As far as I can think back, I’ve loved being in a kitchen and many of my childhood memories cercle around the wonderfully sensuous process of cooking. The way it corresponds with all your senses as well as your creative mind by preparing, creating and of course tasting. Oh how those appetising scents filling the house make your surrounding zealously prepare tables andgather around a long table for a shared meal. This is one of the strongest images I have about family life and it was much of this shared vision that inspired my collaboration with Pearl for Claudia Hütthaler’s first cookbook.

Claudia is an absolutely impeccable cook, a real connaisseuse of homemade Austrian dishes and the growing family table inspires her every day. Collecting her family’s favourite recipes and turning them into a cookbook, has been an amazing process for all of us, thankfully inspired by her son’s persistent requests for it. Claudia says that the joint meals always kept their family spirit together and it seems to be a vital ingredient, as they are running a successful family owned business in the fourth generation now.

I am so proud that Claudia & Herbert Hütthaler trusted us with the artistic direction. To be able to shoot this whole book analogue on medium format film between Ireland and Austria does take clients with patience and a special sense for beauty and a unique aesthetic – which I couldn’t be more grateful to have found in them. And guys I can only tell you – nothing compares to the feeling of actually holding your own first book in hands. Did I anticipate that it would turn out to be a cookbook? Hardly. But as always, I am inspired by the people and Claudia alongside Pearl (and some other talented folks you’ll soon get to meet), have been the most wonderful muses one could wish for!

More on these cookbook adventures soon and for everyone who’s already dying to get their hands on it – you can order your copy of “Fleischverliebt” here!

xoxo Pia