Vogue Head Chloe Malle’s Grub Street Diet

For Vogue’s Chloe Malle, a sweet treat is a must. In the office, she’s often poking around for candy, whether from a colleague or her own coveted snack basket, which she fills with nuts, dried fruit, and her kids’ holiday candy haul. “There’s been a surprising lack of curiosity about where the candy goes.” During Fashion Month, the sugar boost is especially critical. The lead-up to NYFW has predictably been stressful and tiring; Malle barely registered hitting the one-year mark in her role succeeding Anna Wintour. It’s involved a lot of learning on the go, but she’s excited about what Vogue has coming up in the next few months as well as continuing to find her footing. “It’s always fun to see New York through the Fashion Week lens,” she says. “I love when Tory Burch showed at the Breuer Building that’s now Sotheby’s. I love when Tommy Hilfiger showed at the ferry. I love when designers take a New York City landmark and reinterpret it.”

Monday, August 31
I preorder my Mocha Magic smoothie at Barry’s on the sign-up sheet before class. Every time, it’s a thrill that it’s ready when I come out, sitting on top of the bar at 7 a.m. I like using a Kinto reusable water bottle. It is plastic, but it’s so much lighter than the Owala bottles. If you are as clumsy as me, Owalas can become weapons with an ill-timed flick of the wrist. I’m pleased with myself for remembering to bring my water bottle with me and not having to spend $5 on a Barry’s-branded water.

It’s the last week of summer as we head into Labor Day, but it feels like back to school at Vogue. In the New York office, most people are back from staggered August vacations, and in Europe everyone is back and raring to go. It feels like the last week to really lock things in before people disperse for Fashion Month.

At the office, I get a vanilla-flavored iced coffee in the cafeteria. I treat the milk jugs on the coffee bar like Russian roulette and sort of pick at random and see what I get; today, I have almond milk, even though at home my preference is oat. Then I add simple syrup, which is the only option for sweetening iced coffee!

If I exercise early in the morning and get a smoothie, I’m ready for my second breakfast by around 9 a.m. Today, I head to the grill station in our cafeteria, manned by Dennis and Alvie. They ask me if I’d like the “Chloe special,” which, at breakfast, is two eggs over easy with everything-bagel salt on top and a slice of multigrain bread toasted on the griddle with butter. (The “Chloe special” at lunchtime is grilled chicken with a heaping side of sweet-potato fries and chipotle mayo.) I say “yes.”

I’ve brought oatmeal cookies to share with the office that a friend brought us over the weekend, which I pretend to have baked myself. I’ve also brought a bushel of pears from our tree in Connecticut. My husband, Graham, has spent most of August doing pear management, and we have eaten them sliced, juiced, baked, dehydrated, and made into sorbet. I put them in a bowl in my office, and they go quickly. My colleague Maddie from AD even Slacks me to ask if the pear rumor is true and if she could come grab one.

For lunch, I take out a kale Caesar salad left over from the weekend, and it reminds me I don’t like bringing my lunch to work, just like I don’t like planning my outfits in advance. My friend Sadie plans an entire week’s worth of outfits on Sunday evenings, down to the undergarments and accessories. I’m so in awe of this. I’m sure it saves her so much time, but I just can’t do it. I find even if I think about something I want to wear the very next day, by the time I wake up either I have a totally different idea about the day or the weather does. This is how I feel about the salad too. It’s not what I really want to eat, but I don’t want to waste it, so I also get chicken tenders from Meadow Lane. They really are worth the price in my opinion. So delightfully crispy.

Most days, I’m in meetings at the office all day, every half-hour from 9:30 a.m. to around 4:30 p.m., which means I very rarely go out for lunch. If I do, it’s almost exclusively to Sant Ambroeus Brookfield Place across the street, where I can be in and out in an hour and 15 minutes and usually order the lentil salad with either a side of salmon or a pesto pasta “for the table,” and mint-chip ice cream. (Sant Ambroeus and the Odeon have my favorite mint-chip ice cream in the World Trade Center’s vicinity.)

Around 3 p.m., before my podcast interview with Julia Louis-Dreyfus, I head back to the cafeteria and get Justin’s peanut-butter cups and an Honest Tea, iced Moroccan mint green.

