Cooking the Books with Gilly Smith
by Gilly Smith
Cooking the Books is about all of life through the prism of food, from climate change to culture and politics to people. It's for foodie book lovers who want to hear something more profound about the way we live, making the link between delicious food and the impact of food production on the land, all through four food moments from the books of our favourite food writers. Cooking the Books with Gilly Smith is the winner of The Guild of Food Writers' Best Broadcast or Podcast Award 2022, and was shortlisted for Fortnum and Mason Best Podcast 2022 and 2024. Hear how A-lister food writers have changed the conversation about food as Gilly talks through their four chosen food moments from their lat
Episodes
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Priya Mani: Spiced
This week, we’re with historian and food writer, Priya Mani and her latest encyclopaedia of flavours, Spiced. After her success with The Visual Encyclopaedia of Indian Food, an A–Z, this is a ground breaking deep dive into a whole world of spices from Norway to the Greek Islands, Yunnan to the…
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Alissa Timoshkina: Lozhka
This week, we’re with Alissa Timoshkina and her third cookbook about Eastern Europe, Lozhka. Loshka, meaning spoon, is about the symbolism of connection through nourishment. It is, she says, 'the simple kitchen object which time and again has the power to soothe and lift'. After her first book,...
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Charlotte Wood: Love and Hunger
This week, we're with the award-winning Australian novelist, Charlotte Wood and her ode to cooking and food, Love and Hunger. To Charlotte, cooking is 'creativity in its purest form', but it’s taken nearly 15 years to capture the attention of British readers with this book. Thanks to Nigella…
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Vicky Bennison: Eat Everything
In the last of our mini series of speakers from BrightonFoodStory, the food festival Gilly produced this year in her home town which is aimed at changing the conversation about the way we eat, we’re with Vicky Bennison, the James Beard award-winning author of Pasta Grannies: Eat Everything. Vicky...
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Karen Newby: The Post Menopause Method
Ahead of BrightonFoodStory, the food festival on October 3rd that Gilly is producing in her home town aimed at changing the conversation about the way we eat, we’re meeting some of the speakers on the various panel discussions. This week, we’re with Karen Newby, author of the Natural Menopause...
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Hodmedod's: Whole Food
This week, we meet Nick Saltmarsh and Josiah Meldrum of Hodmedods to talk about the magic of beans in their debut cookbook Whole Food. Now, Hodmedods has long since become the byword for beans in Britain, and can claim a major role in elevating the plucky pulse to enjoy its moment in the sun....
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Andrew Turvil: Blood, Sweat and Asparagus Spears
This week we’re with former editor of the Good Food Guide, Andrew Turvil and his book, Blood, Sweat & Asparagus Spears: The Story of the 1990s Restaurant Revolution. Like Andrew, Gilly was right in the centre of the birth of what another editor of the Good Food Guide, Drew Smith called Modern...
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Jeremy Lee: Kitchening
This week, in an extended episode, we’re with one of the most important voices in British food writing, Jeremy Lee with Kitchening, his follow up cookbook to the 2022 multi award winning Cooking. Jeremy has taken his time to become one of the central storytellers of modern British cuisine – with...
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Claire Thomson: Dear Grace
This week, we’re celebrating Back To School and Uni season with Claire Thompson and her latest book, Dear Grace. This is a book unlike any Claire has written before. She wrote it while her heart was breaking as her eldest daughter, Grace, set off for university, and the letters from mother to...
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Anissa Helou: Lebanon
This week, we're with an absolute legend in food writing, Anissa Helou and her culinary celebration of Lebanon. Listed by Arabian Business magazine as one of the "500 Most Influential Arabs" and "100 Most Powerful Arab Women, she’s among the greats of modern food writing with the likes of Claudia...
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Cooking the Books LIVE: Honey and Co.
This week, we are live in Brighton on the hottest day of the year so far with Itamar Srulovich and Sarit Packer, aka Honey and Co. to talk about their new book, Honey and Co.Daily. Against the sound of a massive fan at Patio Wine Bar, we talked about the huge dollop of love that the Honeys have...
