Joanna Robertson's earliest childhood memory is that of the baker calling at noon each day, with a basket full of fragrant buns, cakes and bread. It was the first indication of what was to develop into a lifelong love affair with food.

For Joanna, food has never just been about nourishment. It has shaped her life in highly personal as well as professional ways, with surprising, funny or poignant results.

So much so, that telling her food stories in these Essays amounts to sharing an intimate and revealing autobiography, with deeply personal insights into her life, the places she has lived and worked in, and the people she has met through food.

In the second programme, Joanna is a young adult. She is now working two jobs in London, involving food and encounters with world class artists, designers and musicians. In Soho, these include Derek Jarman, Howard Hodgkin and Alexander McQueen, while on the South Bank she serves, for example, Karl-Heinz Stockhausen, Pierre Boulez and Sviatoslav Richter.

Joanna Robertson is a journalist who has lived in several countries and is now based in Paris.

Produced by Arlene Gregorius.