For a young Edith Bowman, growing up in a small seaside hotel in the tiny resort town of Anstruther, 50 miles around the coast up from Edinburgh, was idyllic but cramped. She wouldn’t have had it any other way. Bowman’s family ran The Craw’s Nest, which also had a restaurant that focused on serving fresh fish and produce from local fishermen and farmers. The radio DJ recalls growing up on a diet of “the freshest fish, the freshest food” available – so much so that her uncle, who owned a fishing boat, would “literally fly past our house and chuck a couple of live lobsters on the front door”.
For her new BBC Two series Coast to Coast Food Festival, Bowman, along with co-hosts Colin Murray and Sean Fletcher, travelled around the UK to speak to farmers, producers and community champions about their food stories. The programme also takes Bowman back to Anstruther, giving her the opportunity to reflect on her childhood there and what it has taught her about food. The show is her first professional foray into the world of food.