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Rebecca Seal: Irritated
This week we're with author, journalist and broadcaster, Rebecca Seal and her deep dive into the world of allergies in Irritated She's spent 20 years writing about food, not least as the deputy editor of Observer Food Monthly, and her life was all about the deliciousness of food. But it was her...
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Trine Hanhnemann: Midnight Sun
This week we're with Danish food writer, restaurateur and campaigner, Trine Hahnemann and her latest cookbook, Midnight Sun. This is a book about long lazy summer days - cycling to the beach, stopping off to buy strawberries from a local stall, peeling shrimps to eat with homemade mayo and…
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Ozlem Warren: Istanbul
This week, we’re with the WORD on Turkish food and heritage, Ozlem Warren to dig into her latest book, Istanbul. We’ve followed Ozlem on Cooking the Books through her writing career, from Ozlem’s Turkish Table which inspired a fund raising supper club for the earthquake in 2023 at Gilly’s house,...
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Rachel Khoo: The Smallest Restaurant in Paris
This week, Gilly is with the author of The Smallest Restaurant in Paris, Rachel Khoo Now, you may know her as the author of The Little Paris Kitchen and the star of the BBC’s cooler original version of Emily in Paris - without the haute couture or the PR job, a young Brit abroad, feeling her way...
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Sudi Pigott: Consider the Anchovy
This week, we're with travel and food writer, Sudi Pigott to Consider the Anchovy. Part memoir, largely a travelogue, this is a deep dive into the story of a big hitting little fish. Stuffed with maverick, rakish characters, it's a passionate manifesto making the case for the anchovy as a leading...
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Ella Risbridger: The Kitchen Book
This week, we're with Ella Risbridger and The Kitchen Book Now, we know Ella intimately through her memoirs, Midnight Chicken and The Year of Miracles, both of which blended grief, joy, love and loss with food, gathering serious accolades and scooping up the awards. Here, she’s happy. Her life is...
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The World Food Photography Awards
This week, we're with three of the judges from this year’s World Food Photography Awards which took place earlier this week at The Mall Galleries in London. The competition, first known as the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year, has pretty much put food photography on the map since 2011.…
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Chetna Makan: 5 Ingredient Indian
This week, we’re off to lunch with Chetna Makan, the Bake Off semi finalist who has become one of our national treasures with her massive YouTube channel, Food with Chetna. Her latest book 5 Ingredient Indian is yet another way of making Indian food simple enough to cook for quick weekday suppers...
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Felicity Cloake at Cooking the Books Live
This week, we're back at Cooking the Books live in Brighton with Felicity Cloake (and Wilf the Wonderdog) to talk about her debut novel, The Underdog. We know Felicity from her Bridget Jones-on-a-bike style adventures across France in One More Croissant for the Road, the UK in Red Sauce, Brown...
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Jago Rackham: To Entertain
This week, we meet Jago Rackham to talk about his first book, To Entertain: Instructions for a Dinner Party. But the book is not quite what it seems. The millennial Substacker who hosts supper clubs and pop-ups fashioned as dinner parties, has, with his long term partner, the artist Lowena Hearn,...
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Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall: High Fibre Heroes
This week we’re with the prince of plants, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and his High Fibre Heroes. Hugh and Gilly have been talking about the national diet for years on this show and before it was even born. They both campaign with the Food Foundation for policy change to make healthier food more...
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Tim Anderson: JapanEasy Kitchen
This week, we’re back at Patio in Brighton for Cooking the Books Live with Tim Anderson and his latest book, JapanEasy Kitchen In front of a live audience, we find out about the nine magical Japanese pantry staples which Tim says can transform anything we want to cook, how this white man from...
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Judging The Fortnum and Mason Awards
This week, we’re looking in depth at the shortlists in the food categories at the Fortnum and Mason Awards with Marie Mitchell, one of the judges and last year’s award winner for her debut cookery book, Kin. Under the guiding eye of Mark Diacono who played head judge this year, Marie along with...
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Jad Youssef: Lebnani
This week, we’re off to Lebanon via Reigate with the man behind Comptoir Libanais and Yalla Yalla, Jad Youssef. Lebnani is Jad’s debut cookbook that's all about the Lebanon of his childhood, the rituals and traditions of the food from his homeland that he's brought to the menus of restaurants all...
