{"id":159253,"date":"2025-06-06T13:00:17","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T11:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.apartamentomagazine.com\/?p=159253"},"modified":"2025-07-15T17:02:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T15:02:23","slug":"interview-with-sally-grainger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.apartamentomagazine.com\/stories\/interview-with-sally-grainger\/","title":{"rendered":"A conversation with Sally Grainger"},"content":{"rendered":" \t\t
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Grayshott: Sally Grainger is a Roman food historian and archaeologist, a scholars\u2019 scholar whose decades of experimentation and genre-breaking research shattered hundreds of years of misconceptions about Roman food and Roman cooking. Her revolutionary methodology is simple: recreate a Roman kitchen and figure out how to make food that tasted nice, which, in turn, allows for a more accurate translation. As she explained in her introduction to Roman Recipes for Modern Cooks<\/em>, a new cookbook illustrated by Joana Avillez: \u2018It was historians and scholars, rather than cooks, who largely dealt with the Latin and Greek recipes in the past\u2019.<\/b><\/p>\r\n

While many famous ancient cookery books were attributed to nobles like Apicius Marcus Gavius from the first century AD, recipes were most likely dictated by cooks (for cooks) who did not feel the need to explain the obvious. Therefore, when ancient recipes were interpreted by scholars, disastrous attempts led to a belief that wealthy Romans used nearly inedible dishes as a way of preserving class boundaries: \u2018This is, of course, nonsense\u2019, maintains Sally, who made it her mission to make Roman recipes accessible.<\/b><\/p>\r\n

After years as a pastry chef, Sally entered into a career in classics as a mature student, giving her unparalleled insight when presented with Greek and Roman recipes which had defeated translators. Beginning on a whim to elevate a university toga party, her Roman dinners slowly built up her reputation for authentic scholarship, leading to designing dishes for the likes of the British Museum (for their Pompeii exhibition), the Museum of London, and being called in as an expert on documentaries like Pompeii with Michael Buerk<\/em>. In the midst of all this, Sally published several books: The Classical Cookbook<\/em> (a co-translation with Andrew Dalby), Apicius: critical edition with introduction and English translation<\/em> (with her husband, Christopher Grocock, a medieval Latinist), Cooking Apicius<\/em>, and The Story of Garum: Fermented Fish Sauce and Salted Fish in the Ancient World<\/em>, as well as a blog and YouTube series called \u2018A Taste of the Ancient World\u2019.<\/b><\/p>\r\n

As an editor, working on Roman Recipes for Modern Cooks<\/a><\/em> sent me tumbling down an incredible rabbit hole of her books, literary references, and videos. Sally exudes ease and a palpable enthusiasm as she moves around her wares, quick to smile, quick to laugh, and quick to offer her neighbour turned cameraman, Rod Hughes, a bite of Roman burger or Roman cheesecake. Inspired by her hands-on translation and archaeological practice, I brought the manuscript into my home kitchen to try \u2018Salsa Verde with Mullet\u2019. The first attempt was delicious, though I couldn\u2019t find dill seeds or celery seeds in Barcelona. \u2018Oh, those seeds were definitely needed to make the sauce successful\u2019, she wrote via email. I tried again after sourcing the seeds, and Sally was right, of course.<\/b><\/p>"},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[153652]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"How was the presentation in Books for Cooks?","answer":"The Books for Cooks presentation was a wonderful day. We live in a village\u2014we live quite rurally, and I don\u2019t go to London that often, so it was nice to go to Notting Hill, a trendy part of London. I shall go back because it\u2019s a lovely shop. And the chap who runs it, Eric, was delightful. He was diffident, but he was delightful."},{"question":"How did it feel to hold the book for the first time and see the illustrations?","answer":"It was the most amazing experience to realise how beautiful it is. It is a stunningly beautiful book. All the way through, it makes you smile and laugh. It makes me smile. My mini-mes are just amazing."},{"question":"I love the little mini-Sally! How was it to work with Joana on the illustrations?","answer":"I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve ever been caricatured. It\u2019s delightful, but it\u2019s also so definitely me. She\u2019s watched videos, and she\u2019s caught the essence of me, which is a slightly eccentric\u2014an intense kind of obsessiveness, but also so much fun. I do enjoy it immensely. One of my great pleasures in life is to cook and to cook authentically in that kitchen. I could see that she\u2019d really engaged with me."