At The Table With: Aishwarya Iyer
3 questions for the indoors enthusiast, food-lover, and founder of Brightland
Unless you’re brand new to this newsletter you know that I’ve been deep, deep into gift mode for the last few weeks. Years of working in e-commerce programmed me to start thinking about gift guides and holiday content well before Halloween, not to mention that the holidays give me an excuse to heavily lean into my embarrassing online shopping habit. So when I was thinking about who I wanted to interview for December’s At The Table With, Aishwarya Iyer popped into my head right away.
Aishwarya is the founder of Brightland, a brand you’ve no doubt gifted or received as a gift yourself. Brightland is known for their olive oils but over the years have expanded into vinegars and honeys as well. I’m genuinely such a fan of everything they make and I especially love that they collaborate with artists for their labels (including Peter Som, Lilian Martinez, B.D. Graft, and my talented friend Marleigh Culver.) You can just tell that Aishwarya and her team put a lot of heart into everything they do and it shows through the quality of their products. Personal opinion: you can’t say the same about everyone doing olive oil!!!
Born in South India and now living in LA (with years in Houston and NYC in between), Aishwarya is a self-proclaimed enthusiast of the great indoors (I can relate) who loves to read and cook (ditto). We also share a real appreciation for food and bringing people together around it, something she does very well: the first time I met her in person was at a party she threw in her own backyard to celebrate the launch of Brightland’s new Pizza Oil, and I kid you not, what felt like hundreds of people showed up. It was like, shoulder-to-shoulder filled with people who adore the brand as much as I do, drenching their pizza slices with oil with wild abandon.
I asked Aishwarya 3 questions:
Ali LaBelle: Imagine perfect happiness. What does it smell, taste, feel and sound like?
Aishwarya Iyer: So. Many. Flowers. Sitting in the beautiful San Ysidro Ranch garden, and then I turn a corner, and I am at the beach in Isla Mujeres, it sounds like waves, it is a cool 72 from the ranch and goes up to 80 in Isla. I see my two dogs running in the garden, and when I turn towards the beach, I see my beautiful husband sitting on one of the swings with his back towards me, but he turns around and smiles. Then I take another turn and I am in my cozy living room with a Christmas tree, with my parents and sister sitting around the tree, opening presents.
AL: Give us a rec!
(Editor’s note: I am kicking myself for not buying that book when I went to Buly in October!)
AL: It’s a table for two and your dinner date can be anyone. Who do you invite and what are you eating?
AI: I would invite one of my female ancestors from 2000 BC. I want to hear what her life was like, what she believed and hoped for, and what she thinks of the world in 2023 AD. We would each bring something from our time—I would have homemade pizza, and Brightland’s garlic olive oil, and I would love for them to bring something from 2000 BC. :)
Thank you so much for being here, Aish! My newsletter on Friday is a gift guide (my last one, I promise!) featuring a bunch of gift ideas that you can buy last minute and—spoiler alert—Brightland is included. You can order from Brightland’s website until midnight on 12/15 for 12/24 delivery (their mini sets are so cute!), or run to your local shoppy shop to grab a bottle while you can.
Brightland also posts monthly produce guides on their Instagram that I am constantly referencing, so give them a follow over there if you too need to know if the tomato you’re about to eat is in season. The recipes they share are great too!!!
Last thing! If you have a friend who is a free subscriber to this newsletter and might like an upgrade for the holidays, or maybe someone who isn’t a subscriber at all, you can gift them an À La Carte subscription! A $5 gift subscription will give them a free month of paid subscriber content and a $50 gift subscription will give them a whole year’s supply.
If you do buy an annual gift subscription, shoot me an email at hello@alilabelle.co with your name and your recipient’s and I’ll send you back a cute customized card that you can print and wrap up to give them in person. It looks like this:
See you back here on Friday for gifts for procrastinators!
x
Ali
In case you missed it:
Last week’s gift guide was book-themed and included 48 cookbooks, art books, reading books, and vintage books at a bunch of different price points.
I kicked off December with a newsletter about my best ever holiday party purchase, an English cottage, and an artist I love that you might too.
I loooove her dinner party answer. “I would invite one of my female ancestors from 2000 BC.” 🥹
Oo the nudge I needed to try this olive oil I've been lusting after.