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Ranie Saidi: The Malay Cook
This week, we’re off to Malaysia with The Malay Cook, Ranie Saidi. The Malay Cook is the debut cookbook from this lawyer turned supper club host at Soho House and Curry Club London and now author. It's an homage to the memory of his grandmother, a wedding caterer who brought him up while his...
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Abby Allen: The Farm Kitchen
This week, we’re back with farming champion, Abby Allen and her latest book, The Farm Kitchen. Abby was, until recently, the face of Piper’s Farm, the online farm shop which brought together the best farmers and producers in the South West. Her passion in creating a resilient food and farming...
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Shivi Ramoutar: Recipes from the Rum Islands
This week, we’re with the queen of modern Caribbean cooking, Shivi Ramoutar. It’s 10 years since her debut cookbook, Caribbean Modern: Recipes from the Rum Islands launched this Trinidadian lawyer and supper club host from Leicester to become the Caribbean queen of daytime TV. The 10th…
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Madeeha Qureshi : The Red Sea
This week we’re exploring the cuisine of Saudi Arabia in Madeeha Qureshi's debut cookbook, The Red Sea. Madeeha who spent her first 18 years in Saudi, came to our attention on Masterchef when she reached the finals in 2021, impressing judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace with her fusion of Saudi...
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Cooking the Books Live: Ali Honour
This week we’re in Brighton for Cooking the Books live with bean queen, Ali Honour. The author of Beans describes herself as a chef and food systems agitator, which brings together the best things about beans – how delicious they can be while saving the planet and the health of the nation. In…
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The Jane Grigson Trust Sous Chef Awards Shortlist
This week we’re discussing the shortlist for the Jane Grigson Trust–Sous Chef Award 2026 with two of the judges, Nicola Lando and Jeremy Lee. This year, it celebrates its 10th anniversary with a stunning shortlist of books about secret kitchens and migrant stories which will all be featured here…
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Ilhan Abdi: The Ramadan Kitchen
This week as millions of people all over the world are celebrating Ramadan, we’re with London-based Somali-Egyptian food writer, Ilhan Abdi to talk about her book, The Ramadan Kitchen. A former Amazon corporate employee, she left to focus on cooking content, gaining 265k Instagram followers...
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Pary Baban: Nandên
This week we’re exploring the food and culture of Kurdistan with author of Nandên: Recipes from My Kurdish Kitchen, Pary Baban Born in Southern Kurdistan, in Qaladze, a place known for its resistance and community, Pary fled Kurdistan with her family to escape what became known as the Anfal...
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BOSH! More Plants
This week, we’re back with BOSH!, the recipe developing duo who have changed the conversation about plant-based diets. Gilly has followed their journey over the last 10 years and watched them become the biggest influencers in the plant-based space. Now, as she explores their latest book, More...
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Tamar Adler: Feast on Your Life
This week we are LIVE in Brighton with James Beard award-winning New York food writer, Tamar Adler to learn how to Feast On Your Life. Her latest book is the result of a deep depression that overwhelmed her after the publication of An Everlasting Meal, which is now widely seen as a modern…
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Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees: You&Me&You&Me&You&Me
This week, we’re with husband and wife novelists, Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees to celebrate Publication Day of their new time travelling rom com, You and Me and You and Me and You and Me Their use of food as device in this story of Jules and Adam’s long-term marriage hitting a midlife wobble and...
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Rowley Leigh: The Andre Simons Awards
This week, we’re with Rowley Leigh, chef, food writer and the food books assessor for the 2025 André Simon Food & Drink Book Awards to discuss the shortlist. Rowley is an award‑winning food writer himself, but it’s his mastery of storytelling through the theatre of food that Gilly wanted to know...
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Clare Coghill: Cafe Cuil
This week, we’re on The Isle of Skye with the author of Café Cuil, Clare Coghill. This is so much more than a recipe book celebrating the best of Highland produce, and the CUIL, the Gaelic for cosy nook - is much more than a play on words. This is a story of brilliant enterprise in the face of...
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Ozoz Sokoh: Chop Chop
This week, we’re diving into Nigerian food culture with culinary anthropologist, food historian and now author of Chop Chop, Cooking the Food of Nigeria, Ozoz Sokoh. Her Kitchen Butterfly blog has been documenting the back story to this West African cuisine since 2009, but Chop Chop, her debut...
