Ep. 501 - Olia Hercules
My Time Capsule
Cast Off Productions
4.8 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 19 June 2025
⏱️ 69 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Olia Hercules is a Ukrainian-born, London-based chef, food writer, and culinary storyteller renowned for bringing the vibrant flavours and traditions of Eastern Europe to a global audience. Olia trained at Leiths School of Food and Wine and went on to work as a chef de partie at Ottolenghi, later becoming a sought-after recipe developer and stylist. Her debut cookbook, Mamushka (2015), won the Fortnum & Mason Debut Food Book Award and earned her the Observer’s Rising Star accolade. She’s since published celebrated cookbooks including Kaukasis (2017), Summer Kitchens (2020), and Home Food (2022), each weaving rich cultural narratives into home-style recipes. In response to the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Olia co-founded the #CookForUkraine initiative, raising over £2 million for relief efforts and earning prestigious awards from Observer Food Monthly, the Guild of Food Writers, and 50 Best Restaurants. Featured among British Vogue’s Most Influential Women of 2022, she continues to advocate for her heritage through writing, teaching, and activism. She hosts workshops, writes for major food publications, and has just released her latest book Strong Roots, a family memoir exploring Ukraine’s history and hope through generations. It’s available here - https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/strong-roots-9781526662965/
Olia Hercules is our guest in episode 501 of My Time Capsule and chats to Michael Fenton Stevens about the five things she'd like to put in a time capsule; four she’d like to preserve and one she’d like to bury and never have to think about again .
Strong Roots by Olia is available here - https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/strong-roots-9781526662965
The online Ukrainian seed shop that Olia mentions is here - https://organicseeds.top
For Olia’s books, workshops, recipes and articles, visit - https://oliahercules.com
Follow Olia Hercules on Instagram: @oliahercules & Twitter/X: @Olia_Hercules
Follow My Time Capsule on Instagram: @mytimecapsulepodcast & Twitter/X & Facebook: @MyTCpod .
Follow Michael Fenton Stevens on Twitter/X: @fentonstevens & Instagram @mikefentonstevens .
Produced and edited by John Fenton-Stevens for Cast Off Productions .
Music by Pass The Peas Music .
Artwork by matthewboxall.com .
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to my time capsule. I'm Mike Fenton-Stevens, and my time capsule is my podcast, |
| 0:17.7 | and in it, I ask people to tell me five things from their life that they wish they had in a time capsule. |
| 0:23.8 | They pick four things that they really love and one thing they'd like to forget by burying it in the ground and never thinking of it again. |
| 0:32.0 | My guest in this episode is the writer, recipe designer and cookery expert Olya Hercules. Olya was born in Kakova in the |
| 0:40.4 | south of Ukraine. She trained at the renowned Leith School of Food and Wine, then worked as a chef |
| 0:45.9 | to party in restaurants including Otolengi and as a recipe designer. Her first book, Mamushka, |
| 0:52.3 | went on to win the Fortimer Mason's Award for Best Debut |
| 0:55.4 | Cookbook. |
| 0:56.6 | She's written many articles for most of the top newspapers and magazines and publish a number |
| 1:01.2 | of best-selling books, including summer kitchens, recipes and reminiscences from every corner |
| 1:06.3 | of Ukraine, and home food, in which she distills a lifetime of kitchen curiosity into her |
| 1:12.7 | hundred most loved recipes. |
| 1:14.9 | Her latest book, which came out yesterday, the 19th of June, if you're listening to this |
| 1:19.4 | on the day that this episode comes out, is called Strong Roots and is really a family biography. |
| 1:26.0 | The story of a century in Ukraine told through four generations of her extraordinary family. |
| 1:31.5 | It takes us from years of Russification, to Oliya's grandmother's deportation, to snowy wastelands |
| 1:37.2 | under Stalin, to her aunt Zenaia's school protests, to her own parents' flight from Ukraine |
| 1:43.2 | when their town was occupied in 2022. |
| 1:46.6 | After that full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Olya co-founded a global initiative to raise money for Ukraine through cooking, hashtag cook for Ukraine, which has raised over £2 million to date. |
| 1:58.8 | Oliya was featured in Vogue's UK's list of top most influential women of the year in 2022, |
| 2:05.0 | and with her friend and Cook for Ukraine co-founder, Alyssa Timoschina, |
| 2:09.6 | they have won the Guild of Food Writers Special Award, |
... |
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