Caribbean Connections: Stories and Recipes Across the Diaspora
Join three of the UK’s most exciting Caribbean chefs, Andi Oliver, Melissa Thompson and Marie Mitchell as they explore the cultural and culinary legacies of their Caribbean heritage with the British Library’s Curator for Caribbean Collections, Nicole-Rachelle Moore.
They discuss how they approach the intersections between recipe, biography, memory and history in their recently published and forthcoming books. The panel share their experiences of writing and the personal and cultural histories they have documented through their recipes.
In partnership with the Oxford Cultural Collective.
This event took place as part of the British Library Food Season 2023.
Marie Mitchell is a writer, chef, co-founder of Island Social Club and founder of Like Cooked Food, Marie’s soon-to-launch project centred around community and kinship. Marie makes a considered effort to create space in which she can explore Caribbean culture and food with authenticity and without limits. Developing dishes by focusing on history, geography, and contemporary ingredients found in her locale and home, London, Marie is conscious of driving British Caribbean cuisine, and thus culture, forward. Outside of Island Social Club, Marie is a champion of social inclusivity, sustainability, and supporting and creating spaces for self-care and mental health awareness. Marie is due to publish her first book in spring 2024, Kin: Caribbean Recipes for the Modern Kitchen, (Particular Books, Penguin), which will feature a collection of recipes from the Caribbean and its diaspora, celebrating the powerful connection food gives us to our families, culture, and to places and people around the world.
Nicole-Rachelle Moore is the British Library’s Curator of its Caribbean Collections. She has co-curated and taught courses on Andrea Levy and Toni Morrison and worked with the George Padmore Institute until 2021. Nicole-Rachelle co-edited Dream To Change the World on the life of John La Rose in 2018 and remains closely involved with New Beacon Books. Her poetry was included in the 2020 publication In Search of Mami Wata: Narratives and Images of African Water Spirits. Nicole-Rachelle Moore’s first book Memories, Musings and Unfinished Conversations is out soon.
Andi Oliver is known to British audiences as host of both the BBC’s Great British Menu and the Sky Arts Book Club, amongst numerous other media roles. In a recent production for BBC2, The Caribbean with Andi and Miquita, Andi and her daughter embarked on an emotional journey to explore their heritage. Andi’s first cookbook, Pepperpot Diaries: Tales From My Caribbean Table, will be published in April 2023. Showcasing traditional and modern dishes, it will reveal the flavours of Andi’s childhood and track how Caribbean cuisine has evolved over time. In November 2022 Andi was appointed a Patron of the Oxford Cultural Collective.
Melissa Thompson is an award-winning food writer, columnist and cook. A former national newspaper journalist, in 2014 she started a supperclub in her front room that eventually became a sell-out pop-up. As a food writer, she has penned powerful articles on the British food industry that became focal points for important discussions around identity, diversity and inclusivity. In 2021, she won the ‘Guild of Food Writers’ Food Writing Award and in 2022, was named Writer of the Year at the PPA Awards. Her debut cookbook Motherland was published by Bloomsbury in 2022. It explores the evolution of Jamaican food, from the island’s indigenous population to today. It was shortlisted for the Andre Simon Award in 2023. She is a regular panelist on Radio 4’s The Kitchen Cabinet, has appeared on Saturday Kitchen and is co-director of the British Library’s Food Season. She is a columnist for BBC Good Food Magazine and has written articles and recipes for a range of publications for the Guardian, Conde Nast Traveller, Stylist, Vittles, Waitrose Weekend, Waitrose Magazine and others.
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