Mariella Bliss explains how she started her Oxford catering company Bliss

Every (and I mean every) Italian is mad about food. Of course, when I was growing up in a large town just a bit south of my beloved Napoli, I just didn’t realise it. Neither did I realise the importance of knowing how to speak English. Luckily my Pappa did and he packed me off to a language school just outside Oxford for six months.

Despite staying with a wonderful family, I soon realised, to my horror, that it wasn’t just the English language that I didn’t understand. It was also the food. The sheer variety of it. I was an Italian girl who had eaten Italian food all her life. I thought that’s what everyone did. Not true; here I was surrounded by a plethora of choices. Once you’d chosen your restaurant there were a hundred things to choose from.

In the south of Italy you go out for Italian food – pizza, pasta or fish, then go for an Italian ice-cream followed by an Italian espresso. All delicious of course, but restricted. By the way, why do the English often say eXpresso?!! Oh, and while we’re about it, get your singular and plurals right, it’s one panino and two panini.

So I fell in love with not just English food in England, but food in general, because of the British open-mindedness towards it. And then I fell in love with my English teacher and married him. As you do.

Living in England also gave me some perspective on Italian food: the world loves the food from my country but doesn’t often get it right. And then my light-bulb moment came; I wanted British people to try Italian food as it is really made by Mama. And not only that, I wanted to teach them how to do it, because good Italian food and how to make it, is neither top-secret nor rocket science.

So, for my first farmers’ market (in Wolvercote) I nervously baked four focaccia and cut them into slices. They sold out. I was thrilled. Customers smiled. Job done.

Except that it wasn’t, because my wonderful customers started asking me for tips on how to cook. I found that explaining how to cook food properly was as fulfilling as making it and selling it. So now I teach small classes.

Then my market customers and students started asking if I would do catering. Like my first market, I started small. I’ve since catered for wedding receptions, birthday parties and village hall events. One of the guests at a university function was Rowan Williams, at a local village hall party last year: David Cameron. Mama back in Italy was very proud. ‘You wouldn’t get The Pope or Berlusconi turning up at a local do in Italy’, she said. And she was right.

So that’s me: market-stall holder, teacher, caterer. Food, food, food. Mad about it. Eating, cooking and showing others that they can do it too. Passing it on’ is what it’s all about. To this end, my nine-year old daughter appears also to have food ‘bug’ and enjoys helping me run my Wolvercote Farmers’ Market stall. Just remember the following and Mama back in Italy will be proud of you as well: Pizza doesn’t come from Italy. It is from Naples.

No onions in a tomato sauce please. Just tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and salt.

Cook your pasta one minute less than it says on the packet, it carries on cooking after you’ve drained it.

Try not to put anything on top of a pizza. Putting sweetcorn or pineapple on top of a pizza might get you arrested in Naples.

Only a tourist has a cappuccino after breakfast time in Italy.

Visit her website www.mariellabliss.co.uk