V&A museum, in this episode we chatted to California-based artists Fallen Fruit - David Burns and Austin Young - about their part in the farming section of the exhibition. David and Austin make public art which explores the role of fruit in creating shared culture. By foraging depictions of fruit from the V&A's collection, they have created two unique installations for the exhibition - beautiful wallpaper which draws on the horticultural history of the site and a series of fruit maps which plot the locations of fruit trees growing in public space in London. Visit the exhibition Listeners can get 40% off tickets to the exhibition using promo code: FOOD40 @vamuseum  @fallen_fruit  #plateup See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ep2 of our mini-series in partnership with the V&A to celebrate their fantastic exhibition FOOD: Bigger than the Plate. In the grand setting of the V&A museum we chatted to artist Fernando Laposse about his part in the compost section of the exhibition - Totomoxtle, a beautiful new decorative veneer material made with the colourful husks of heirloom Mexican corn. We talked everything from seed banks to saying yes when you mean no, from biodiversity and the future of growing, to rural farmers on facebook.  Visit the exhibition https://www.vam.ac.uk/whatson   Listeners can get 40% off tickets to the exhibition using promo code: FOOD40   @fernandolaposse @vamuseum #plateup See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.