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Jeffrey Boadi: Plant Fuel
To kick off a brand new year, we’re diving straight into the power of protein with Jeffrey Boadi, author of Plant Fuel. As a former semi-professional footballer and tennis player, Jeffrey has been a top level athlete for most of his adult life. But it was his decision to go vegan overnight that…
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Alison Roman: Something from Nothing
This week, we’re creating Something from Nothing with Alison Roman. The former chef, food columnist for the New York Times, senior food editor at Bon Appetit, author of Dining In, Nothing Fancy and Sweet Enough, and now owner of her own store in upstate NY is all about about doing the bare…
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Emiko Davies: The Japanese Pantry
On Christmas Day, we’re combining all the things that Cooking the Books is about – identity, belonging, food cultures and vicarious travel thorugh food with Emiko Davies in one of Gilly's favourite books of 2025, The Japanese Pantry. As Emiko puts the pieces of her Italian living...
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Skye McAlpine: The Christmas Companion
This week, we’re with the Spirit of Christmas herself, Skye McAlpine and The Christmas Companion Among all the talk of the pressures, the aspirational values and the industry of Christmas, Gilly finds herself feeling like the Grinch in the presence of the Christmas Fairy as she asks Skye about...
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Cherie Denham: The Irish Kitchen
This week, we’re with Northern Irish food writer Cherie Denham and photographer Andrew Montgomery in The Irish Kitchen If you’ve listened to Gilly's chat with Andrew on her Substack a couple of weeks ago, you’ll know that this is no ordinary book. It follows their first book, The Irish Bakery,...
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Nat Thaipun: Thai: Anywhere and Everywhere
This week, we're with Masterchef winner and the hottest name in Thai food, Nat Thaipun. Her book THAI: Anywhere and Everywhere is packed with glorious flavours of Thailand via Melbourne where she grew up. But it was when Jamie Oliver as one of the judges on Masterchef spotted her talent that she...
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Evie Harbury: My Bohemian Kitchen
This week, we’re off to the Bohemian Kitchen of Brit-Czech writer, Evie Harbury My Bohemian Kitchen is a nostalgic trip through the memories of a place Evie only knows through summers with her Czech granny and her dad’s childhood memories as she investigates the traditional cooking techniques of...
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Cooking the Books LIVE: Mark Diacono
This week, we’re with one of our favourite CTB pals, Mark Diacono in front of a live audience at Patio, the buzziest yet somehow most intimate bar in Brighton to talk about his latest book, Abundance. Abundance is Mark's pioneering way of writing a food book, a Substack post every week over a…
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Amber Guinness: Winter in Tuscany
This week, we're with Amber Guinness whose latest book, Winter in Tuscany takes us into her own home to rifle through her pantry and cook what she cooks. But, as Gilly finds out, it’s also a stroll through a time and place still rooted in tradition, where cooking with the seasons and the frugal...
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Stephen Harris: The Sportsman at Home
This week, we’re celebrating 25 years of great British cooking with chef patron of The Sportsman and former punk, Stephen Harris. He’s the chef who put “cuisine de terroir” on the map, hyperlocally sourcing the foods from the land that have been the inspiration behind his award winning cooking.…
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Cooking the Books LIVE: Anna Ansari
This week, we’re with Anna Ansari, the American-Iranian author of Silk Roads: A Flavor Odyssey with Recipes from Baku to Beijing. We meet at Helm Gallery in Brighton’s North Laine, in front of a live audience which includes members of the Network of international Women whose debate about the...
Topics in this show
About this show
Cooking the Books is about all of life through the prism of food, from climate change to culture and politics to people. It's for foodie book lovers who want to hear something more profound about the way we live, making the link between delicious food and the impact of food production on the land, all through four food moments from the books of our favourite food writers.
Cooking the Books with Gilly Smith is the winner of The Guild of Food Writers' Best Broadcast or Podcast Award 2022, and was shortlisted for Fortnum and Mason Best Podcast 2022 and 2024.
Hear how A-lister food writers have changed the conversation about food as Gilly talks through their four chosen food moments from their lat
Hosted by
Gilly Smith