Chopping Onions on My Heart
on losing and preserving culture
BUY from an independent bookshop and get it signed: Owl Bookshop.
BUY in the UK: Bookshop.org, Hive, Waterstones, Amazon, Blackwells, Foyles, WH Smiths.
It is coming out in 2026 in the US, with the title Always Carry Salt.
LISTEN to me talking about the book on BBC START THE WEEK
READ me on trying to pass on my food heritage in the Guardian
READ me on the creativity of Passover food in the Financial Times
READ me on why I wrote it & what it meant to me in the Jewish Chronicle
WATCH me talk about it with the Chaldean Cultural Centre.
WATCH me talk about it with Harif.
“An optimistic and often wryly funny book…a gift to the future, rich with insights about the nature of belonging that are not limited to one community but matter to all of us” - Stephanie Merritt in the Observer
“A linguistic feast (as well as a gastronomic one…)…Chopping Onions on my Heart’s aching sense of loss has a truly global resonance” - Keith Kahn-Harris in the Guardian
“A radiant and moving meditation on how we might find renewal even in the shadow of devastating events…vibrantly, even radically hopeful” - Elizabeth Morris, Crib Notes
“A wonderfully immersive and sensitive meditation on belonging and identity” - VIV GROSKOP, author of How to Own the Room and One Ukrainian Summer
“A book about loss written with pure, irrepressible joy... Urgent, alive, propulsive. I adored it” - MARINA BENJAMIN, author of Last Days in Babylon, and A Little Give
“Beautiful and vibrant, funny and engrossing, this book is full of insights, passion and fascinating twists’ - RACHEL SHABI, author of Off White
I loved this book so much...a heart-opener and an eye-opener... Think: The Body Keeps the Score in practice not theory” - ELLA RISBRIDGER, author of Midnight Chicken
“Easily my non-fiction book of the year...her writing is just incredible - witty, informative and quietly devastating in turn. I couldn’t put it down” - RUKMINI IYER, author of The Roasting Tin
““A beautiful tale of painful cultural loss, delicious food, rich history; and the bittersweet grief that only the perfect recipe can solve. A truly enlightening book that will leave you hungry yet satisfied” - CARIAD LLOYD, author of You are not Alone
“Chopping Onions on My Heart is quite simply wonderful - a lyrical meditation that sparkles with life and joy. Such an elegant study of identity, loss, and hope, and so beautifully written” - FRANCESCA SEGAL, author of Welcome to Glorious Tuga
”A profound meditation on loss and the importance of language as a means of remembering. It is a moving and resonant lament for the past but also a thought-provoking siren call for the future. Thoroughly recommended” - ANNE SEBBA, author of The Women's Orchestra of Auschwitz
“Marvellous” - JAMES BARR, author of A Line in the Sand
“A glorious, fascinating, substantial, utterly absorbing journey through love, language, family and time” - BIDISHA
“I devoured this touching, vivid, joyous account of both belonging and not belonging…packed with intelligent nostalgia for a lost paradise of tastes, smells, textures and language Ellis's book is a feast in itself” - AMANDA CRAIG, author of The Three Graces
“Soul-searching, sensory…enthralling” - CAROLINE SANDERSON, The Bookseller
“Beautiful” - EMILY RHODES
“Fascinating, moving and important” - MARIANNE LEVY, author of Don’t Forget to Scream
“A lovely book, full of thoughts about culture, language and place. Sam was a vital element in the writers’ room for Paddington, and this book is predictably brilliant on how people who move home need to bring something with them, and hold onto it tight.” - JOEL MORRIS, author of Be Funny or Die
“Poetic and evocative…I loved this funny, moving memoir” - EMMA FORREST, author of Busy Being Free
Samantha’s mother tongue is dying out. An urgent need to find out more becomes an expansive investigation into how to keep hold of her culture -- and when to let it go.
The daughter of Iraqi-Jewish refugees, Samantha grew up surrounded by the noisy, vivid, hot sounds of Judeo-Iraqi Arabic. A language that’s now on the verge of extinction.
The realisation that she won’t be able to tell her son he’s ‘living in the days of the aubergines’ or ‘chopping onions on my heart’ opens the floodgates. The questions keep coming. How can she pass on the stories of displacement without passing on the trauma? Will her son ever love mango pickle?
In her search for answers Samantha encounters demon bowls, the perils of kohl and the unexpected joys of fusion food. Her journey transports us from the clamour of Noah’s Ark to the calm of the British Museum, from the Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages to the banks of the River Tigris. As Samantha considers what we lose and keep, she also asks what we might need to let go of to preserve our culture and ourselves.
This is a life-affirming memoir about resilience and repair, and the healing power of dancing to our ancestors’ music, cooking up their recipes and sharing their stories.
For publicity enquiries, please contact Priya Roy at Penguin Random House.
