Deliciously Ella

How did she end up running down Oxford Street carrying a toaster? Why did she spend her anniversary in a Portakabin? And where the hell did those abs come from? Wellness supremo Ella Mills spells it out...

The epitome of British elegance, Ella Mills is smashing life in her signature perfect way. Jessica Salter talks to the queen of wellness about imposter syndrome, the clean eating backlash and how she balances work and life (spoiler: she doesn’t) photography HELEN MCARDLE styling CHARLIE LAMBROS digital manipulation PETER CROWTHER

aonce-gleaming white mansion in North London couldn’t look more catastrophic. A giant box of red cherries is in danger of being trampled into the plush carpet, carrots from a local farmers’ market are scattered across the floor and florets of broccoli have been smashed into the countertops. It’s a scene straight out of a healthy-eating disaster movie. Amid the chaos, a gleaming beacon of wellness. Dressed in Antonio Berardi neon-pink flares and impossibly high Giuseppe Zanotti wedges, Ella Mills, aka Deliciously Ella, calmly poses for her photographs, her magenta lips parted to reveal a row of picture-perfect teeth. During takes, she’s focused and professional, but while the crew sets up the next shot, there’s a steady stream of chatter from her about how she loves Women’s Health and can’t believe she’s going to be on the cover. She also checks her phone a lot – but that’s because, unlike when you or I mindlessly flick through social media, she speaks to 28 million people a month who hang off her every wholesome post. But if you’ve scrolled through her feed, you could be forgiven for thinking she’s just a little too wholesome. Somehow not quite real. Maybe it’s something to do with the conveyor belt of images displaying nutritious food porn that looks as if it would take no less than a full working day – in a magazine-worthy kitchen of course – to create. Oh, and look, there’s Ella mastering her headstand as her dog Austin looks on. And don’t miss the pic where she’s gazing adoringly at her model-hot husband Matthew Mills, in their matching uniform of his and hers collared shirts, chinos and loafers, standing outside one of their three London delis or launching their new range of breakfast cereals. It’s a level of perfection on par with a Disney animation. But as Ella admits when we begin talking, ‘No one wants you to list the things that went wrong. [Social media] is a highlights reel, a window into a picture, but it’s not the full story. The breakfast that I cobble together at 6am doesn’t look as beautiful as those times I Instagram it – it’s just porridge with peanut butter from a jar.’ In person, Ella is warm, engaging and – like her social media output – relentlessly upbeat. As we chat, it’s clear this Pollyanna-like optimism lies in the fact that she still can’t quite believe this is happening to her. Ella’s journey from student sugar monster to wholesome self-taught cook is well documented. After months spent battling a mysterious illness that left her sleeping for over 15 hours a day and in chronic pain, she was diagnosed with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) and was

‘INSTAGRAM IS A HIGHLIGHTS REEL – IT’S NOT THE FULL STORY’

prescribed a cocktail of medication to help ease her symptoms. It left her miserably low. ‘I felt useless,’ she says. ‘I was sitting on my own while everyone else was living their lives, going on Facebook where I’d see photos of all of my friends at parties.’ But the drugs didn’t work and, desperate to find a way to manage her illness, she decided to focus on a natural, plant-based diet – and began gaining strength as she developed her own recipes. It was when Ella started sharing her dishes online that her kitchen experiments became a brand. ‘I didn’t see it coming,’ she says. ‘If you’d asked me back then, I never would have thought [the brand] would happen. I didn’t have enough belief in my own abilities… I wasn’t ambitious. If you’d asked my mum which of her four children would be running a business, she wouldn’t have said me!’ That’s when having a partner who not only boasts business acumen but a steady faith in your talents is a serious perk, which Ella found – and fell in love with – back in March 2015. Within four months of meeting, she and Matthew were engaged, and they now run Deliciously Ella together – Ella as creative director and Matthew as CEO, doing his best to lurk in the shadows rather than shine under the spotlight. Between them, they run three delis, with additional pop-ups at festivals all over the country, and recently launched a range of products that are in nationwide stores from Tesco to Starbucks – not just specialist health food shops. ‘Matt had 10 years of experience behind him, whereas I had never had a “real” job,’ Ella says. ‘How do you take something that’s proven successful online and turn it into something tangible like actual food products and eateries? It’s a risk, and I needed Matt’s confidence and support to do it. I had no idea how to calculate a margin or what a profit and loss account was, but he owned that side and allowed me to run with the creative.’ She recently read by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg. ‘In it, she talks about imposter syndrome and acknowledging that you need support – I was just sobbing and sobbing,’ she admits. But with success comes risk, confidence knocks and mistakes – ‘millions of them’ – and in this, Ella is no different to the likes of you and me. ‘I think that women can be quite down on themselves. [When I make a mistake, I think:] “I can’t believe I was that stupid” – but everyone does. A lot has gone wrong. There were times when the deli first opened where I was running up and down

