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FOOD & DRINK
Real food; virtual setting It’s not unusual to hear business owners talking about the sustainability of their company and their responsible approach to its workings, but this can come across as a politically correct chant. Not so with Charlie Bigham, whose love of the environment and his community is clear in every decision he makes, discovers Emma Clegg
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harlie Bigham is very modest about his food expertise, surprisingly considering the success of his business, which he set up in 1996 with the aim of creating really delicious, top-quality dishes. “I’m a cook not a chef,” Charlie tells me. “I would be hopeless in a restaurant, however I have cooked for a long time and I’ve picked up a few skills on the kitchen front over the years.” His meals are freshly cooked and packaged ready to prepare in the oven or on the hob. While convenient, these are not ready meals, he is at pains to emphasise: “Why compromise by putting things in the microwave and settling for something that doesn’t taste so nice? We just make nice food – that’s our objective. “Our consumers write into us all the time,” Charlie explains, “and say, ‘I never buy ready meals, I love cooking, most days I cook from scratch myself, but every now and again I just want a night off and your food is home-cooked and it’s really tasty.” It all started with Charlie leaving his job and taking time off in 1995 to travel to India. Captivated by the tastes, colours, textures and aromas of the cuisine, he decided to set up a food business. After perfecting three dishes in his home kitchen – Caribbean lamb,
Cajun chicken and salmon with a dill sauce – he went knocking on doors and managed to find some upmarket London food shops who were up for stocking him. Then Waitrose were interested. Then Sainsbury’s and Tesco. Another element that makes Bigham’s meals so distinctive is the wooden packaging. “Long before David Attenborough did the commendable job of bringing plastic packaging to the forefront of everybody’s minds, we knew plastic was not right and wanted to avoid it as much as possible.” The food parcels certainly stand out on the supermarket shelves as being different. “Most people decide what to buy in a nano-second, and so our packaging sends a signal to consumers that maybe we are a bit different,” says Charlie. Bigham’s has two kitchens, one in North London and the other near Wells, where Charlie lives. Here the meals are prepared at Quarry Kitchen, in a former quarry in
Two of Charlie Bigham’s meals with their distinctive packaging
34 THE BRISTOL MAGAZINE
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OCTOBER 2020
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No 193
Dulcote. Quarry Kitchen was named RIBA’s South West Building of the Year in 2018, for its technological functionality and environmental transformation of a disused landscape, and in June this year, more than 900 solar panels were installed. “It’s quite a big quarry, about 20 acres of hole in the ground,” says Bigham, and we’re surrounded on most sides by 120-foot cliffs. We have peregrine falcons flying around and badgers foraging and 20 acres of wildflower meadow outside our door. It’s a pretty unusual location. It makes a difference; if you’re making a high-quality product, start with a high-quality environment. We make some of our best-selling dishes here including our fish pie and chicken tikka masala. Because of their ready supermarket channels, the business kept on operating successfully in lockdown: “We are a bit of light relief and we have appealed to consumers who perhaps haven’t heard of us or used us before,” says Charlie. “So there have been positives, but I would far rather it hadn’t happened.” Charlie talks of the many artisan producers who have had their business taken away since the period of lockdown, but reflects that some food outlets have benefitted: “Some small retailers and producers have had quite a busy time. We don’t have enough diversity in the whole way our food market works so if it’s made this a bit better that’s something to celebrate.” Charlie is a man of ethics – he cares about the environment and about his close community, and this philosophy and sense of responsiblity runs strongly through the mechanics of the business. “I have always had a view that business has an important role to play in society – it’s there to make a profit and provide employment, but businesses should be responsible players in society, so we want to have a positive impact on the world, whether that’s from an
