Annie Gray
@dranniegray.bsky.social
Food historian, mainly British food ca1650 on. Writer, consultant, speaker. #BBCTKC panellist. Author of many books - the latest The Bookshop, the Draper, The Candlestick Maker: a history of the High Street. Also grows vegetables, often badly.
The last couple of days have been brilliant - meeting the inestimable Tom Herbert of The Long Table in Cirencester, doing a thought-provoking event with Mary Portas for Ciren History Festival (which is just brilliant - kudos to the organisers) and curating my very own display case for the museum.
October 31, 2025 at 11:46 AM
The last couple of days have been brilliant - meeting the inestimable Tom Herbert of The Long Table in Cirencester, doing a thought-provoking event with Mary Portas for Ciren History Festival (which is just brilliant - kudos to the organisers) and curating my very own display case for the museum.
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.
September 28, 2025 at 11:43 AM
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.
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.
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.
September 25, 2025 at 6:55 PM
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.
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.
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/
September 16, 2025 at 2:23 PM
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/
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.
August 20, 2025 at 11:40 AM
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.
Early modern breakfast: pain perdu / poor knights + white puddings (sweet, the best one made with macaroons) and a bonus rice pudding, all in guts.
#foodhistory #skystorian
#foodhistory #skystorian
August 16, 2025 at 10:08 AM
Early modern breakfast: pain perdu / poor knights + white puddings (sweet, the best one made with macaroons) and a bonus rice pudding, all in guts.
#foodhistory #skystorian
#foodhistory #skystorian
I'll be on the Beeb tonight trying not to say that the whole DEATH OF THE BRITISH PUDDING thing might be a little bit contrived so that English Heritage can publicise a baking book. On the other hand... entirely coincidentally I made C17 white puddings. They were not entirely a success.
August 14, 2025 at 5:02 PM
I'll be on the Beeb tonight trying not to say that the whole DEATH OF THE BRITISH PUDDING thing might be a little bit contrived so that English Heritage can publicise a baking book. On the other hand... entirely coincidentally I made C17 white puddings. They were not entirely a success.
It's a terrible picture, but I can report that Elizabeth Raffald's heavily plagiarised 'to barbecue a leg of pork' is incredible. (It's 90% in the sauce, and of that, quite a lot lies in the quality of your lime pickle). Obviously it's a complete and utter bastardisation of the original concept 1/
August 1, 2025 at 1:13 PM
It's a terrible picture, but I can report that Elizabeth Raffald's heavily plagiarised 'to barbecue a leg of pork' is incredible. (It's 90% in the sauce, and of that, quite a lot lies in the quality of your lime pickle). Obviously it's a complete and utter bastardisation of the original concept 1/
And here's the actual book, which just arrived in the post. A lovely reworking of the hardback cover. I really like it very much.
July 30, 2025 at 10:59 AM
And here's the actual book, which just arrived in the post. A lovely reworking of the hardback cover. I really like it very much.
New event! Celebrating the paperback launch of The Bookshop, The Draper, The Candlestick Maker:
www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev...
www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev...
July 30, 2025 at 10:42 AM
New event! Celebrating the paperback launch of The Bookshop, The Draper, The Candlestick Maker:
www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev...
www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev...
The 1980s called.... (This is a pear salad, apparently. Supposed to look like bunches of grapes. Cream cheese is involved. Yes.)
July 18, 2025 at 8:23 AM
The 1980s called.... (This is a pear salad, apparently. Supposed to look like bunches of grapes. Cream cheese is involved. Yes.)
The cover is pretty sexy too. Out now in hardback, paperback in September, audiobook read by me and there's a large print version too.
July 8, 2025 at 3:41 PM
The cover is pretty sexy too. Out now in hardback, paperback in September, audiobook read by me and there's a large print version too.
V pleased with this. V pleased indeed.
July 7, 2025 at 2:43 PM
V pleased with this. V pleased indeed.
I have zero regrets about making asparagus ice cream at the weekend. (Agnes Marshall, 1894, mainly tasted of cream and sherry).
May 7, 2025 at 9:26 AM
I have zero regrets about making asparagus ice cream at the weekend. (Agnes Marshall, 1894, mainly tasted of cream and sherry).
Donned a corset and that pink frock to say goodbye to Mrs Crocombe and the live interpretation (and therefore the award-winning, long-running, weirdly viral, globally popular youtube series from @englishheritage.bsky.social) today. End of an era. Seventeen years the team has been there. 1/
April 10, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Donned a corset and that pink frock to say goodbye to Mrs Crocombe and the live interpretation (and therefore the award-winning, long-running, weirdly viral, globally popular youtube series from @englishheritage.bsky.social) today. End of an era. Seventeen years the team has been there. 1/
This week's vibes. (Am on holiday, am ill, this sucks).