Oxford Street carrying tills and toasters – but I just try to fix things as quickly as I can.’ There’s no doubt both Ella and Matthew are wedded to the business, and if that means their personal life takes a backseat, then so be it. ‘It was our first wedding anniversary in April and we’d planned a romantic trip to Paris leaving on a Thursday evening,’ she explains. ‘But that afternoon, two of our biggest cereal stockists said they needed a pile of completed documents we thought we had three weeks to finish – so we ended up spending our anniversary in a Portakabin, finalising spreadsheets, eating about 30 kilos of granola between us.’ Could happen to anyone, I assure her, as she laughs it off. ‘It was so romantic.’ If anything was going to cause Ella sleepless nights, I’d take a punt on it being the clean-eating backlash and her decision to feature in that TV documentary, her wellness peers notably absent. It seems, although appearing on the BBC’S Clean Eating – The Dirty Truth in January must have felt akin to walking into the lion’s den, putting her point across to the nation was a no-brainer for Ella. ‘I like to tackle things head-on, and if I believe something, I’ll say it,’ she says defiantly, sitting up a little straighter. I’m suddenly starting to get an idea of what she’s like when she sets her mind to something. ‘I do think that healthy eating had become far more complicated than it was intended to be. The conversation got a bit heated – ‘clean’ wasn’t my number one word, mine was ‘delicious’. For me it meant being healthier, eating more greens – but I can understand why it became more loaded and complex and ultimately confusing.’ Ella’s message, however, is anything but. ‘Just eat more vegetables. We all know that already, but it won’t happen if we don’t try to make them a little more interesting.’ Interesting, but ideally not recipes that call for the entire stock of Whole Foods and a full weekend spare, yeah? ‘I started Deliciously Ella when I was a student with loads of time on my hands. Now I don’t, so I’ve had to learn how to simplify those same principles to fit a life where I’m working 12 or 13 hours a day, focusing on quick meals and ingredients that I can get hold of in any supermarket.’ And what of food prep, lauded by healthy eaters everywhere? It doesn’t work for Ella. ‘I prefer the principal of making too much when I cook, then freezing the rest. So I only end up cooking dinner about three times a week.’ But enough about food. With that envy-inducing figure – she was even recently photographed by Mario Testino for underwear brand Intimissimi – we can safely assume there’s room in the schedule to squeeze in a little fitness? ‘I think exercise is magic when it comes to how you feel mentally, and I love going to group classes because I have to leave my emails at the door and switch off,’ she says. And what does she credit for her killer abs? ‘Yoga – what a healthy eating cliché! – and the spin studio Psycle, which is five minutes from the Deliciously Ella office. The music is so loud and so immersive – it’s brilliant for blowing off steam.’ Any other techniques to quieten the frazzled mind of a business owner? ‘I’ve tried meditation and love it, but I’m bad at it,’ she admits. ‘When people ask me what the first thing I do when I wake up is, I wish I could say meditate, but really I’m checking my phone!’ Though for her own mental health, she often takes breaks from social media on a personal level. ‘I have no choice but to log on as Deliciously Ella for three or four hours a day, but if I’m not in a good head space, I won’t allow myself to scroll through my friends’ feeds. I can feel like I’m missing out, just like anyone else.’ The impressive work ethic that sees her and Matthew working 12-hour days does come at a price, though. The intense strain of opening the first deli along with preparing for her second book launch saw Ella’s illness come back to haunt her. ‘We were working seven days a week, then I’d go home and stay up until 2am on the computer. After a couple of months, I wasn’t in a good way.’ She had to press reset on her health, in the most simple of terms; getting enough sleep, moving every day and carving out time to cook her own recipes. ‘There’s no magic button, it’s about being consistent.’ See? There is no perfect Ella – behind the Instagram pictures, she’s just as prone to fucking up as the rest of us.

‘WE SPENT OUR FIRST ANNIVERSARY IN A PORTAKABIN FINALISING SPREADSHEETS’