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159742,159740]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"There is such an amazing intensity to what you do, alongside passion and playfulness. Roman food is hovering in academia so much, and what you do is completely rigorous, but, at the same time, it\u2019s joyful. Though you are also at the mercy of the British elements, and in some of those videos you can see your breath!","answer":"I can<\/em> choose. I don\u2019t have to be out there when it\u2019s bitterly cold, and it is joyful. If things go wrong\u2014I mean, some of those videos have burnt offerings in them\u2014I just laugh it off because it\u2019s the only way. Atmospheric pressure interferes with the way charcoal burns, and the heat is less intense. The wind blows, and the heat flies up, and it doesn\u2019t stay under your pot. The smoke can be unpleasant, so it\u2019s sometimes a struggle.\r\nIt\u2019s also exhausting because it means an awful lot of fetching and carrying of wood and charcoal, and you have to be really careful not to allow the fires to get out of control. My ancient kitchen is downstairs next to my conservatory, and the rest of my house is on three floors. I have two flights of stairs to get from my modern kitchen to my Roman kitchen. I\u2019ve got lots and lots of baskets and containers of all sorts to carry equipment and food. I still forget things. I\u2019m still running up and down the stairs."},{"question":"That\u2019s amazing. So, how long have you been in that house?","answer":"Thirty years?"},{"question":"I also wanted to ask about your garden.","answer":"Its only disadvantage is it\u2019s sloping and north facing, so in the winter the sun is behind the house. In the summer, it takes a long time for the sun to come over the top of the roof and hit the garden. So, there\u2019s a lot of shade-loving plants, but we also grow every conceivable kind of vegetable\u2014onions and garlic and fennel and beetroot and carrots and parsnips and three or four different kinds of climbing beans, tomatoes, cucumbers. I fill my freezer. I just absolutely adore cooking with my own vegetables."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159766]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"Wow. I\u2019m thinking about the time it takes to really learn the rhythm of a garden. Is it a 30-year-old garden?","answer":"It was first a woodland slope. It had about six enormous trees, and the whole thing was just dead grass and shade underneath. We had the trees removed and did all the terracing ourselves. We built areas for fruit and areas for vegetables that look like the ruins of a Roman villa. If you ever go to a Roman site, you see there\u2019s a little short wall that\u2019s the outline of a room. We built those raised beds using stones that we found\u2014this is an appalling area for farming, really\u2014you get about three inches of soil and then enormous pieces of sandstone."},{"question":"You have to build up a little bit to give yourself soil?","answer":"Yes, and in every direction from our house, there is National Trust woodland, and all the wood we need to cook with comes from there."},{"question":"How has your garden informed your cooking, and how has your research informed your garden? I\u2019m imagining you had herbs in mind that most people don\u2019t, like rue and lovage.","answer":"I started by sourcing the seeds and growing my own rue and lovage but also things like winter savory, which are very common in Roman recipes and not that easy to find. I also have thyme, rosemary, fennel, parsley. Coriander I tend not to grow. I want a lot of it, but I tend not to grow it because it always bolts and runs to seed, and I can\u2019t get enough foliage, so we buy it. There\u2019s a lot of herbs close to the back door to save my legs. I tried to grow herbs inside in the summer, but they don\u2019t like sitting on windowsills."},{"question":"Do plants like rue and lovage that were common in Roman recipes like English soil?","answer":"Yeah, they are very well established. The lovage\u2014if I were to dig it up, the root would be the size of a man\u2019s thigh. It\u2019s huge."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"full","gallery":[153648]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"Wow.","answer":"I get maybe six different stalks out of it at any one time. The issue, of course, is you need the seed, not the leaf, so every year I have three or four flower stalks that I protect as they dry. I don\u2019t want them to get too wet because once they get wet, they go green and mouldy. I keep probably about two or three ounces of it at any one time, which is a lot of seed. Many of my colleagues can\u2019t get it, so I parcel it up and send it off."