When people eat together, they tell each other stories. Add a fire to the mix and the stories become myths and the food becomes manna.

Tales for the Table is a cookbook and collection of short stories that explores the relationship between stories, food and fire, where the food and the narratives intertwine and influence one another to create an immersive culinary experience for those who are creating it and those who are receiving it. The stories are inspired by the sensual and symbolic associations of ingredients within the dishes, and the menu is in turn informed by the ebb and flow of the narrative of the story to create a symbiotic relationship where story and senses are interwoven. When a sponge diver casts off into the Mediterranean sea surrounded by bushes of thyme and lavender, you eat an oyster doused in lavender and thyme vinegar. Where walnuts represent wisdom, and specifically the wisdom of the self, a young nun’’s life is changed by a fateful meeting beneath a walnut tree while you eat Ossau-Iraty broth with walnuts and grilled asparagus.

HEARTH-FABLE is the marriage of storytelling and cuisine

Mieux: the starter story and dish has been published by Gastronomica Food Studies Magazine in November 2022. Available at: https://online.ucpress.edu/gastronomica/article-abstract/22/4/93/194507/Mieux?redirectedFrom=fulltext