S2 E8 Claire Thomson, chef, cookbook author, food journalist and a mother of three girls

Claire pretty much embodies the very concept of mother food as her cooking and food writing is so much focused on the family kitchen. Her cooking is very autobiographical documenting her experience as a mother of 3 girls. She’s an author of 5 cookbooks all of which have the home kitchen as their main location. So I highly recommend her books to all the parents listening to this podcast. Because her books really do have the answers to so many questions we often face in our kitchens - full of practical advise, seasonal, family orientated with practicality, flavour richness and nutrient value in mind. Claire is a really passionate chef and food writer, and as you will hear, her knowledge of and her delight in cooking is so intoxicating! I just loved talking to her and then coming back to this conversation while eating the podcast, as it gave me a very much needed boost of confidence, reassurance and inspiration to get me out of my culinary rut, in which I have been finding myself a bit too often this autumn. i loved learning how her professional life developed and flowed into her personal life almost seamlessly. I really have been chaining my mindset around what being a working mother means to me and I have been, looking for examples in other women, as I am still new to the idea of embracing home as my creative space, and of not clearly defining work time and family time. So Claire’s example was so inspiring and brought many smiles to my face as we were talking. Claire’s new book - Home Cookery Year - is an ode to the simple joys of cooking as well as to the sheer diversity of reasons and occasions we enter out kitchen. So Claire truly knows what she is talking about when it comes to family cooking. This episode is full of wonderful tips and ideas, and if I were to encourage you to take away one thing from this conversation it would be the joy and the playfulness around food, and the idea of not taking food and yourself in the act of feeding too seriously - something I am certainly guilty of a lot - so for me it was a very welcomed reminder that a good meal is a lot more simple than the ambitious cook inside my head thinks it is. Find out more about Claire's work from http://5oclockapron.com and join in the conversation with us over on Instagram @alissatimoshkina and @5oclockapron