060 "I Wanted to Encourage People" Letitia Clark, Author of "Bitter Honey"

One of my first questions for Letitia Clark, author of the stunning book “Bitter Honey” was this: How should I classify your book? It is, of course, a cookbook. Letitia has filled the book to the brim with recipes.

After working as a professional chef in many London kitchens, Letitia moved to the remote island off the coast of Italy named Sardinia. These are the unpretentious, “unbossy”, simple recipes Letitia ate as she discovered her true calling, not as a professional chef, but as a home cook and author.

Letitia agrees, however, that the book is more than a cookbook. It is equal parts memoir, story, and manifesto about a way of life and eating that are all but foreign to the rest of us.

As we continued in our discussion, my aim was simply to ask Letitia questions that I couldn’t answer from reading “Bitter Honey” (which I loved so much that I read cover to cover in one evening.)

The result is a meandering but stimulating conversation between topics of home, self-doubt, the necessity of transparency when women seek to empower other women, and the definition of authenticity, both in and out of every kitchen.