The Award

The closing date for entries for the 2019 Award is 30 November 2018.

The Jane Grigson Trust launched the Award for new food and drink writers in 2015 in honour of the twenty-fifth anniversary of Jane’s death.

Jane’s observation on writing, made in the last year of her life, has been a guiding principle in this award:

Writing a book is for me an act of faith and folly. You have a plan of course, but you bluster about in the work, following blindly, one step after another, slogging it out in the early stages. Then suddenly you come across one thing, one reference, one passage, that explains to you why you are writing this particular book, that gives you the theme, that shows you the way. You have in a sense to earn this discovery. It is a reward.

Literary prizes are usually given for newly published works or for books already on sale. The Jane Grigson Trust Award is, however, given to a promising new writer ahead of publication in order to help them discover ‘one thing, one reference, one passage… that gives you the theme, that shows you the way’.

The £2000 award is made to a writer new to food and drink writing (although they may have written on other subjects) who has already received a commission from a publishing house but whose book has not yet been published. In the spirit of Jane, the Award is for a non-fiction book on food and drink in the widest sense – so it could be a cook book, memoir, travel, history or anything else for that matter, so long as the primary subject is food or drink.

The Jane Grigson Trust intends that the writer will use the Award for further travel/research to deepen their knowledge of their chosen subject in the vital time between gaining a commission and delivery of the script.

Rules of entry

The judges for the 2019 Award are:

• Geraldene Holt (author, chair of the Jane Grigson Trust)
• Clarissa Hyman  (food and travel writer; Trustee of the JGT)
• Jeremy Lee (chef and food writer; Trustee of the JGT)
• Josceline Dimbleby (cookery writer and former Trustee of the JGT)
• William Sitwell (writer, TV presenter and food critic)

Past Winners

The winner of the Jane Grigson Trust award 2018 was:

Angela Clutton: The Vinegar Cupboard

In this fascinating and unique book, food writer and historian Angela Clutton demonstrates the many great ways vinegars can be used to balance and bring flavour, which will enable modern cooks to make the most of this ancient ingredient (to be published by Absolute Press in February 2019).

The Jane Grigson Trust Award has made just the most enormous difference to the development of The Vinegar Cupboard. To anyone who has done the amazing feat of getting a first book commissioned, I can only wholeheartedly say they should - must - apply for this because it is a very, very good thing indeed.

The winner of the Jane Grigson Trust award 2017 was:

Vicky Hayward: The New Art of Cookery: A Spanish Friar’s Kitchen Notebook

Drawing on her deep knowledge of Spanish culture, Vicky Hayward gives a modern retelling of an eighteenth-century classic cookbook, including fresh, simple and surprisingly easy to make recipes. (Published by Rowman & Littlefield in the UK in September 2017)

Vicky said of winning the Award:

My heartfelt thanks go to the Trust for the 2017 Award; it has drawn me back to Jane’s scholarly, inclusive, independent writing and, in so doing, it has given me inspiration for the years to come.

The winner of the Jane Grigson Trust award 2016 was:

Alex Andreou: The Magic Bay Leaf

In an evocative mix of memoir and recipes, Alex Andreou writes about the food of the Greek islands. (To be published by Chatto & Windus in spring 2018)

Alex said of winning the Award:

At precisely the point when the project looked far too titanic to tackle, when I had begun to doubt myself – as every writer must – the Jane Grigson Trust Award put the wind back in my sails. It gave me the boost, focus and breathing space to break through my barriers. I will be ever grateful for Jane Grigson’s vision and the Trust’s faith.