About
I have spent twenty years on both sides of the table.
First as a journalist and author, then as a producer, and now as the person who makes sure the right story reaches the right desk. Each of those lives taught me something the next one needed.
Writing taught me that no editor owes anybody a favour, and that a story has to earn its place. Producing taught me what it costs to build something, and how rarely the people building it have time to explain themselves. Communications is where those two things meet.
Today I am Senior Culinary Attaché at Bon Vivant, a global gastro embassy with posts in Barcelona, Tbilisi and Bangkok. It is not an agency, it is an embassy, and the difference shows in the work: culinary diplomacy, dinner parties, films and star chef world tours, alongside the press office and the awards submissions.
Three things I believe, and work by.
A press release has never convinced anybody of anything.
Journalists are persuaded by rooms, by people and by food. My job is to get them into the room, and then to get out of the way.
Coverage is a consequence, not a product.
Nobody can sell an article. What can be built is a house worth writing about and a relationship with the people who write. The rest follows, or it should.
Say no more often than yes.
I work with a small number of projects I believe in. It is the only way to do this properly, and it is also considerably more enjoyable.
Books
Four titles, all published by Planeta Gastro.
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With Xavier Torres-Bacchetta. Named the world’s best wine tourism book at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards 2023.
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With Sara Castaño. On the village kitchens rewriting Spanish cooking.
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A story of three generations, and of the best Chinese restaurant outside China according to Ferran Adrià.
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With Paco Méndez. Recipes, techniques and revolutionary ideas from the Michelin-starred restaurant COME.
Teaching
Culinary history, which explains more than people expect.
I lecture at the Hofmann Culinary and Hospitality School in Barcelona and at the Madrid Culinary Campus, where I teach culinary history to cooks who are about to spend their lives making it.
Writing
Still at it, and always will be.
I write on food and drink for FEAST Journal, Beber Magazine and El País, and I keep a newsletter of my own, Fork & Pen, for the pieces that belong to nobody else.
Enough about me.
If this sounds like the kind of person you want speaking for your house, write to me. Where it is, what you are trying to do, and what is standing in the way. A paragraph is plenty to begin with.