},{"question":"That\u2019s lovely. What excites you most about Roman cooking now that you\u2019ve been doing it for all these years?","answer":"There are still recipes I\u2019d like to try, and there are still techniques of cooking I want to try. Part of this is getting access to the equipment that\u2019s required. We can identify the vessel, and then I need to go to a potter and ask them to make that vessel. We actually have a new relationship with a potter down in Cornwall. He\u2019s got examples of what I want, but they are badly made. They\u2019re called \u2018clibanus\u2019, and we found the original in a shop of the National Museum of Archaeology in Naples. They must have come out of the ground in the 18th century, and they are very old, but there\u2019s no provenance. We don\u2019t know which house, which status was using them, but we know they were burnt and very well used. No matter how cold it is, when I get my new replicas, I shall want to go outside and light a fire and play with them."},{"question":"I love that. What sparked the initial conversation about building your first Roman kitchen?","answer":"Before we moved south, I\u2019d done a little bit of experimentation in the northeast because my husband was working in a museum of the Anglo-Saxon world. It was called Bede\u2019s World in Jarrow."},{"question":"Your ruler is from there?","answer":"Yes, the ruler is from the Bede Museum, and it had an Anglo-Saxon farm with a working bread oven and other means of cooking. I started experimenting with Roman recipes in that Anglo Saxon environment and didn\u2019t tell anybody that it wasn\u2019t Anglo-Saxon.\r\nWhen we got back here, we thought, how shall we move forward in this? We were so excited by the whole concept of experimental archaeology, and that was a new concept. Really, very few people were doing it.\r\nPeople were re-enacting, dressing up as Romans and pretending to cook, but the funny thing is they would dress as Romans\u2014and they would fight and so on and demonstrate and have examples of pottery and things like this\u2014but then they would go around the back of their tent and eat a sandwich because they couldn\u2019t cook Roman food."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159735,159739,159730]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"Ha! There was a missing link.","answer":"So, we started to reenact. We got costumes, and we wrote to English Heritage and National Trust and so on and said, \u2018We can cook Roman food\u2019.\r\nAnd we couldn\u2019t, but we thought we\u2019d try. It was just trial and error. I was a chef, and I had the hygiene knowledge, so they let me cook.\r\nWe had a flat-pack Roman kitchen, and we travelled the country. It was good for demonstration and entertainment and educational purposes, but I said to Chris, \u2018We have this space at the back of the house. Why can\u2019t we have a real one?\u2019"},{"question":"Was he excited?","answer":"He was on board from the beginning. We were in Herculaneum and allowed to go into places where we would not normally be allowed because of our contact with the archaeologists there. I found a small kitchen with an L-shaped platform, and the oven sat where the two points meet, so you could pull the embers out onto the platforms in either direction. That\u2019s why we put the two together as we have, so when the fire has burnt through inside the oven, and the oven is hot enough to cook with, you pull those embers out to the far end of your hob. So, you\u2019re doing two lots of cooking from one lot of wood."},{"question":"I love what you said at the start about burnt offerings. How did you approach experimentation? I mean, it sounds like you\u2019re not dissuaded by failure.","answer":"No, but the problem is that if I\u2019m going to be cooking a lot of food again and again to try and get the technique right, I need somebody to eat it. I kept knocking on my neighbour\u2019s door, saying \u2018I\u2019ve got some food. Come and try it\u2019. I\u2019ve also become a research associate at Reading University."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"full","gallery":[153649]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"You\u2019re teaching?","answer":"I give them a lecture and a food tasting once a year in exchange for access to journals. That access is hugely important for the two projects I\u2019m working on. One is ongoing research on fish sauce\u2014really, really obscure byways of fish sauce, and the other is this spice called silphium. Asafoetida."},{"question":"Yeah, I remember your article on silphium. Is that the one where people weren\u2019t entirely sure which plant it was?","answer":"Yes, and it used to grow in northern Libya. It apparently became extinct, and they started to source it from parts of Afghanistan and Iraq. It\u2019s used a lot in Indian food, and it gives a kind of a funky-rotten-garlic-onion kind of flavour. You have to use it with great delicacy, substantial delicacy. Two pinches in a quarter kilo of food."