Michelle Berriedale-Johnson
Way back in 1987, just as I was starting work on a major history of English food, my eighteen-month-old son and his father were diagnosed with dairy intolerances. Back then the alternatives for those on dairy-free diets were few and far between and pretty unappealing so, after some months of experimentation, I launched Berrydales Special Ices, soya based ices which were dairy and additive free – and tasted delicious!
While manufacturing the ices I started a newsletter, The Inside Story, about food allergy and food intolerance and, by 1995, it was a quarterly magazine circulating to over 35,000 health professionals. In 2000 The Inside Story, re-named Foods Matter, became a subscription magazine and in due course, the magazine gave way to a website, foodsmatter.com, covering everything to do with food allergy and intolerance and all of the many health conditions related to them.
And out of the websites and the rapidly expanding market for ‘freefrom’ (gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free etc) food have grown the freefrom awards: the Freefrom Food Awards, FreeFrom Christmas Awards, the FreeFrom Skincare Awards and FreeFrom Gift Awards. The awards now have a significant social media presence on Twitter, Instagram and Linked In (see the individual sites for links).
Meanwhile I run three blogs. This one focuses, mainly, on my professional interests (food allergy and intolerance and ‘freefrom’ foods) but there are many other topics which do not directly relate to food allergy and intolerance but about which I still feel strongly and therefore feel impelled to put finger to keyboard – such as electrosensitivity from which I suffer (although no longer badly I am very grateful to say). The other other two blogs focus on Hampstead Heath where I live, and on the salon music concerts that I run, periodically in my house.
If you wish to contact me please do so either by leaving a comment or by emailing me.