On my Substack home page, you will find some recommendations of newsletters to which I subscribe, but I wanted to take some time to tell you why I think these newsletters are worth my (and your) time. I’ve started with three that are quite different from one another, yet they have one thing in common: the passion each writer has for food and writing.
Regula Ysewijn is the author and photographer of several cookbooks that trace the history of recipes from Great Britain, Belgium, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. Her passion for researching the historical origins and cultural importance of baked goods from these places is clear in the detailed way she writes about them. The history of food and culture is also a passion of mine, and reading her newsletter both satisfies my curiosity, and makes me want to follow up with research and baking of my own. If you are a food nerd, a history nerd, or a food history nerd, you will thoroughly enjoy your time spent with Regula.
I became a Kristin Donnelly fan by listening to the podcast she co-hosts, “Everything Cookbooks”, so I subscribed to her newsletter. She has a fun, friendly voice, and she shares quick, simple recipes that often feature 5 ingredients or less. She’s generous and creative, and a prolific recipe developer. Her recipes offer sections called, “Fun for Kids”, “Swaps”, and “Bonus Points”, as ways to allow you to make these recipes your own, use what you have on hand, and build your self-confidence in the kitchen, all while you feed your family. If you read my bio, you’ll understand why I enjoy this newsletter.
illyanna Maisonet’s first cookbook, Diasporican, just won the James Beard Award for Emerging Voice. She is the first person of Puerto Rican descent to win a James Beard Award. Neither of these things is the reason to subscribe to her newsletter.
I honestly can’t remember how I found out about illyanna. It could be the combination of Covid and menopausal brain fog, but all I know is I now follow her on Instagram and Twitter (for now), and I subscribe to her newsletter, and I feel this weird parasocial sense of pride about her that fans feel for their favorite singers, actors, and athletes. All of this is due to her unique, powerful, authentic voice as she shares what it was like to grow up with a single parent, in poverty, as part of the Puerto Rican diaspora, and yet separate from it, because her family chose to settle in Sacramento, CA, rather than on the East Coast in one of the larger Puerto Rican communities. Cooking, in her words, was an economic necessity for her family, not a choice. But that does not mean it was without passion.
I preordered Diasporican based on curiosity (and fierce loyalty). When at last, I held her cookbook in my hands, and began my journey through it, first flipping through to see the photos, then landing on the Introduction, I knew this was not an ordinary cookbook. When she recently shared that she had won the Beard, I was thrilled, but I was not surprised.
Her newsletter, and her cookbook, are at the same time profane and profound, and her stories are full of memory and soul. Hers is a voice and a story that should have broken through a long time ago. If you subscribe to her newsletter, you are in for a singular experience. I highly recommend it, and her cookbook, as required summer reading.
That’s enough to get you started. Come visit my Substack home page to see my list of recommendations (scroll down to the bottom for the link), and while you’re there, check out the Recipe Index tab at the top of the page, and find something new to cook.
What I’m cooking
Recently, I’ve gotten back to some recipe testing, and so there’s another rhubarb recipe in my (and your) future. I picked up the first share of the season from the CSA we recently joined, and we are leaning heavily into salad situations, with lots of fresh crispy greens and radishes, our typical early spring produce. I also made a batch of lemon macarons that, while not perfect, I am pretty proud of how they came out. I always forget how easy they are to make, and also how long it takes to make them properly.
Thanks for subscribing, and reading. Share this newsletter with anyone and everyone! It means more than I can explain.