Ardent followers of Nigel Slater don’t just pepper their cookbook collections with the British food writer’s works; they have a dedicated “Nigel Shelf.” From his less-than-epicurean beginnings, chronicled in his 2010 memoir, Toast, Slater emerged as the unlikely hero of everyday cooks in the 1990s through a recipe column he has now written for The Observer newspaper for over 30 years. He’s a champion of real food cooked without fuss, but it’s a lot of what Slater isn’t that has defined his appeal: He’s not a chef, he doesn’t intellectualize food, and while he is culturally curious, a collector of ceramics and a keen gardener, he’s not at all preachy. He simply enjoys food, and sharing that joy through his writing.

Emma Moore: How do you approach writing about food?

Nigel Slater: From a very personal level—a diary, if you like. From the beginning, I’ve always added a sense of place to the recipe. I didn’t want to go into, you know, “This is my granny’s way of making Victoria sponge.” But at the same time, I wanted to tell a story so that the recipe had a home, so to speak.

EM: Have you always journaled?