Hillary Eaton

Originally appeared on EATER/ PUNCH

Make / July 16, 2025

For Māori Winemakers, It’s About More Than Just Natural Wine

When Luke and Vanessa Reynolds walk through a block of cabernet franc at their vineyard Tūāpae, they walk on ancestral land. Tūāpae is on Waiheke Island, on the North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. Vanessa (Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki, Te Waiohua, Ngāti Tahinga, Ngāti Hine) and other Māori use their iwi (tribe) and hapū (sub-tribe) names to show pride in and connection with their ancestors. “My tūpuna (ancestors) have been connected to this specific area in Tāmaki (Auckland) since well before the great waka migrations,” Vanessa explains, referencing the mass migration in the 1300s when many Māori first began to inhabit the land after journeying from the Polynesian island of Hawaiki, guided by the navigator Kupe. Here, voyagers committed themselves to stewardship of the land.

Despite a rich spiritual relationship with the land for over 1,000 years, Māori have historically had little presence in one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s largest and most lucrative agricultural ventures: viticulture. Vines were first planted there in 1819 by missionary Samuel Marsden, and by 1840, when English officials and Māori chiefs met to sign the Treaty of Waitangi (a commitment to live peacefully and in equality for the development of Aotearoa New Zealand, together), European grapes had already firmly taken root on unceded Māori soil. 

Through 200 years of winemaking, Aotearoa New Zealand has developed a strong global reputation and a demand for the country’s wine, from Central Otago’s berry-rich pinot noir to Marlborough’s uniquely grassy sauvignon blanc. In that time, the wine industry has been vastly dominated by people of European descent. Today, however, some of the most impactful wines from the region are made by a growing number of Māori winemakers, who are working to decolonize the industry by integrating Māori-influenced farming methods and ideologies. Many of these practices predate European biodynamic farming, which has largely been seen as the model for natural wine.

Originally appeared on Food & Wine

Travel / July 16, 2025

With 30,000+ Islands, Scandinavia Is a Secret Seafood Paradise for Summer Travel

When you think of island hopping, the Nordics don’t usually come to mind. But ask any Dane or Swede what makes the most idyllic Scandinavian summer and there’s no doubt they’ll paint you a picture of their favorite Nordic island complete with a small red cabin by the beach, late afternoon swims, and lazy alfresco dinners late into the summer’s midnight sun. From Sweden’s Stockholm archipelago — a scattering of 30,000 islands — to Denmark’s Bornholm in the far south, it’s the abundance of such unique nature that makes visiting these islands the trip of a lifetime.

Each region is unique in its beauty, and visitors can expect forests heaving under blankets of fern and moss, undergrowth thick with wild blueberries and chanterelle mushrooms, and spanning blonde fields of wheat or beach grass studded with poppies undulating in the breeze. Near the shores, intoxicatingly fragrant rosa rugosa beach roses sprout up between the jutting rocks into the sea alongside meadowsweet, juniper, and blackberries. In short, these islands are a forager’s utter summer paradise.

The cuisine of the region is just as compelling. Traditional Scandinavian smokehouses are scattered across the islands, known as rogeriet or rökeri, smoking everything from herring, mackerel, and eel, to salmon, prawns, and oysters over alder wood alongside traditional accompaniments of rye bread, egg yolk, chopped onion, radishes, and butter. Taken in alongside a pint from the local brewery, it’s the casual Scandinavian answer to the ultimate fish and chips shop.

Beyond the smokehouses, restaurants lean into the abundance of the land and sea with smørrebrød (rye bread topped with things like egg, roasted pork, or smoked salmon) on the more traditional side of things and simple seafood grilled over fire alongside locally grown or foraged ingredients.

Originally appeared on The Wall Street Journal

Eat / September 23, 2020

Inside Mei Lin’s anticipated new project, Daybird

If there is one thing Mei Lin and Francis Miranda didn’t envision for 2020, it was how their Los Angeles restaurant, Daybird, would come to life. Hot off the success of their first project, Nightshade, chef Lin and her partner Miranda originally planned to open their new Silver Lake spot in early May. It was meant to be a small, chef-driven fast-casual place inspired by Nightshade’s crispy-skinned Szechuan hot quail dish. Lin would also use it as a test kitchen of sorts, to play around with new recipes.

