Juliet Harbutt: A Life Through Food
The Food Programme
BBC
4.4 • 976 Ratings
🗓️ 15 December 2015
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As she readies herself for an imminent move back to her native New Zealand after three decades in the UK, Juliet Harbutt, cheese educator and campaigner, shares her life in food with Sheila Dillon.
Born and raised in Auckland, an experience with some French cheeses in Paris changed everything for Juliet, who decided there and then that cheese would be her life's focus.
She sold her deli-restaurant in Wellington and moved all the way to London, to open up a cheese shop based on her experiences in France. This was the start of a journey that coincided with a huge change in the way Britain approaches, and makes, cheese. This is the story of that period, and Juliet's life in food.
Along the way, Juliet founded The British Cheese Awards and edited the World Cheese Book, which won a Guild of Food Writers Award for Food Book of the year in 2010.
Looking back on those three decades, it's a time in which cheese has become one of Britain's great food successes, but it has not been a smooth ride - and things nearly turned out very differently. At its heart, this is a tale about one person's fascination with and passion for cheese, which is, as Juliet says - "a combination of man's ingenuity and one of Mother Nature's finest miracles, milk".
Presenter: Sheila Dillon Producer: Rich Ward.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello you've downloaded a podcast of BBC Radio 4's The Food Program. |
| 0:05.0 | Welcome to our world, from cooking to culture, politics to pleasure. |
| 0:10.0 | We hope you enjoy it. |
| 0:12.0 | You could count on two hands the number of really good artisan cheeses made in Britain |
| 0:18.0 | and now we do actually make over 750 different unique British cheeses. |
| 0:24.3 | Incredible. |
| 0:25.1 | This is a story about a person who helped rethink of food |
| 0:31.5 | that in its real delicious form had almost died out in Britain. |
| 0:36.0 | The whole process of cheese making, it's one of the most amazing things and it never ceases to amaze me. |
| 0:44.0 | Someone who's not widely known, but who, through her relentless enthusiasm and energy, |
| 0:49.8 | has helped democratize what could have become a small and specialized market. |
| 0:55.5 | My name is Juliet Harbets. |
| 0:57.2 | I came to the UK with the idea that I wanted to set up a cheese shop and I guess I got it carried away. |
| 1:06.0 | I'd say that that counts as being seriously carried away. |
| 1:11.0 | You know, it took a kiwi to introduce |
| 1:15.2 | all of these British chefs and restaurateurs |
| 1:17.2 | to the wonder of British cheese making. |
| 1:19.1 | Juliet is one of those people who just, she makes stuff happen. |
| 1:24.2 | Champion promoter, she's one of those people who, |
| 1:27.8 | without her, without her contribution, |
| 1:30.2 | British Ar San Cheese would just not be where it is today. |
| 1:34.0 | Juliet Harbert is a New Zealander who spent three decades in the UK, |
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