},{"question":"A tiny, tiny amount.","answer":"I\u2019m trying to source the green herb from the plant and also the root itself, because the resin is the eye of the tiger, but the root was also used in Roman times. I finally managed to connect with a spice trader, and he sent me asafoetida roots. It\u2019s dry slices of root, and I\u2019m going to be experimenting to work out the intensity of the flavour compared with the resin. I\u2019ve also found a contact in India who\u2019s going to be sending me some of the green material. Many of the people who trade the resin in India don\u2019t understand how it\u2019s grown or the process it goes through before they get it."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159737,159734]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"Is it guarded?","answer":"I think there\u2019s a suspicion that if you reveal too much information, you lose power. And it\u2019s not cultivated. It\u2019s just grown wild."},{"question":"And what will you do with that research?","answer":"I\u2019m going to an academic conference in Poland to talk about it and will also be talking about it at a conference in Oxford. This is where my passions lie at the moment\u2014very obscure. An academic study with a narrow focus on an aspect of food in the Roman world."},{"question":"But that\u2019s fascinating\u2014deep dives on those elemental ingredients. From your YouTube series, the Roman \u2018burger\u2019 episode is my favourite. In parallel to your academic studies, do you often like to explore ingredients by visiting farms? Some cooks are explorers.","answer":"I do like to use meat if I know it has come from happy animals. There are farms that produce meat and sell to local suppliers, so I always use those. Have you seen the video of the cheesecake libum?"}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"video","video":"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=zr36sNahjsE","video_caption":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"Yeah.","answer":"In the valley that you can see from my garden, if you follow it to the left, there is a large swathe of land owned by a couple, and they have goats. We filmed the goats being milked, and we made fresh cheese in order to make the cheesecake. Where possible, I like to source my ingredients locally. She also used to keep pigs, and so at one stage I had all the offal from her pigs."},{"question":"I loved that part of the video where you talk about the caul fat being like lace. Never in a million years would I have thought that, but as soon as you held it up, I was like, of course, it looks like lace.","answer":"It\u2019s gorgeous, it\u2019s wonderful. It adds a fabulous flavour, and it adds moisture to dry, lean meat. And there is a traditional dish called a \u2018faggot\u2019. Have you ever heard of the word \u2018faggot?\u2019"},{"question":"When I was editing your text, I definitely had to look it up.","answer":"It\u2019s like haggis in the sense that it\u2019s very finely minced offal, and it may even be bound with oats and then wrapped in caul fat, which gives it the moisture. They\u2019re roasted, and you serve them with a really thick, rich gravy. It\u2019s a way of serving offal where you don\u2019t have to worry too much about what you\u2019re eating.\r\nI strongly believe in eating offal. For the Romans, you sacrifice an animal, and you offer it to the gods, and you then spit roast it. Apparently, first dibs for the host and his guests was the offal, and the offal would be spit roasted separately.\r\nI\u2019ve been to two family parties in Greece, and they\u2019re spit roasting lamb, what\u2019s called kokoretsi, which is the heart and the lungs and the liver and the intestines, all cut into pieces and skewered on a spit. And then the whole thing is bound with the intestinal material.\r\nIt\u2019s glorious, wonderful stuff. I\u2019ve eaten it a couple of times while being abroad, and it\u2019s honouring the beast. You take a life, you don\u2019t waste any of it. Yet people are fearful of it."},{"question":"Yeah, I have made haggis before because my husband is from Scotland, and we were celebrating Burns Night in the south of Spain where we didn\u2019t have access to store-bought haggis. We bought things from the market, but it was intense because to clean the stomach and to clean everything, you know, you have to boil it and boil it. And the whole house just smelled so strongly. But when we had the finished product, it was incredible. I\u2019ve eaten haggis in Scotland many times now, but it\u2019s this special thing when you do it yourself; you\u2019re getting close to the meat in a different way.","answer":"Exactly, and in the elite section of the cookery books, elite recipes, high status recipes, that\u2019s where all the offal is."