But as the months went by and the pandemic set in, Lin and Miranda found themselves confronting the challenges of a new kind of dining scene. They were forced to close Nightshade on March 15, and they chose not to reopen at limited capacity. With Daybird, the pair have ended up focusing much more on to-go and delivery. “Pre-Covid, I never wanted to do a takeout model,” Lin says, “but we have to think of the customers, and it will take some time to come to our new normal.”

But as the months went by and the pandemic set in, Lin and Miranda found themselves confronting the challenges of a new kind of dining scene. They were forced to close Nightshade on March 15, and they chose not to reopen at limited capacity. With Daybird, the pair have ended up focusing much more on to-go and delivery. “Pre-Covid, I never wanted to do a takeout model,” Lin says, “but we have to think of the customers, and it will take some time to come to our new normal.”

So when Daybird opens July 22, diners won’t be sliding into its birch booths. Instead, customers will be enjoying Lin’s dishes—the crispy chicken thigh sandwich on Japanese milk bread, for example, or chicken tenders with hot honey and cornbread—off-site. Yet Lin and Miranda are excited to feed their neighbors and Nightshade supporters in the weeks to come. They’ve carefully sourced key ingredients, like umami-rich porcini powder or fiery Thai bird’s eye chili, from expert supplier Le Sanctuaire. To temper the three levels of heat, Lin will serve her signature milk tea and other original drinks. And she will still be using the space to have fun with food, so playful dishes like her Instagram-famous scallion pancakes may start to pop up on the menu.

“Covid-19 has highlighted a lot of things for us and others,” Miranda says. “Fine dining is going to suffer, and things will move in a different direction. Is the future having a $2 million dining room or having something that can open? What’s important?” daybirdla.com. —

Originally appeared on Eater

Travel / June 23, 2020

One Day in June

On June 2, 2020, as Parisians sat down at cafes for the first time in months, people in Moscow still couldn’t leave their homes between curfews. Here, the divergent views of 17 cities around the world on the same day.

IfIf there’s one thing that the coronavirus pandemic has made crystal clear these last few months, it’s how thoroughly interconnected life on Earth has become.

We are now, without a doubt, a global civilization, and as many brands have so graciously reminded us lately, “We’re all in this together.” But the spread of COVID-19 has also had a profound way of spotlighting the differences: the ways in which each of our societies responds to crisis, the things we value, and how our governments support our vulnerable communities — or don’t.

The first days of June were an anxious time for much of the world. Just as protesters took to the streets across the U.S. to condemn racial violence and the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd, cities across the globe were grasping for the first signs of life after months of COVID-19-related lockdown and quarantine, thanks to the easing of restrictions on bars and restaurants.

Virtually every major metropolis on earth spent the bulk of spring in some state of shutdown; our responses since have been less synchronous. On June 1 and 2, Paris and Melbourne began to allow dine-in seating, and Berlin reopened bars — prost! Elsewhere, life remained at a near standstill. Bogotá only began allowing carryout from restaurants on June 1, and taking so much as a walk in Moscow — let alone a bite — continues to require scheduling. Meanwhile, Ho Chi Minh City and Tokyo welcomed this June like every other before it, with little fanfare beyond the usual blooms and ripening market fruit; for them, the spread of COVID-19 is all but a terrifying memory.

The point is, despite the near-universal tragedy caused by the novel coronavirus, the look and feel of our experiences today is anything but uniform, and depends greatly on the place we call home. Last week, Eater asked an international team of photographers and writers to document daily life where it intersects with food and drink in 17 cities around the world on the very same day. What follows is something like a diary of eating on planet Earth on Tuesday, June 2, 2020. The resulting snapshots show our disparate realities as we edge ever closer to once again sharing a great meal, a stiff drink, and everyday life, together

Originally appeared on Bon Appetit

Explore / July 9, 2019

Mānuka Honey Is a Wellness Wonder—But Your Jar Could Be a Fake

In the jade roller–colored realm of wellness, where you can pick up $80 crystal water bottles, adorably packaged ceremonial-grade matcha, and reishi-infused wellness shots, there’s nothing like mānuka honey.

