Annie Gray

Anyone who has written cookery books (or published recipes where people can comment) will now be nodding furiously and saying uh huh, and 'that's a very measured response'

A plate of sliced raw sashimi style fish dressed with a pink red sauce sits in the foreground, a plate of pommes anna (but with duck fat) in the background. Wooden table. Water glass.

A chilly looking beach with the sea, a grey sky and a cobbled boat ramp leading down to the sea. Rocks strewn with clothes.

A table of books, with my very own high street, Greedy Queen, victory in the kitchen and at xmas we feast taking pride of place

A rather wonderful jolly to Jersey for Jersey Festival of Words. Great food, a chilly but highly invigorating swim, live music and a really engaged audience. Books and book people are wonderful.

Thank you for coming. I really enjoyed it.

Yes! Utterly wonderful. We were recommended (and loved) Restaurant Pri Škofu. Get there early (or book) as it isnt very big. Lots of good places around there inc a rather lovely print studio.

I have a mini programme of talks to celebrate as well - Jersey this weekend, Petersfield and Ipswich next week, Cirencester and Stratford later next month. Come! Join me! Ask stuff.

A luscious paperback book sits on a stripy chair. The book is The Bookshop,The Draper, The Candlestick Maker: a history of the high street by Annie Gray. The cover features illustrated shops.

Happy paperback release day to me!

This beauty is now out, and available in all good bookshops and also some which you really should avoid because, especially given the topic, your best bet is to toddle off to your (or someone else's) high street to shop at an actual shop.

Seconded. Also Claire Tomalin and another shout out for Alison Light.

Reform, with 0.7% of all MPs, featured in 25% of BBC's recent 10pm news bulletins Astonishingly, a party with 18 times as many MPs as Reform has received one-third less coverage on BBC News at 10.

This is not OK

www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/how...

Is the really good pizza van still there though? Tis the question (do not be tempted by the pizza vending machines. Worth it only to say you tried it).

They don't do a decent soles on the women's (yet), annoyingly. I like their stuff a lot.

In the Liminal Zone...! Cool boots.

I quite liked mine, but the skins burst like a beast. I need natural casings.

Patrick Grant's book, Less, has a very helpful list of interesting companies doing similar things.

I nearly came out with 4 pairs. Happily a combination of one pair being too small and someone else nabbing a pair I was being indecisive about stopped me (yes, this means I do have two 🫣 but I live in leather boots). And one pair is for what passes as formalwear for me.

Unlike DMs they are pretty much wearable out of the box. Also, they are gorgeous. And will last, as they are repairable and have decent uppers and soles. Also - there's a factory shop. Just saying. /end

Solovair (the correct spelling, oops) aka NPS shoes were founded in 1881, part of what was an enormous shoe-making industry in the area. They were the original makers of DMs when they - & the airwair sole - were invented and now that DM production has largely left the UK, make their own version 2/

A pair of rather spiffing brown brogued leather boots on my feet.

One of the effects of writing The Bookshop, The Draper... is that I've become even more anti-shopping and even keener to support businesses keeping quality craftsmanship alive and doing very nice things very well. Bye bye my beloved Doc Martens, hello Solevair, based in Northamptonshire. 1/

Oh, good call. Having just got back from Vancouver without managing to find a bloody Nanaimo bar.

Either way, clafoutis of the food of the gods and I always make a portion for 10 and then eat chunks of it cold for breakfast. I mean, it's essentially solid custard with fruit in. What's not to love?!

The two are verrrry close - my mirabelle is the classic yellow one but there are red ones. I *think* - that mirabelles tend to be sweeter. So I'd call mirabelle, but I'm much better at cooking than growing (!)

This is not unhelpful www.orangepippintrees.co.uk/trees/mirabe...

All the bloody time.

A few online spaces are still available on the what can be done to help save our #pubs event.

Event is free & open to those who work in pubs, those who campaign for them, or anyone who is passionate about #pubs.

Contact me for more details

Oh wow, that IS big news.

I always forget - or never fully grasp - how enormous Canada is. (Also, there's a really weird tiny slice of a peninsula off the bottom of Vancouver which is the US and I can't quite fathom it).

'We don't need a Gail's' - the coffee shop boom dividing locals The controversial cafe chain is expanding outside London but locals often have mixed feelings.

This is not terrible www.bbc.com/news/article... though misses out the stuff around VC miney, Patisserie Valerie and the deliberate branding of Gail's to look indie. Much is left to the reader to infer. I do like the comment about it being an upmarket Gregg's though.

Oh, that sugar was produced by enslaved people but that many people either didn't know (or chose not to) or decided not to care. Very controversial, that.

I wanted mutton but it isn't the season 😕

🔥

A pudding basin with a pudding cloth on is suspended from a string handle above a cluttered worktop.

More pudding content. This one's lamb steak and kidney and was very nice thank you yes please none of this death of the pudding crap around here.

By a copywriter for a publisher working for a major historical organisation. They had a lot of expertise to draw upon including from their own blog and staff. Worst thing is that it was so obvious. Nobody had even read it before sending it to me.