“I discovered that cooking is also a bit of therapy”

It all came from the pleasure of eating. For as long as I can remember, I have always had a powerful attraction to food, I have always loved eating. My parents say that when I was little, they couldn’t let me go at weddings and other parties, because I would rush to the kitchen to grab the petits fours and devour the cake. At home, my mother prepared simple things using raw products, and we also spent a lot of time, with my brother, at our grandparents’ house.

Our two grandmothers were excellent cooks: on my mother’s side, it was simple and good traditional dishes, roast beef and green beans or leg of lamb and potatoes, I saw the pleasure she had in preparing for us a meal and to see us eat. My paternal grandparents ran a hotel-restaurant in Cauterets, in the Pyrenees, during the winter, and a campsite in Biscarrosse, in the Landes, during the summer. My grandmother took care of the cooking and housekeeping.

During the holidays, there were often seven or eight children with them, we slept in the house or in the caravan, she prepared large sharing dishes for the campers and for us, barbecues, paellas, pies, side dishes. spaghetti and cakes. They stopped this activity when I was 10 or 12 years old, but my grandmother continued to cook for the regiments. I grew up with the idea that the meal is a crucial and necessary moment of conviviality.

Allow yourself time and joy

That said, my relationship with food has had its ups and downs: when I was in middle school, I was in sports class and I did between ten and twelve hours of swimming per week. It took a lot of energy and I ate a lot. Then, in high school, I stopped swimming, continued to eat the same way, and gained a lot of weight. I called on a dietitian, who helped me lose 20 kilos, but I had become obsessive, I no longer allowed myself anything.

At 20, I went on Erasmus to The Hague, in the Netherlands, and, curiously, that’s where I reconnected with the pleasure of eating. I met a lot of different people, Dutch, Spanish and American students, for whom eating was just a matter of subsistence. I started cooking for those around me, to show them that food could be a real pleasure. I discovered that cooking is also a bit of therapy: you concentrate, you taste, you are present and elsewhere at the same time. We give ourselves time, and joy too.

This is also the moment when the Instagram application arrived in France, and I started photographing my dishes. Then I started a blog. I made a lot of pies. I love that: a pie can be super delicious, salty or sweet, depending on the seasons and regions. It ranges from tartiflette to tarte Tatin, from gourmet quiche to rustic pie. You can make it anywhere, you just need a baking tray and an oven, and put everything you like in it.