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"full","gallery":[153653]},{"acf_fc_layout":"two_blocks","block_sizes":"half_50_50","content_type_left":"image","image_size_left":"regular","image_left":153651,"video_left_url":"","video_caption_left":"","video_left_type":false,"text_left":"","credit_image":null,"credit_link_left":null,"content_type_right":"image","image_size_right":"regular","image_right":159215,"video_right_url":"","video_caption_right":"","video_right_type":false,"text_right":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"It\u2019s interesting to trace how they go from poor food to rich food back to being undesirable.","answer":"Yes, things like sweetbreads and brains went into stuffing. I used to be able to get brains and sweetbreads from my local butcher, but you also had a question about obscure and bizarre Roman foods?"},{"question":"Yes, you\u2019ve read my mind.","answer":"I do have a story about dormice. I always wanted to try one, and I didn\u2019t instinctively know it wasn\u2019t the little mouse in the teapot from Alice in Wonderland<\/em>. It\u2019s a completely separate species. It\u2019s a rodent, but it has a furry tail rather than a thin tail.\r\nWe went to a conference in Split in Croatia, and opposite Split is an island called Bra\u010d. It\u2019s just a few trees and rocky hillsides and a few farms, and it\u2019s a holiday resort now, but the locals, most of them grew up with their only meat being dormice. They had a festival in September or October when they were at their fattest before they hibernated. They\u2019d catch as many as they could, and everybody got meat."},{"question":"I mean, it must be a little bit like rabbit? Or I can\u2019t imagine what it would be similar to\u2014","answer":"It was very, very gamey, but we were also there during Easter, so the dormice weren\u2019t fattened. The concierge organised a trip for us, and we were in a community in the centre of Bra\u010d. We found a small local tavern that had caught some for us that morning, and I watched them being bled and spit roasted. It wasn\u2019t pleasant, but I had archaeologists back in the UK who wanted samples of the bones.\r\nThe Romans would have fattened up dormice in the same way as geese. They were probably force fed with sweet things and nuts and fruit to make their meat sweet. Have you ever seen or heard about the dormice vessels?"},{"question":"Yes, Joana found pictures that she was thinking of drawing.","answer":"They were enormous pots with a kind of spiral inside, and the mouse just runs around this spiral, and then you drop the honey and nuts and the honey-soaked bread pieces. When it gets fat enough, you break the pot. I mean, it\u2019s grim. But they had a different attitude towards animals, and we\u2019re pretty bad, let\u2019s be honest. They were obsessed with obscure, bizarre food items. The more exotic and difficult to attain, the more desirable they were. Animals were shipped across and served up as roasted meat, things like tigers and giraffes."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159732,159743,159741]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"It is interesting how it feels wrong to eat a flamingo, or it feels wrong to eat a crane, but it doesn\u2019t feel wrong to eat a turkey.","answer":"Yeah, absolutely."},{"question":"My goodness. So, you actually started out as a chef?","answer":"I was very bored being a chef.\r\nI was a pastry chef, and I used to work evenings. I used to have two or three hours off in the afternoon and then go back to the kitchen, so my social life was pretty grim. I eventually got a job where I had my evenings free. I was living in London, and my local further education college was just up the road, five minutes away. I\u2019d left school with very little in the way of academics at all."},{"question":"You mean you left school at a young age?","answer":"Yes, I left school at 16, and I didn\u2019t do any A Levels, and I didn\u2019t do O Levels. I was probably dyslexic, a little. So I went to the Working Men\u2019s College in London, which is a famous college for educating working men, and it was only ever open in the evenings for people that wanted to further their education. And it was a wonderful place. I did four O Levels and ultimately two A Levels. I took an ancient history A Level because by that time I\u2019d been reading I, Claudius<\/em> by Robert Graves."},{"question":"Yes you mentioned that you loved it.","answer":"Yes, and I\u2019d become fascinated by Roman history. I applied to university in London to do ancient history, and I was at the Egham campus at Royal Holloway. My fellow students used to have toga parties. They would wrap themselves in their sheets and drink a lot of beer, and that would be their idea of a toga party. I said, well, let\u2019s have a real Roman banquet because I\u2019d discovered a bad translation of Apicius<\/em>. I\u2019d just been glancing at it and thought, OK, let\u2019s do this.