The multi-course dinners served at the Lost Kitchen in Freedom, Maine are culinary adventures rooted in simple ingredients and traditional techniques. But getting to the Lost Kitchen is an adventure in its own right.
Tucked into the rural forest west of Belfast, Maine, the Lost Kitchen is a bucket list destination for foodies around the world. They come to sample French’s self-taught, steadfast commitment to simple ingredients that come together in unexpected and exciting ways and experience more than a dozen courses rooted in local availability and time-honored tradition.
Over the last decade, French has grown the Lost Kitchen into a lifestyle brand, and her journey has been documented in two television series. Her new show, “Getting Lost with Erin French,” premiered earlier this summer on Magnolia Network and tells the story of a 10,000-mile road trip in search of new inspiration.
Watch “Getting Lost with Erin French,” on Magnolia Network and streaming on MAX.
A Culinary Adventure Born in an Airstream
Today, the Lost Kitchen is housed in an 1834 mill in Freedom. But the story began when French – down on her luck and adrift after a difficult divorce – purchased a 1965 Airstream trailer in 2013, outfitted it with vintage appliances, and transformed it into a mobile kitchen for pop-up dinners across Maine. For a year, French towed the trailer to local farms and fields where she gathered fresh ingredients and hosted elegant farm-to-table dinners.
Magical, romantic, and built out of a dedication to simplicity, the early days of the Lost Kitchen set the stage for what is today a world-class culinary experience at its brick-and-mortar location in Freedom. But those days of hitching up and towing a mobile kitchen around also represented a difficult time for French as she searched for what would come next.
“There were struggles,” French remembers. “But the Airstream gave me some confidence – there was a freedom to it that really gave me an independence that I was looking for in my life that I didn’t have in my previous life.”
Not only did French use the trailer as a workspace, but she also lived and slept in it while searching for her next step. During that time, she met her now-husband, Michael Dutton, who today helps manage the Lost Kitchen’s growing culinary universe.
“The trailer really gave me a space to reinvent myself,” she says. “The wheels kept me moving even when the brakes in my life were on. The Airstream forced me to keep rolling when all I wanted to do was stop.”
A Lost Kitchen Finds a Permanent Home
Within a year, French had outgrown the Airstream, and a local farmer friend suggested she check out the old mill in Freedom to see if that would be a suitable location for the Lost Kitchen’s next act. French and Dutton parked the Airstream nearby and over the next decade transformed the stone building and grounds into a destination food experience. Guests travel from around the world to experience the candlelit dinners prepared with care by French and her kitchen staff and afterward stay on the grounds in beautifully appointed cabins.
Even the reservation system is built with simplicity in mind – no phone calls, no online booking: To get a reservation at the Lost Kitchen, the first thing you have to do is send a handwritten postcard and hope that it's randomly selected from a pile of nearly 60,000 other postcards sent by hopeful food fanatics around the world.
Luckily, even if you don’t get a reservation, you can still tap into the Lost Kitchen mystique with a growing lifestyle collection of goods. Two cookbooks, a memoir, and a shop filled with home goods, kitchenware, and more let fans bring Lost Kitchen style back to their own kitchens. A three-season documentary series on Magnolia Network (streaming on MAX) takes viewers behind the scenes at the restaurant while telling French’s remarkable story of determination in the face of adversity. And today, a new documentary series expands the Lost Kitchen story with a road trip around the country in search of new inspiration.
Magnolia Network’s “Getting Lost with Erin French” Documents a Culinary Adventure
After more than a decade in Maine, French was eager to get out and explore and find new inspiration on the road. Her story came full circle as she and Michael set off on a three-month, 10,000-mile road trip which Magnolia Network documented in the new eight-episode television series, “Getting Lost with Erin French,” produced by Erin and Michael's long-term collaborators at Anchor Entertainment.
Each episode, Erin and Michael travel to a new destination to meet with local chefs, sample regional ingredients, and discover new techniques and cooking methods. Along the way, the couple lived in the 25-foot Flying Cloud – and made their fair share of epic road meals.
“It makes you a stronger cook,” says Erin about cooking in the Airstream. “There’s less movement, you’re a little more organized and thoughtful.”
Whether it was enjoying a fresh meal with the rear hatch open overlooking the beach at Malibu or whipping up tacos in the desert, the couple marveled at the joy of bringing your kitchen with you on the road – like French’s favorite cast iron and dishware.
“Everything we needed was there,” Michael remembers of the trip. “It was challenging at times, but we were successful more often than not.”
The trip took the couple to New Orleans, Houston, Southern California, up the West Coast and back across the country.
Along the way, they rediscovered what they’d known all along up in Maine – that food is as much about the experience and the people as it is about the ingredients. After meeting with local chefs and exploring new techniques, Erin and Michael gathered their new friends for an impromptu meal cooked by French and served wherever they were camping for the night.
“We’d make a nice meal and then take it out into this orange grove where we were camping and share it with our new friends,” she says.
“For us it was about taking in these moments in Big Sur, White Sands, or camping in an orange grove in Ojai, California,” says Michael. “It’s an aesthetic that harkens back to a bygone era – it wasn’t just about cooking. The Airstream creates this cool experience right there, in and around the trailer.”
In New Orleans, they discovered Louisiana oysters that rivaled anything they’d ever seen in oyster-rich Maine.
“They were the size of my hand,” says Michael, holding out his fingers fully stretched.
“We just pulled up to the place where they were shucking them” says Erin. “We went out on the bayou and gathered them up, and then opened the hatch and set up a little bar. We fried them right there, served them on saltines with hot sauce.”
“That was a truly immersive moment,” says Michael. “These are things you want to eat right there and then, and it was something we would not have been able to do without the camper.”
Rediscovering the Freedom of the Road While Discovering New Horizons
Beyond cooking, Erin and Michael’s time in the Airstream shooting “Getting Lost” let the couple rediscover themselves and deepen their relationship.
“It was a great stress test for us,” says Michael. “You’re in a small space for several months, and you’re challenged as a couple and as individuals. There were a few moments where things got introspective, but overall, it was reaffirming of the strength of our relationship.”
For this couple – who met while Erin was living and working in an Airstream – the road trip represented a way to reconnect with each other and come full circle. It was also a great opportunity for Erin to broaden her culinary horizons and return to Maine with some of that magic. Along the way, she discovered the joy that every Airstreamer knows.
“Traveling brings growth,” says Erin. “To come home and have this different perspective, to have met these people and go all these places I’ve never been before – you almost become a different person because you’ve experienced these things.”
“Everywhere we went, we bonded with people over place and food,” Michael says. “We were fortunate to have our home – this trailer – with us. That created an environment that was powerful for the people coming in and spending time with us. That’s what we set out to do – take this home away from home and go in search of people who are doing what Erin is doing, with a commitment to local and community. We succeed on that level and came away with a very real personal experience.”
Back in Maine, Erin is excited to start incorporating everything she learned on the road into the Lost Kitchen experience in Freedom. She’s connecting with guests on a different level after traveling to many of the places they are journeying from.
“Our world up here in Maine can feel very small,” she says. “To take a 10,000-mile lap around the country was extraordinary – it opened our minds, our spirit, and it strengthened us as a couple. We went out seeking inspiration and we came home with it.”
Get lost with Erin and Michael on their epic road trip: Watch “Getting Lost with Erin French” on Magnolia Network and streaming on MAX.
