In Episode 4 I chat to food writer Di Murrell about her experiences with her husband Tam of living and working on canals in Britain and France. Canals were played an essential part in how food and fuel was transported around Britain but it is a way of life that has all but disappeared. Among their various roles Di and Tam were involved in transporting limes in the depths of winter to cordial manufacturer Roses on what was known as the ‘lime run’. Forget messing about on the river - working life on the canals was truly hard graft.

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Useful Links

You can find out more about Di and Tam’s canal adventures on the A Foodie Afloat website or on her more recent blog Written In My Kitchen.

Petits Propos Culinaires the journal which gave Di her first break in food writing is now published by Equinox (and edited by me!). Di has published several articles in the journal over the years.

The Sophie Coe Prize is the longest-running and most generous prize for writing in food history in the English language, given once a year for an essay or article of up to 10,000 words on any aspect of the history of food. Entries for this year’s award close on 24 April 2026.

You can discover more about Britain’s waterway history at a number of canal museums across the country such as London, Stoke Bruerne and Ellesmere Port or by visiting the Canal & River Trust

Suggested Reading

* Barges & Bread: Canals & Grain to Bread & Baking

* A Foodie Afloat

The following aren’t about working life on the rivers but are fun reads to get you in the mood:

* The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Graham (1908)

* Three Men and a Boat - Jerome K Jerome (1889)

* An Inland Voyage - Robert Louis Stevenson (1878)

Don’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.

A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.

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