\r\nI had no idea how to do it at all, but I organised a Roman party where everybody would come in costume, but none of the students would go because all the staff wanted to go. At that stage, people doing classics at university\u2014the staff did not socialise with the students, and the students were frightened of them.\r\nBut I was 30 years old. I was not 18. So I said, fine, I\u2019d sooner have the staff than the students. So, we had 25 people, and they all came in costume, and lecturers in poetry would recite (as they should). The meal was a bit hit and miss, but it worked. One of my friends had invited a guy from London to come, and he was called Andrew Dalby."},{"question":"Ah, yes!","answer":"After the meal, he said, \u2018Sally, would you like to do a book?\u2019 This was my second year at university, and I was 31. So, by the time I left university, we were halfway through the preparation for The Classical Cookbook."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159733,159731,159729]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"That\u2019s brilliant.","answer":"I had to go back to cooking after I graduated because I needed money, but my heart wasn\u2019t in it anymore, and then I met Chris."},{"question":"I was going to ask, when did you meet?","answer":"We met at his tutor\u2019s house, and his Latin skills were superb. I know that sounds like I\u2019m showing off because he\u2019s my husband, but most Latin teachers need to prepare every lesson in advance because they can\u2019t read Latin off the page. Chris could read Latin off the page. He\u2019s an old-school Latin scholar who has the skills. If I\u2019m in the middle of something, and I can\u2019t understand what Pliny the Elder is saying, I just say, \u2018Chris, what does this mean?\u2019 I know he\u2019ll just read it."},{"question":"That\u2019s rare.","answer":"It\u2019s wonderful. We have two big leather-top desks that face each other."},{"question":"That\u2019s so romantic.","answer":"It\u2019s lovely. I\u2019m sitting where he normally sits, so you\u2019ve got the books behind me, and I\u2019ve got a bank of orchids to look at in the window.\r\nChris has the enthusiasm, and he loves food. We got together because I brought food to this meal where we met."},{"question":"I love that. The food is in your life in a deep way.","answer":"It is. I love cooking good food. We always have a big party in the summer. We spit roast a lamb in the garden, and we invite 50 people. I do Roman food, and we do tomato salad. It\u2019s not authentic, it\u2019s just whatever I fancy doing. But I also plan for the next three days after the party: I do nothing because I can\u2019t move."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[159765]},{"acf_fc_layout":"interview","interview":[{"question":"I can only imagine! Are there any favourite pieces of equipment that you\u2019ve gotten over the years that you treasure as physical objects?","answer":"The house is chock full of the equipment that we used to use a lot when we worked for English Heritage, and we travelled around the country, so there\u2019s lots of samian ware."},{"question":"Is this the orange pottery? Right over your shoulder there are two little vessels.","answer":"Yes, but it\u2019s just sitting there gathering dust because I don\u2019t use them. We have an awful lot of it, and it\u2019s nice just to look at it\u2014it\u2019s familiar, and it reminds me of what we used to do. But my favourite has to be the mortar."},{"question":"When I started working on the book, I realised I needed a mortar and pestle in my home. My brother-in-law bought me a heavy stone one for my birthday last June, and my collection has started.","answer":"I must have about 20 different kinds\u2014you know, the little grooves that go in the base that help to grind the spices? They can be big, medium, small. The mortars can be shallow, taller, or they can have a lip or a wide handle, and then I also have lots of modern ones all over the house."},{"question":"Your collection is amazing! Well, there is so much more about this book, but we are also looking forward to celebrating with you here.","answer":"Yes! And I have a secondary reason for wanting to come to Barcelona. There\u2019s somebody at the university who\u2019s doing research into fish sauce who I would really want to see."}]},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image_size":"regular","gallery":[153639]}],"related_text":"","issue":"","button_text":""},"yoast_head":"\nInterview with Sally Grainger<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sally Grainger\u2019s Roman Recipes offers 34 modern interpretations of ancient dishes. 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