Cheftimony Episode 010 – Transatlantic
Today’s show came about through a happy meeting on Instagram, and that virtual meeting happened because of shared interests in chefs and their stories.
Seetal Savla stands out in the world of food bloggers and restaurant reviewers. Seetal lives in London, she works in digital marketing, she travels enough to make me very jealous, and in amongst all that, she writes a wonderful food blog called SavlaFaire. I think the name is absolutely fantastic.
Seetal is not a chef herself – she leaves the cooking to her husband, whom she calls Chef Savla - but Seetal is most definitely interested in food. In her childhood, Seetal had the wonderful home cooking of her mother and grandmother, so much so that she didn’t really explore restaurants and other cuisines until she was older. But now that Seetal has started exploring the culinary world, she is exploring that world with vigour. And happily for all of us, Seetal shares her experiences and her thoughts on SavlaFaire.
Visit Seetal’s site, and you can take in her thoughts on chefs, restaurants, travel and lifestyle. Seetal gives honest reviews of the places she’s dined, and she’s such a thoughtful and articulate reviewer that I find myself really, really wanting to visit the places she recommends. One of those, as an example, is the Holborn Dining Room. Their meat pies (and their veg pies for that matter) look incredible, and I’m a big fan of Chef Calum Franklin’s Instagram feed, full of those beautiful pies. Of the restaurant, Seetal wrote: “In a city where eating out is practically a competitive sport, Holborn Dining Room consistently bring their A-game. I’m ready to move in.” So that’s enough for me, I’m going!
Another big part of SavlaFaire is Seetal’s Spotlight on Chefs section. Like me, and like you I suspect, Seetal finds chefs really interesting. And what I love about the Spotlight series is that Seetal doesn’t stick to bog standard questions that chefs have answered repeatedly in the past. As with her restaurant reviews, you’re going to learn things from Seetal’s Spotlight series that you won’t find anywhere else.
During our talk, I had to ask Seetal the impossible-to-answer question “Where should I eat in London?” Kindly and politely, she tackled the question she has heard countless times before and shared some wonderful-sounding places, from the Holborn Dining Room to The Quality Chop House, Indian Accent, Noble Rot, Gunpowder, Padella and more.
And if you’re looking for more great food writers, whether bloggers or reviewers, Seetal has recommendations for you there, too. We both follow Ed Smith of Rocket & Squash, and Seetal also enjoys the work of Chris Pople of Cheese & Biscuits, the Hungry Hoss, The Critical Couple, Aaron Vallance of 1Dish4TheRoad, Cladia Roden and more…
To hear it all, join me on Episode 010 for my transatlantic talk with Seetal Savla.