Newsletters are having a moment. Case in point: What’s this that you’re reading? In addition to newsletters like this one, from a traditional publication, we’ve seen the rise of a new food-media class in recent years: one in which individual writers and creators have built direct-to-reader models through platforms like Substack, Beehiiv, and Ghost. Through these, readers can support creators, often without the middlemen of ads or corporate overlords.
It’s an extension of the individualized media ecosystem enabled by Instagram and TikTok, and a representation of the changing relationship readers have to media. And in the wake of new partnerships between the tech elite and the political establishment, more and more people seem to be making the argument of fleeing Meta platforms and building out their newsletter rosters instead.
It’s refreshing to see more perspectives and more people writing outside traditional systems. In these, we see everything from recipes and meal plans, like Caroline Chambers’s wildly successful What to Cook; to cultural analysis, like Alicia Kennedy’s From the Desk of Alicia Kennedy; to more experimental projects like Andrea Hernandez’s Snaxshot (a self-described “food oracle”); to what is effectively a fleshed-out food mag, like Jonathan Nunn’s London-focused Vittles and Hanna Raskin’s American South-centric The Food Section. While you likely subscribe to some of these already, here are five smaller or up-and-coming food newsletters that are worth having on your radar.
Best Food Blog by Ali Francis, Anikah Shaokat, Anna Hezel, and Antara Sinha: The cleverly titled Best Food Blog comes from alums of (and my former colleagues at) Bon Appétit. True to its name, its writing thus far calls to mind the good old days of daily blogging. So far each send — which contains blurbs from each of BFB’s writers — has been an easy morning read. Expect a mix of cooking thoughts, trendspotting, takes, and fun, unvarnished stuff you probably wouldn’t read in the pages of Bon Appétit. For example: How do polycules split the cooking?
Family Friend by Lukas Volger: Recently, I’ve been seeing more people cutting meat and becoming bean-curious in response to high grocery prices and unpredictable food costs. If either of those is of interest to you, consider Family Friend from cookbook author Lukas Volger. Volger’s weeknight-friendly recipes are unfussy but satisfying and often prioritize getting in a good amount of plant-based protein, for hitting those financial or health goals.
Bake Chats by Kassie Mendieta: I rarely bake, and yet Kassie Mendieta’s Bake Chats is still an instant-open for me. You might know Mendieta from viral dome cakes and perfume-inspired bakes on social media. In addition to recipes, Mendieta, a pastry cook and recipe developer, offers in-depth advice for logistical info that you might have trouble finding elsewhere, like how to scale recipes, how to think about flavor, and how to write recipes that will work.
Shifting the Food Narrative by John Birdsall: The acclaimed food writer and James Beard biographer John Birdsall writes about “queer and other less orthodox stories of food” in his intermittently sent newsletter. Recently, these have included an essay on the singer-turned-anti-gay activist Anita Bryant and “the orange juice boycott that changed America,” and another using a memorial potluck as an entry point into writing about AIDS and forgetting. We can expect Birdsall to expand on the themes of this newsletter in his forthcoming book, What Is Queer Food?
The LO Times by Ryan Sutton and Robert Sietsema’s New York by Robert Sietsema: Both Ryan Sutton and Robert Sietsema, former Eater NY restaurant critics, are now running criticism in their own newsletters. From Sutton’s LO Times, expect essays, longform reviews, and detailed, themed roundups of generally buzzier and pricier spots (recently, he reviewed the tasting menu at Per Se). Sietsema continues his focus on more inexpensive eats (recently, his favorite hot dogs in New York and New Jersey), with three suggestions for the weekend sent out every Friday.
More for the table: