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STYLISHVauxhall Magazine; July 2006

Food for ThoughtAll The Art To Boot

Struggling to make the right lifestyle choice, Thomasina Miers was given one piece of celebrity advice - follow your pass ion. She did just that, and the result is a highly successful career that's rapidly gathering momentum... Words by Muriel Freeman pictures by Noel Murphy

Thomasina, 29, won the title of BBC MasterChef in 2005, and is also excited at becoming one of the latest members of Vauxhall's VX Collective - a collaboration between Vauxhall and a number of new, young talents who are setting style standards for the future.

'My role', she says, 'will be to involve all those people who share my vision about food and farming today. I offer input, and the VX Collective will be instrumental in putting me in touch with the people who matter. I'm joining guys like product designer Sam Buxton, and artist and film maker Lucia Helenka.'

And the publication in October of Thomasina's own distinctive book of recipes, entitled Cook, will be the culmination of everything she has been working towards since she met TV chef and countryside campaigner Clarissa Dickson-Wright at a fashion show. As Thomasina says of what was a chance meeting, 'I'd always admired her and we were chatting. I was involved in an internet consultancy at the time. And I should have been thrilled to be at the cutting edge of things, but I couldn't understand why I felt so dissatisfied'.

'Clarissa just said: "the way to true happiness is to find your passion and follow it". I said that



the only thing that really grips me is food - in fact I've been cooking since I was seven - and she said "there you are then". 'She directed me to a marvellous school of cookery run by Darina Allen at Ballymalloe in Ireland', Thomasina says, 'and I was totally inspired. The emphasis there is on excellent, seasonal local produce, sensitively prepared.

'Simple food can be made sensational. I was totally in my element and everything I have done since stems from that.' Thomasina went on to make cheeses in Ireland and experimented with bread making. 'These are the basics, but the processes that bring about a wonderful cheese or a perfect loaf are amazing'.

Yet Thomasina's recipes show all her instinctive flair and imagination too. She used Kentish cob nuts 'similar to a hazelnut' in her winning ravioli recipe for MasterChef: 'I believe we should all be using foodstuffs that are local and naturally available to us.'