March 19, 2025 at 5:14 PM
This week's vibes. (Am on holiday, am ill, this sucks).
Idk quite what is going on here, but for any of you who listen to The Kitchen Cabinet but haven't (yet?) made it to a show, it is pretty typical.
New series starts recording April, tix via the BBC be in the audience website, & there's a postbag ep for all your Qs submitted via the email/socials.
New series starts recording April, tix via the BBC be in the audience website, & there's a postbag ep for all your Qs submitted via the email/socials.
March 14, 2025 at 1:16 PM
Idk quite what is going on here, but for any of you who listen to The Kitchen Cabinet but haven't (yet?) made it to a show, it is pretty typical.
New series starts recording April, tix via the BBC be in the audience website, & there's a postbag ep for all your Qs submitted via the email/socials.
New series starts recording April, tix via the BBC be in the audience website, & there's a postbag ep for all your Qs submitted via the email/socials.
Oh, people can be pants. But also not. Block the bastards and eat pie. Or...something weirder. I guve you the product of a deranged mind for cheers.
February 27, 2025 at 10:27 AM
Oh, people can be pants. But also not. Block the bastards and eat pie. Or...something weirder. I guve you the product of a deranged mind for cheers.
Cakey mcCakeface. The holder of the speed record for the fastest steam train and probably the most beautiful train ever produced, in gingerbread, marzipan and modelling paste. Why yes, I do have deadlines (but this was also a deadline, being my brother's birthday).
February 3, 2025 at 9:43 AM
Cakey mcCakeface. The holder of the speed record for the fastest steam train and probably the most beautiful train ever produced, in gingerbread, marzipan and modelling paste. Why yes, I do have deadlines (but this was also a deadline, being my brother's birthday).
Stumbling around London after a horribly early wake up and not enough caffeine. Here's Madame Tussaud's, purpose built in the 1880s but originally occupying the Baker Street Bazaar, just round the corner - the last (and very short-lived) of London's bazaars the history of which is fascinating - 1/
January 27, 2025 at 10:16 AM
Stumbling around London after a horribly early wake up and not enough caffeine. Here's Madame Tussaud's, purpose built in the 1880s but originally occupying the Baker Street Bazaar, just round the corner - the last (and very short-lived) of London's bazaars the history of which is fascinating - 1/
Managed to find this when in Lisbon: a modern day garum, developed commercially with a team from Lisbon University as well as local restaurateurs. Garum was THE Roman condiment, used across all classes and cuisines. It's a fermented fish sauce, so intense you only need a few drops.
January 12, 2025 at 4:26 PM
Managed to find this when in Lisbon: a modern day garum, developed commercially with a team from Lisbon University as well as local restaurateurs. Garum was THE Roman condiment, used across all classes and cuisines. It's a fermented fish sauce, so intense you only need a few drops.
Went to Lisbon. Loved it. Discovered ginja. Bad bad bad idea. Now back, hungover, and with a bottle of it in my luggage. Sigh.
January 11, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Went to Lisbon. Loved it. Discovered ginja. Bad bad bad idea. Now back, hungover, and with a bottle of it in my luggage. Sigh.
Twelfth Night, people! Time to drink, eat cake and send Xmas out with a bang. Here's my cake, now cut, a regency twelfth night party (staid, no obvious illicit sex, yet), one of Queen Victoria's twelfth cakes and the wrapper from a set of twelfth might cards from the 1840s).
January 5, 2025 at 11:16 AM
Twelfth Night, people! Time to drink, eat cake and send Xmas out with a bang. Here's my cake, now cut, a regency twelfth night party (staid, no obvious illicit sex, yet), one of Queen Victoria's twelfth cakes and the wrapper from a set of twelfth might cards from the 1840s).
Happy christmas cake times, peeps. Based on George F Burton's Cake Making, Icing and Breads (1919, 2nd edition), which features cakes ranging from ideas for men in the trenches through to insane exhibition cakes. Some hot tips for royal icing as well. Pls note this is even for the first time ever.
December 25, 2024 at 1:42 PM
Happy christmas cake times, peeps. Based on George F Burton's Cake Making, Icing and Breads (1919, 2nd edition), which features cakes ranging from ideas for men in the trenches through to insane exhibition cakes. Some hot tips for royal icing as well. Pls note this is even for the first time ever.
Tell me you've got several days off in a row without telling me you've got several days off in a row. Hoping it is better than bloody Middlemarch. (Thus far, 29pp in, it is infinitely so).
December 22, 2024 at 2:53 PM
Tell me you've got several days off in a row without telling me you've got several days off in a row. Hoping it is better than bloody Middlemarch. (Thus far, 29pp in, it is infinitely so).