Dawn O’Porter in Conversation About Her New Book, Hungry Eyes: A Memoir of Appetite, Ambition and the Odd Bag of Wotsits for Dinner

An evening with Dawn O’Porter, in conversation about her new book, Hungry Eyes: A Memoir of Appetite, Ambition and the Odd Bag of Wotsits for Dinner.

There are few better places for an evening of conversation, good food and stories than Estelle Manor.

Last night, the Oxfordshire estate hosted an intimate evening with television presenter, journalist and author Dawn O’Porter, in conversation with Lucy Pearson, founder of The Literary Edit.

Set within the beautiful surroundings of Estelle Manor, the evening centred around Dawn’s latest book, Hungry Eyes: A Memoir of Appetite, Ambition and the Odd Bag of Wotsits for Dinner – a deeply personal, funny and surprisingly thoughtful exploration of food, family, ambition and the experiences that shape us.

Published by HarperCollins in June 2026, Hungry Eyes takes the kitchen table as its starting point. For Dawn, food is about far more than what is on the plate. It is intertwined with memory, family, childhood, love, loss, ambition and the search for a sense of fulfilment. As the book explores, the way we eat and the experiences we have around food can stay with us long after the meal itself is over.

And, of course, there is the rather brilliant matter of the Wotsits.

The title itself hints at the book’s combination of honesty and humour. Dawn’s story moves between the glamorous and the gloriously ordinary – from a career in television, writing and publishing to motherhood, cooking, Hollywood ambitions and the realities of everyday life. In a recent reflection on the book, Dawn described how her experience of MasterChef deepened her emotional relationship with food and ultimately inspired her to write Hungry Eyes.

In conversation with Lucy Pearson

The conversation was hosted by Lucy Pearson, founder of The Literary Edit, who has spent more than a decade creating a platform for people who love books.

Lucy launched The Literary Edit in 2012 and has since developed it into much more than a traditional book blog. Today, her work encompasses book recommendations, author conversations, personal essays, literary travel, bibliotherapy and bespoke library curation for hotels, Airbnbs and wellness retreats. She is also a freelance journalist, with writing appearing in publications including The Telegraph, The Spectator, The Guardian and Stylist.

Her passion for books is evident in everything she does, and that made her a natural person to draw out the stories behind Hungry Eyes. Rather than simply talking about the book itself, the conversation opened up some of the wider themes running through Dawn’s life and work – ambition, change, family, food and what it means to reassess what success actually looks like.

Lucy’s The Literary Edit has also increasingly become a place for these kinds of conversations. Her ongoing Desert Island Books series sees her speaking to authors and creatives about the books that have shaped them, alongside essays and recommendations for readers.

From ambition to appetite

One of the most interesting threads running through Hungry Eyes is the idea that fulfilment doesn't necessarily arrive in the way we expect it to.

Dawn writes candidly about ambition and the desire for recognition, while also reflecting on how priorities can change through grief, motherhood, relationships, cooking and simply getting older.

There is something particularly relatable about using food to explore those changes. Most of us have memories attached to food – a meal cooked by someone we love, something we ate growing up, a dish associated with a particular place or period of our lives, or even the meals we throw together when we are too tired to cook.

Food can mark occasions, comfort us, bring people together and, sometimes, tell us something about where we are in life.

That combination of the deeply personal with the everyday is what gives Hungry Eyes its appeal.

An evening at Estelle Manor

Against the backdrop of Estelle Manor, the conversation felt particularly fitting. The setting provided the perfect environment for an evening centred around food, books and conversation – relaxed enough to feel intimate, but with all the atmosphere of a special occasion.

What made the evening memorable was the combination of three things: a beautiful setting, a genuinely engaging conversation and a book that takes something as familiar as food and uses it to explore much bigger questions about life.

And perhaps that is what makes Hungry Eyes such an interesting read. It isn't really about having the perfect dinner, cooking the perfect meal or achieving some ideal version of a glamorous life.

It is about the stories we attach to food – and the stories food can tell about us.

An evening of books, conversation and good food at Estelle Manor seemed like a very appropriate place to explore them.

Dawn O’Porter’s Hungry Eyes: A Memoir of Appetite, Ambition and the Odd Bag of Wotsits for Dinner is published by HarperCollins and is available now.