The Food Writer’s Lunch of the Oxford Literary Festival
Report by Fiona Oates
The Oxford Literary Festival kicked off in the last week of March with a tasty starter indeed – a Food Writers’ Lunch hosted by one of England’s leading chefs, Raymond Blanc, at his Michelin-award winning restaurant, ‘Le Petit Blanc’. Monsieur Blanc was joined in the discussion by Claudia Roden, a well-known doyenne of food writing and winner of 6 Glenfiddich Awards; and by Sophie Grigson, daughter of revered chef and writer Jane Grigson, and a respected chefebrity in her own right. The panel was chaired by Anne Dolamore, author of the first book about olive oil to appear in the English language, and publisher at Grub Street, an innovative cookery book publishing house.
The fodder for the day was the question: ‘Given that cooking is about taste, should we first begin to learn about taste before we learn to cook?’ which was examined from the perspective of modern trends in food and cookery writing. Raymond Blanc opened the discussion with recollections of his own education in the taste of ‘le terroir’, recounting fond memories of hunting and gathering in his local forest until the age of 14, picking cascades of sweet berries and learning to understand the yearly calendar by what was available for the picking. He also recalled the way pigs were a central staple of village life – pigs’ throats were slit in front of the local children and the villagers celebrated the slaughter with three days of dancing. Every single part of the pig was used for one dish or another.
Raymond lamented the British move towards the US model of large-scale intensive farming, and the lack of interaction in food production by most British people. He blamed this process for diseases such as foot-and-mouth, which has ravaged England over the last few months, and claimed that the British are only just beginning to realise the health benefits of eating proper food (while the Chinese have know about this for thousands of years!).
Claudia Roden agreed that an education in taste was important; not only for the ability to distinguish proper flavours, but for what each food represented by way of history and culture. She remembered her early upbringing in Cairo, where live birds and sheep were taken home from market to be butchered in the kitchen. During her more recent cooking classes, she has tried to teach people the importance of taste by giving her students a list of ingredients without quantities, and asking them to make the recipe ‘by taste’. She noted that she asked each student to write in the quantities used, and that usually the results were very similar.
Claudia also raised a topical question: People seem now to have an obsession with food, with watching food programs on television and consuming food literature, yet few seem to be cooking. Why is this? Some people have suggested to her that it is fear of failure, in comparison to what they see on television or in recipe books, but as Claudia pointed out, surely this failure could only occur once, and the next time people attempt a recipe they will improve on it until they are satisfied. She feels that sometimes people are afraid of cooking something unacceptable, something that is out of fashion. Her recent experience in Egypt supported this theory—the poorly paid chefs would ask her what to cook as they did not know what was in fashion. These chefs used to think that ‘good food’ was French haute cuisine, and now they were alternating between themes such as Mexican and Chinese in an attempt to produce food pleasing to consumers. Claudia proposed that countries lose their cuisine and culture through tourism.
Sophie Grigson concurred that the internationalisation of food to please everyone had produced some bad results in restaurants abroad, but also argued that food television and writing had promoted a greater interest in regional cuisine, so that people on holiday now asked for local dishes rather than seeking something similar to what they would eat at home. She did believe, though, that there is still a big division in the UK between people who are interested in food, and those who are not. She related tales of a relative who did not know what taramosalata was, despite it being on the shelves of all British supermarkets, and of a 23-year old who had never eaten pasta, melon or grapes. Sophie stressed the need for a greater general interest in food and its source, pointing out that in most markets on the Continent food was always local and seasonal, and that people discussed the produce and its origins, whereas at British markets there was no guarantee of local or seasonal food, only a promise of cheaper produce.
Generally, the panel agreed that the modern proliferation of food writing and television programs had played a valuable role in popularising cooking and educating people about different kinds of food. As Raymond Blanc pointed out, however, consumers still take little responsibility for the quality and taste of produce, and this is the first step towards understanding food. The consensus was that people needed to learn the basic skill of enjoying real food, which meant asking questions about the origins of products and being able to distinguish authentic flavours. A greater understanding would then produce further benefits, including a better basic nutritional standard and an increased sense of conviviality as people united around the table to enjoy well-cooked food rather than fast, individually prepared processed meals.
The main premise of the day, served to us along with three courses that were a delicious illustration of the argument, was that if people are taught to cook based on taste and an interest in the origins of produce, they will begin to create a proper culture and language of food.
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