Made from the nectar of New Zealand’s mānuka tree, mānuka honey is prized for its antibacterial, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory properties. New Zealand’s Māori people have used the mānuka plant for medicinal purposes for centuries, but mānuka honey didn’t gain global popularity until the late 1980s after New Zealand biochemist Peter Molan’s discovery of methylglyoxal (MGO), an antimicrobial and antibacterial compound found in high concentration in mānuka honey. (Some honeys have it in trace amounts, but not nearly as high as in mānuka honey.) Today mānuka honey can be seen across Instagram slathered on skin to fight acne and recommended by holistic health practitioners for its ability to fight throat infections and help heal wounds.

A small jar of high-grade mānuka honey can run upward of $180, making it one of the world’s most expensive honeys. It’s also reportedly one of the world’s most fraudulently labeled ingredients.

Originally appeared on Travel + Leisure

Explore / January 27, 2019

Here’s What Really Happens When You Visit a Balinese Healer

As traveling for wellness becomes more and more popular, hotels are finding more diverse ways for their guests to explore health and wellness while on vacation. In Bali, the increase in wellness focused travel has many hotels incorporating traditional Balinese healing elements in their spa and wellness programs, some even bringing on Balinese healers and priests for shamanic energy work, therapy and traditional healing sessions. Translation: there’s never been a better time to visit a healer in Bali.

But while anyone who’s given “Eat, Pray, Love” a watch might be familiar with what a Balinese healer is, what it’s actually like to go to one (off the silver screen) is a different story. To learn for myself, I headed to the Mandapa Reserve, home to one of the most immersive, curated selections of Balinese healing experiences in the region.

Bali is Indonesia’s spiritual center. With a population that’s nearly 90 percent Hindu and religion deeply rooted at the heart of daily life — you’re bound to find offerings of fruit and flowers at the feet of nearly every street corner statue — Bali is one of the world’s most vivid centers for spirituality and self-discovery. But even still, finding the right healer in Bali can be tricky.

Originally appeared on EATER

Travel / January 27, 2019

The 38 Essential Restaurants in Santiago

Santiago is experiencing a culinary renaissance like it’s never seen before, says food and travel writer Hillary Eaton. Chile’s capital city, famous for its stunning setting amid the Andes as well as its mix of modern and Spanish colonial architecture, has long been on tourists’ radars.

“In the past decade, Santiago’s dining scene has undergone a massive transformation,” says Eaton. “Thanks to a mixture of seasoned Chilean chefs returning to their culinary roots, young chefs returning home with flavors and ideas inspired from overseas, and better access to fresh and native ingredients, Chile’s culinary epicenter is more diverse, self-reflective and internationally noteworthy than it’s ever been.”

Some of Chile’s best up-and-coming chefs are behind a vibrant middle class of restaurants, and are tackling the whole idea of what it means to cook Chilean cuisine. From a carefully curated tasting experience of native Chilean flavors at Boragó to traditional plates reinvented at La Salvación to cocktails that have left their mark on the world’s bar scene at Seite Negronis, there’s no better time to experience the old alongside the new in Santiago.

Originally appeared on MUNCHIES (VICE)

Eat / January 27, 2019

This Chef Is Making Civil War-Era Cuisine to Uncover American Food’s Real Roots

“The fascinating thing about our history is that it’s very dark,” Brian Dunsmoor tells me, hunched over hand-scrawled menu notes for Fuss & Feathers, the supper club out of his Southern-American inflected restaurant, Hatchet Hall, that takes a deep dive into what we mean historically when we talk about American food. It also happens to be one of the most exciting tasting menus in Los Angeles.

“In almost every direction you look, it’s very dark. If you look at George Washington or Thomas Jefferson or anyone that was of influence at that time [of America’s origins] you can’t find a clean slate. That’s why we’re so fascinated with American food. And why so few people know or talk about it. I think because it’s all tied to some really horrible things. Our history is carnage. It’s carnage. A lot of that can be seen in the food. It’s food as carnage.”