Hi, I’m Anna Jones and welcome to my newsletter. It’s great to have you here. If you have found yourself here but are not yet subscribed then you can sort that out below…
Today we celebrate! We celebrate two years of this newsletter in its current home here on Substack and 12 years since I sent out my first-ever newsletter to a hundred or so people. Sure, it feels like quite an abstract thing to celebrate. The birthday of a newsletter - an email that I send once a week? It might seem a bit annoying, irrelevant, navel-gazing. And I am sure it is all of those things, but this newsletter is something more - hear me out.
Over the years, this newsletter has been a place where I have shared news (books, babies, getting married) as well as recipes, and feels like the place where my recipes and writing are most at home. It’s been a place where I’ve been able to respond to cultural, political and environmental things I care about, usually in my own fairly gentle way.
It’s also been a place that has allowed me to lift other people up and it’s this part of this newsletter that has been the most meaningful to me. Whether it’s telling you about an incredible chocolate bar made in small batches by artisans, a petition on something I care about, an ingredient I feel bereft without or to speak up for someone who is not able to do so themselves. This is a place for recipes, but I hope this is also a place for humanness. I hope you feel my humanness in the words I write and the things I share.
Also, this newsletter has renewed something in me; my commitment to you has made me a better and more consistent recipe writer (and I hope in some way it has made my actual non-recipe writing better too).
I aim to write two new recipes here a month, and those recipes are tested and tested until they are bulletproof. I write the recipes carefully with great attention to detail to make sure that not a moment of your precious time is wasted, the same for the ingredients you buy. The art of a recipe is very important to me and you might notice that my recipes are written differently from other people’s to make them the easiest and clearest for you with subheadings, with ingredients amounts listed in the method as well as the ingredients list. Small details but ones that I hope make it easier for you to cook from them.
Today is also about celebrating the three women who help/have helped me publish this every week. Jess sent out that very first newsletter 12 years ago and has been a friend, force and creative crutch ever since. Rach presses send on this newsletter each week and is a creative and cultural wing woman, photographer, copy editor and everything in between as well as a true and loyal friend. Chloe helps me make and write my recipes and is a sunshine girl. Work is not really like work when your days are spent with people as good as these.
But, more than that, today I want to celebrate you all. All 55,888 of you. Once, to try and imagine how many inboxes my writing reaches, I worked out that it was the 02 arena filled almost 3 times. That’s a lot of you. Most of you open and read this every single week and I am so grateful for that. In a world where attention is now an actual part of the economy and in every direction there are people who want yours I am overjoyed that what I do is worthy of your time. I do not take it for granted and I will work to my last to keep the work I do new, fresh and honest.
So in an attempt to celebrate everything I am proud of here we’ve put together an index of all my recipes which live here on my newsletter (well the last 2 years worth anyway). This will hopefully be an easy way for you to find what you are looking for and also to be a jumping off point for inspiration when you can’t decide what to make for dinner.
As well as the recipe index today, I’d also like to offer you a one off special birthday discount on yearly memberships, so you can make the most of all these recipes. Until Monday night, yearly membership is 20% off, just about £10 off the regular subscription price, which works out as about £3.25 a month.
I love to support other people's writing here on Substack. I feel I am slowly understanding more and more that only by supporting do the things we care about remain and exist. Supporting art, writing, craft, and humanness is how I want to spend my money.
I am always so thrilled to hear from you all. The emails and comments you send over about your love for this newsletter just make me so happy. It’s good to know there are good people on the other end. So here’s to you and thanks for allowing me to write this every week. It’s an honour to spend time with you.
Also a little note here - if you are viewing this on Substack (the platform I use to send you this newsletter) then please do subscribe to get my newsletters rather than follow me, following me is the same a social media follow you just get to see what I post in the notes (read social media) section of this site. But if you subscribe you get my actual writing once a week, the slower side of things which is where I want my work to live.
Your favourite things to click on over the last few year -
The best ever salt, delivered to your door
Lady Grey iced tea for hot days
Inside the world of GBBO
The knife I use everyday and the knife that brings the most joy
My favourite noodles, just around the corner in Hackney
My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.
Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. It’s free for everyone this week and a lot of time, love has gone into it. Thank you.
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