Callum Hynd sits down to talk with Clare Finney, award-winning Food Journalist and St John’s Alum.
Recently I was privileged to sit down and interview Clare Finney, the award-winning Food Journalist and St John’s alum. During our conversation, Clare reflected on her time at Durham, the life of a freelance journalist and how food is such an important way of connecting with the people around us.
From dressing up as a journalist on a bar crawl, Clare’s passion for journalism has always been evident but the journey hasn’t always been an easy one.
I was in fact stunned to discover the sheer amount of drive and dedication Clare had put into her dream (taking on five jobs at five different papers before even finishing her masters degree, for example).
Being a freelance journalist proved a rewarding but rigorous job. “I can pitch five ideas and only get one commission but pitching those five ideas takes half a day”, Clare says. And while being a food journalist offers free food and holidays to exotic Greek islands, it is not all glamour. Often days go by in hotel rooms as deadlines have to be met. “There are checks and balances to everything”, she reflects.
When it came to memories of St John’s, Clare mentioned that Leech Hall was just as cold in her day as it is now. Like many freshers who first arrive at St John’s, Clare felt overwhelmed (and very cold).
One further difficulty was the food. Ironically, Clare arrived at Durham a picky eater, something which left her isolated as she frequently skipped meals. When her friends caught on to the fact, they forced her to at least be present at dinner time, an unorthodox but effective method, and one she is grateful for.
Clare looks back on her picky eating habits with some regret, particularly when it came to her Grandma’s cooking. “I look back and I think, ‘why?’ Her not being able to feed me in the way that she wanted too, to show her love by doing so… To not let people feed me was a rejection on so many levels”. For Clare, food is such an important way of connecting with people, the dinner table a rock to cling onto in stormy times. During these formative years, “the scales gradually began to drop from my eyes… and I just fell upon it and went ‘oh my God, bread is amaaaaaazing.’ I couldn’t believe I had refused this for so long.”
Looking back on her time at Durham, Clare was thankful for good friends who forced her to go to dinner and a confidence that allowed her to both knock down the Palatinate door demanding a role as well as memories of awkwardly schmoozing at formals over warm champagne. “Being here at the college in which I used to quite religiously not eat as a food critic makes me glad I persisted… I had the dream… I just kept doing it. I’m glad I made something of myself rather than assume it would make something of me.”
When asked for words of advice, Clare is torn between the desire to encourage aspiring journalists with being realistic about the challenge: she didn’t get her first Times article published until the age of 34. She settles on reconciling the tricky balance, “remember that life is long, you have time”, and that building connections is “not nepotism, it’s being a nice person”. While you might not make it to your first mark of success for longer than you would like, know that you have time.
If you would like to know more about Clare and the importance of food as a binding agent of life her book, Hungry Heart (one of The Times’ books of the year), is out now.
Photo credit: Orlando Gill
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