Sophia Lingham-Tsiaparas
A food writer, descriptor, culinary emotio-cultural analyst, and PhD researcher .
‘Travel broadens the mind’ - agreed, but it must be accompanied by a healthy dose of meaningful and sense-evoking authentic food experiences. These experiences help us start to understand the local area, its people, and their culture. Conversations you would never otherwise have the opportunity to participate in occur over food; people open up over food in a way no other means results in. Food thus provides a key to experience a different story to your own.
Having spent much time abroad since childhood and experienced many different types of cuisine, different flavours, ways of cooking, and ways of eating, with many different types of people, food has always been central to my experiences and to making new friends. These memories vary considerably in humour, style, and location from watching my father conduct business deals in a high-end Singaporean restaurant over a bowl of pigeon soup (with head bobbing up out of the broth), to developing trust with Kenyans in the Massai Mara by making ugali together in a large pot over a fire, to becoming part of a high mountainous village community with a sharing economy in central Greece learning the secrets to making authentic (Greek) yoghurt and feta cheese (whilst being fed copious amounts of fresh rice pudding talking with the sheep farmer!).
Food is not just fill-belly (a phrase I have recently discovered), nor just nutrition (although obviously this is important). What is lesser appreciated, especially in the West is that: Food is people. Food is life. Food is memories. And it deserves respect. These emotio-cultural (coined by me) respects for food are one of the foci of my PhD; the different ways people view food, how they use it, and its importance to them is fascinating and understanding and furthering such respect of food I believe plays a part in the deliverance of community resilience, food system resilience and ultimately food security.
My background originates in the legal sector, but after a stint working in Shanghai and UK legal departments, I realised I wanted more. More meaning, more creativity, more ‘savoir vivre’. I taught, travelled and discovered and it led me to start something new, something in fact which had always been part of my life: food writing, or more explicitly, describing my food experiences across the globe in the hope of enlightening others to some lesser known culinary and cultural gems and delights, and the stories accompanying them.
I have proudly only been into a Starbucks once (I was desperate one evening in Shanghai), a MacDonald’s twice, and any other fast food company nil times. I avoid supermarkets as much as possible, and although the odd takeaway or ready meal is sometimes unavoidable (and Cook’s is very good!), I try as much as possible to cook with seasonal local produce wherever I am. I am an avid supporter of all forms of food celebration, from food microbusinesses and SMEs producing high quality products, to locally sourced pub menus, Michelin-starred restaurants with ingredient traceability, restaurants exhibiting innovative food styling and combining of flavours, to raiding the allotment for a seasonal salad, to grandma’s butter splodged paper scrap with the best suet pudding recipe.
I’ve always found it tricky not to write about food- cooking with people always presents a myriad of fascinating conversations and giggles, even if you do not speak the same language, and the memories thereafter are associated with that food. Filing recipe ideas away for a later date, discussing family food traditions or helpful hints for the next time you have an altercation with a butternut squash- all golden anecdotes. In eating establishments, perusing the menu (if they have one), I frequently debate inwardly as to the potential presentation, taste and feeling of each dish, most frequently opting for the most authentic dish of the area, or at least one consisting of ingredients or innovation I would be hard-pressed to come across at home. This is followed by eagerly awaiting the choice, soaking up the surroundings, content in the notion that your appetency for new flavours and foods will soon be satisfied. Next comes the actual culinary treat, the sight or aroma demanding solo appreciation. And with all these impressions, developing notions, visual feasts, specific sonic interludes and snatches of other conversations, felicitous beverages befitting the occasion and pre-awakening our senses, and the culinary aromas wafting around the establishment, I cannot fathom why everyone isn’t frantically taking notes of the emprise to refer to post-event. I have often carried notebooks with me throughout my travels to jot down literary morsels which I may return to at a later date. Even the disappointing meals are fun to write about and at the very least provide an entertaining element to the event. So, here it is: my platform for inflicting my opinions and experiences on the world!
P.S: If anyone is wondering about the name for this blog, it’s my initials :)