After work, a group of us from the office go volunteer at Materials for the Arts in Queens, sorting boxes of donated fabric and art supplies. I’m inspired to get tacos afterward, but I can’t find a place close by. I am supposed to meet my mother for dinner anyway, so I zip to midtown on the R train and meet her at her local watering hole: Gabriel’s on Central Park South. She lives a block away, and she and her dog, Bruce, can be found in a booth in the back several nights a week. Bruce even has a custom bowl with his name on it, in which they serve his ground beef. I order a glass of Sancerre and corn-and-crab soup followed by spaghetti pomodoro. I am torn about drinking wine at dinner; my Oura ring tells me not to, but it usually loses the fight.

Tuesday, September 1
I’m home alone this week because my kids, my husband, and my dog. Lloyd, are up at our house in Northwest Connecticut for one last week of summer. When I’m solo in the apartment, I really lean into my Don Draper tendencies. I don’t cook. I don’t even make coffee. I do know how to make the coffee, but like Bartleby, I prefer not to. Graham is a very passionate coffee-maker, and over the 17 years we’ve been together, we have cycled through everything from the Moccamaster to pour-over to now the moka pot, the extra-large Bialetti stovetop contraption. Graham even waits until the morning to ground the beans for peak freshness. Every morning, Lloyd hears the jostle of the beans and thinks it’s his kibble. He is disappointed every time.

When I’m home alone, I just make tea. I like a fancy Earl Grey variety. I buy Mariage Frères duty free when I’m at Charles de Gaulle airport. Loose-leaf tea is chic, but I don’t have time for it. I need it in a bag, and Mariage Frères comes in silky little pouches. I was lucky enough to be given a delicious jar of honey from Burberry last year that was produced at Highgrove, King Charles’s estate in Gloucestershire. I was also gifted a jar of Meghan Markle’s honey from her brand, As Ever. A battle of the royal honeys!

I hustle down to the office for a meeting with eBay and our commercial team. I checked beforehand to make sure there will be breakfast served, and my colleague Beth assured me that she would not let me down; indeed, there is a full spread. I have a mini-croissant I dunk in my coffee, yogurt with berries, and a slice of vegetable frittata.

Later in the morning, I pull down my snack basket from my top shelf in my office. There’s a real Jekyll-and-Hyde mix in here between cashews, almonds and some dried fruit, and my kids’ leftover Easter candy. (The “Switch Witch” comes to take their candy in exchange for a small toy, but they don’t know it ends up in my office. The Halloween candy is long gone.) A few friends and colleagues on the floor know it is there and come by for afternoon nuts or Tootsie Rolls.

For lunch, I have crispy tofu bibimbap at the Cook’s Corner in the cafeteria, a Bon Appétit special, and a Poppi Doc Pop soda, which pretends to be healthy but surely isn’t. In the afternoon, before heading off to do some studio visits, I tap into beauty editor Margaux’s BonBon supply. Beauty brands are always sending sweet things, and she consistently has some gummy variety at her overflowing desk. The most welcome are from BonBon. I had three cavities filled earlier this year. My dentist just shook his head at me and said I needed to cut down on my candy intake.

My friend and colleague Marley Marius had Eleni’s sugar cookies printed with my signature that’s on the bottom of my editor’s letter and Lloyd’s face — my Slack icon — to celebrate the first anniversary of the news of my job being announced. I’d forgotten about that. It is such a wonderful afternoon surprise — and sugar fix.

In the evening, I head to Sailor in Fort Greene to meet my friends Joana Avillez, Thessaly La Force, and Irina Aleksander for dinner at 7:30 p.m., which feels wildly late to me. I rarely have a meal out with friends, as I’m usually rushing home to see my kids for bedtime or heading to work events. This feels like a treat, especially because Joana is moving to Rome for a year. My favorite things on the menu end up being the tomato toast with labneh and skirt steak with arugula and horseradish cream. We drink a delicious Spanish white wine.

Wednesday, September 2
I box at Punch Force Fitness most Wednesday mornings. It’s on 72nd and Columbus, the fourth location since I started going about 15 years ago and the most convenient for me — about a half-mile run from my apartment near Columbus Circle. It’s also next door to Juice Generation, where I get a Rise ‘N Grind smoothie afterward. My kids love their Banana Brain protein muffins, and I’ll usually bring those home for Graham to halve and grill in a pan with butter. My daughter also now requests pain au chocolat, so sometimes I’ll stop at Breads Bakery since they have both of our favorite pain au chocolat.

