One Day : Valentine Benoist - Food Writer and Ceramicist
Location : Islington, London, UK
Profession / passion : Food Writer and Ceramicist
Website : myhungryvalentine.com and myhungryvalentine-ceramics.com
Instagram : @myhungryvalentine and @myhungryvalentine_ceramics
One Day is an ongoing project sparked by the Covid-19. In the days of isolation we would like to focus on what we do best; bringing people together. Read more about the project here.
We will be posting one new day of someones life every day until we run out of contributors. See our instagram stories to experience these peoples One Day in action.
Your favourite baked good.
Coffee éclairs
What is the story behind your profession/ passion?
Food has always been an essential thing in my life, because it’s the ultimate people gatherer - sharing a good meal, a nice bottle of wine and having a good time with the people you love… Restaurants encapsulate these best moments in life, spent around a table, filled with dishes prepared by someone who put a lot of thought and love into it. That’s how I started writing about restaurants for various French publications. My passion for places with careful sourcing, from producers to makers, naturally grew from there. And ceramics was the next step, becoming a maker myself!
How do you want people to react to your work / passion?
In response to the situation, I’ve obviously stopped the restaurant reviews and created a directory of all the small independent businesses offering delivery to support them in these hard times. I just wanted to make a useful tool for Londoners, to help them navigate through the lockdown whilst supporting their local food and drinks businesses. It’s been so successful, I wish it helps change the way people shop and eat in a more long-term manner. Once you’ve tasted real fruit and veg grown respectfully, hopefully you won’t buy supermarket plastic ones ever again.
Ceramics-wise, I want my wares to be functional, being used daily and getting chipped in the process - Full of life, not sitting on a shelf. When people use my plates, serving dishes or mugs everyday, it makes me so happy!
How has the current situation affected how you work?
For the restaurant critic / event consulting part, I’m clearly out of work! Which is why I’ve decided to put some time in creating a directory of all the small independent businesses offering delivery at the moment.
I had also planned to launch my ceramics online shop at the end of March, so this is happening but my shared studio is closed, so I’m mostly creating bespoke orders from my living room, waiting patiently for the kilns to be fired up again.
Describe a smell that brings back memories to you.
Pit-roasted chicken from the farmer’s market in France, which you can smell from miles away. Coming in a small paper bag with potatoes soaked in dripping, it’s the best Sunday lunch ever!
If you could only have one meal for the rest of your life what would it be? (3 courses and drinks)
Potato sourdough bread from the Dusty Knuckle and a very good salted butter (that counts as a proper course, right?!).
Fresh pasta, probably the pappardelle with beef shin ragu from Trullo. https://www.trullorestaurant.com/
Shengjian baos - pork and leek pan-fried soup dumplings from the Dumpling Shack for dessert. https://dumplingshack.co.uk/
All the wines from Catherine and Pierre Breton from the Loire Valley. https://domainebreton.net/
Your favourite ingredient?
Fleur de sel that I usually bring back in gigantic quantities from l’Ile de Ré, a small island off the coast of La Rochelle.
Quality or Quantity?
Quality, always!
Your best kitchen hack?
I’ve learnt my way around no cling film, it involves a lot of air-tight glass boxes and clean tea towels.
A restaurant, individual, supplier, anyone in the food world you feel is doing something great and deserves a shout out and why?
I have around 300 of them in my directory!
There are so many doing a fabulous job right now, feeding you and me, the NHS and vulnerable people - it’s hard to pick just one. I try to order from as many different businesses as I can to support them all, but If I had to make a lockdown delivery shortlist:
• Snackbar for fun weekdays WFH lunches. https://snackbarlondon.com/
• Oren for a Middle Eastern feast that will last days (atm, we treat ourselves to a nice restaurant delivery on Fri night, to celebrate the end of the week and pretend we’re going out). https://www.orenlondon.com/
• Henderson To Home for stunning fish and shellfish. Hendersontohome.com
• Provisions for natural wine, cheese and charcuterie fuel. http://provisionslondon.co.uk/
• Paul Rhodes Bakery for the biggest boxes of bread and pastries, to share with your neighbours (or not, I’m not judging). https://paulrhodesbakery.co.uk/
What 3 ingredients would you always have in your house?
Salted butter, sourdough bread and anchovies. You can live through anything with these three.