A Sweet Conversation with Paul Lowe

Picture this—you’re a new college grad and while you’ve grown up around food and certainly know your way around a kitchen, you shamefully only have a couple measly recipes you know how to cook. On this particularly stormy day, you want to make something good not just something to fuel you until your next meal.

Rather than admitting defeat and calling your parents to ask simple questions like how can I tell if my pasta is fully cooked, you think to yourself—I definitely should know this by now. Take a sip of wine and dust off a cookbook that was gifted to you as a housewarming present upon moving into your first Big Girl apartment.

It’s Paul Lowe’s (aka Sweet Paul) Eat & Make, a stylish and crafty book that explores some of the most comforting, easy-to-follow and fun to make recipes. Perseverance kicks in, and you think, there’s got to be something in here I know how to make.

Then you spot it—Ramen. Aha! Every college grad’s staple and one that feels more than suitable on this particularly stormy day. You venture out in the rain to gather ingredients and don’t punish yourself when you forget the bokchoy.

The ramen comes out perfect. The jammy egg delightfully so and you wonder how on Earth you could have told yourself moments earlier that you weren’t that great at cooking. You are in fact, a good cook, you just need to have the confidence to try something new and not be afraid for it to come out tasting less than ideal.

Cut to present day. Your counter is a little more bare than usual after having to give away all of your cookbooks to move to a different country. A story for another post.

That being said, Sweet Paul still keeps you company, the pages a little sticky and starchy from having splashed them with ramen water, flour, sugar, and other ingredients. These are recipes that have kept you company for years and supported your cooking endeavours with a level of humour that can only be found in parts of Scandinavia—where Paul Lowe is from.

The excitement builds as you muster up the courage to send Paul a note on social media expressing how comforting his book has been and whether he’d explore his foray into cooking with you.

I am absolutely delighted to welcome Paul Lowe to Daughter of a Restaurateur this week. Together, we talk about his journey into food, how it sparks joy for him and so many others. There’s conversation about the bridge between food, and the want to simply make beautiful things that delight others and the origins of where that came from.

There’s talk about the World’s Best Cake (a recipe also found in Paul’s book) that was inspired by his grandmother.

I’m inspired and swept into Paul’s world as he outlines how his love of food came from his parents and grand parents where he learned the art and science of baking and creating recipes that warm the heart. As we talk through this I’m reminded of just how personal food is to all of us. Food is a universal experience however the ways in which we experience food varies from generation to culture to style to lifestyle—there’s so much involved in the ways in which we consume. I think about this as I silently dare myself to try to bake Paul’s World’s Best Cake, since I’m certainly the World’s Most Average Baker.

On my first attempt, I realize I have drastically mis-measured the sugar quantity making more of a World’s Sweetest Cake than Best but that feels apt to the series of Eat & Make and so I’d like to think I am simply being on brand with this experience. I endeavour to make this a second time and am beyond when I realize how delightful the cake is, light, creamy with roasted almonds that tie it all together. I can vouch that it certainly is the World’s Best.

In the end the thing that sticks out the most from my experience interviewing Paul is his sweetness. He has the ability to see beauty where others see mere function and expresses his journey with food and food styling in a way that increases my motivation to do the same. Now Paul has ventured on to explore the the world of props, tchotchkes and other elements of styling ones home. The chapter may look different but one thing remains: having a knack for good taste and a strong sense of humour to compliment it.

Paul, thank you so much for your time and willingness to share your journey with me on Daughter of a Restaurateur. Sending you lots of love!

Note: Sadly the podcast episode for this week has been erased due to a technical glitch. Also, due to recent amendments to Canadian content distribution there may be less episodes of DOAR. I’m actively learning about more ways to create content to share with you and appreciate you all for following along. More to come soon :)

Bon Appetit,

Erika x