About Us

Who are we?

We are Matt Purver and Anna Colquhoun, from London via San Francisco. Anna is a chef, and Matt is a computational linguist, and we both love food. To investigate this topic further, we spent 2008 driving round Europe, Turkey, north and west Africa, collecting recipes, stories and other culinary notes.

Who is Anna?

After 10 years working for an international education development agency, Anna changed career to become a cook.  She trained professionally at the Tante Marie Cooking School in San Francisco, took more specialised courses at other schools, including the San Francisco Baking Institute, worked as an intern at Alice Waters' legendary restaurant Chez Panisse in Berkeley and has also taught cooking classes to adults and children.  Abby Dyson featured an interview with her on her blog, Eat The Right Stuff, if you're interested.

Who is Matt?

Matt is a computational linguist who took some time off from the research he usually does for the journey.

Why the 'culinary anthropologist'?

There is no pretence at serious academia here. Take your pick from these explanations...

• We are interested in food. We like travelling around meeting people to find out more about the foods and cuisines of different regions. Pasta Alfredo is not the celebrated traditional Italian dish you may think it is. Get it?
• The stories behind the dishes we create and the different perspectives on the foods we eat are as interesting as they are delicious to eat. Food is not feed.
• In many parts of the world we are fast forgetting how to grow and make real food - food that is good for us and good for the planet.  We want to find and learn from the people who still have this important knowledge.
  
• Anna did anthropology at university. Anna is now a cook. She likes to glorify her new career by thinking of herself as a culinary anthropologist.

Is this a Blog?

No, it's a website. Which we will update regularly, a bit like a sort of, er, online diary.  In September 2006 Anna embarked on her new culinary career in San Francisco and started sending weekly recipe emails to friends and family back home.  When this website was created in February 2008 these were added in as posts.

Where do the recipes come from?

The majority of recipes on this website are ones which Anna has developed herself and tested several times.  They are usually adaptations of something eaten in a restaurant, cooked in a restaurant, found in a book, learnt at a school, borrowed from a colleague, encountered on travels or remembered from the past.  Feedback on all recipes is much appreciated - so that they can be improved.

Who is Barnaby?

Barnaby is our culinary bear.