After zipping home and getting dressed, I rush downtown and meet my friend Sarah Hoover at the new Frenchette Bakery on Broome Street. We get egg sandwiches, which have a delicious salsa brava on them. The real winner is the cinnamon roll, which has a perfectly tart cream-cheese frosting. We bring breakfast to Sarah’s husband, Tom Sachs, at his studio, where he shows me his new project, 31 Rue Cambon, a simulacrum of the Chanel store in Paris, mostly made out of plywood and LEGOs. I love it and hate to leave, but I hustle down to make it to my 9:45 a.m. meeting.

I record weekly headlines for the Run-Through podcast with Chioma every Wednesday at noon, which can make my lunch feel painfully late. I preorder a salad niçoise on the Daily Provisions app and an Arnold Palmer. I still don’t really know who he was, but my God, what a legacy. I also get two chocolate-caramel cookies and give one to our deputy editor, Taylor Antrim, who, like me, requires a cookie a day.

I head to a screening of Elsinore and grab some BjornQorn at Meadow Lane on the way. The movie makes me sob, and I cry into my popcorn. Straight from the movie, I zip to the U.S. Open with my friends and colleagues Sam Sussman and Sam Cochran. We are guests of Ralph Lauren, and I am in awe of how they have made a mini Polo Bar at Arthur Ashe Stadium. I sample almost everything on offer, from shrimp cocktail to mini-sliders. I also have a Honey Deuce, but it’s too sweet, even for me.

Thursday, September 3
I write Malle Wear in bed in the early morning with a cup of Earl Grey before meeting my mom for breakfast at Cipriani near her apartment. I have salmon eggs Benedict with hollandaise on the side and an Americano with oat milk. I drive myself to the office and park near One World Trade so I can drive directly to Connecticut from the office at the end of the day. Driving through Times Square always feels like living in a video game.

I eat lunch at the Condé cafeteria a couple days a week, and I often lean toward whatever fish special is available. My friend claims I can’t stay away from an ambiguous fish, and it’s true. There’s often a vague sea-bream special that I’m inexplicably drawn to. Today, however, the cafeteria’s heated counter theme is Texas BBQ. I get vegan chorizo, and my colleague Ignacio and I circle the empty pan of mac ’n’ cheese like vultures, waiting for it to be refilled. It’s worth the wait! I eat it while meeting with Libby, who heads our shopping team to go over the Vogue Shopping Newspaper that comes out during Fashion Week. It looks fantastic and makes me want to shop!

I get to Connecticut just in time to say “good night” to the kids and then I make myself a stracciatella, peach, and cherry tomato salad with basil. I prefer stracciatella to mozzarella for a caprese because I like when the cheese coats all the tomatoes. I also premake a pitcher of iced tea for the next day. I like Harney & Sons iced-tea bags, which are bigger and stronger than regular tea bags. When it’s done, I add a splash of apple juice as sweetener.

Friday, September 4
I wake up around 6:15 a.m. with my son Arthur, who can’t decide whether he wants me to read him Harry Potter or look at his Pokémon binder. We alternate between the two in a pretty stressful way: We read a page of Harry Potter, and then he shows me a new Pikachu card, and then another page of Harry Potter, and so on. Fortunately, this only lasts an hour.

Graham has a large Moccamaster drip-coffee setup here, and we deplete the pot throughout the morning. For breakfast, I have Arethusa whole-fat yogurt with a local farmstand granola and add peaches, maple syrup, and cinnamon. It’s my breakfast of choice if I have time and supplies.

I work in the morning, catching up and replying to pre-holiday-weekend emergencies. I try to keep Fridays meeting free when possible; it’s the only day I can catch up on my to-do list. For lunch, I have pimento cheese (from a local cheesemonger with a great name, New Curds on the Block) on crackers and battle the tyranny of late-summer tomatoes by making yet another tomato salad, this time just with Graza olive oil (which has won me over with their excellent marketing and packaging), pepper, and purple basil from our herb garden. I’m also always eating my kids’ leftovers. They like ravioli and tortellini, which I love. To me, cheese tortellini with butter and Parmesan is the dream, and I finish it from their plates as I’m cleaning up after them.

For dinner, we make chicken on skewers that we get pre-seasoned at our beloved grocery store New Morning Market. Graham gets mad at me because I blister shishito peppers in his special carbon-steel pan that has a very specific set of care instructions. Apparently, I’ve set him back four pan uses by cooking the peppers without the pan being a certain temperature. You understand now why I don’t cook!

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