Hi there! I’m Becky Excell I’m a London and Essex-based food writer, recipe creator and a four time Sunday Times best-selling author. I’m half South African and I live with my boyfriend Mark and my Miniature Schnauzer, Peggy.
Welcome to my gluten-free food blog! I started it in 2013 after my doctor diagnosed me with IBS (that was back in 2009) and told me that my relationship with gluten was officially over. I never thought I’d eat nice food ever again…
How it all began…
After all, it’s not until you can’t eat gluten that you realise it’s in *almost everything* – bread, cakes, pasta, pizza… essentially all my favourite food. So I put my apron on out of pure ‘hangry’ frustration and began creating all the recipes I really missed and posted them on my blog; mainly just so I could share them with family before I went over for tea.
(you don’t know how long it took to stop my own family from accidentally poisoning me!)
But out of the blue, people started visiting those posts on my blog, making my recipes and sending me photos of their creations. Like… what?! But it made me so happy to think I’d helped to reunite people with food that they really missed. So I kept doing exactly that.
Fast-forward 10 years to 2023 and yup, I’m still posting recipes for all the food that I really miss! But the only difference is that compared to the early days where a handful of people stumbled across my blog… now I have almost 1 million people following me across all my social media channels and I even won a few awards too. How crazy is that?
How To Make Anything Gluten Free – My first actual recipe book?!
And the madness didn’t stop there. In 2021, my first ever cookbook ‘How To Make Anything Gluten Free‘ was published! It contains over 100+ recipes for ALL the things that gluten-free people always miss out on.
I never thought that some random girl who bakes in her kitchen at home with *zero* professional training or cooking/baking credentials would ever be lucky enough to get an opportunity like this… but here I am! I still can’t believe it if I’m totally honest – I often pinch myself just to make sure I’m awake.
And of course, me being me, I just assumed that this would be a fairly quiet release that a small, dedicated few would buy and appreciate. But it turns out… all of you guys out there absolutely loved it!
It quickly became the number 1 best selling gluten-free cookbook on Amazon, a Sunday Times best seller (!!), I was on national radio gabbing about it and Queen Nigella (yes, THE Nigella) even featured it in her Cookbook Corner on her website. Surely, I must be dreaming this time, right?!
So I guess I’m a cookbook author now…
And now that my wildest dreams had been far, far exceeded, I was convinced I’d peaked. But the madness only continued…
As soon as I announced my second book ‘How To Bake Anything Gluten-free’, it shot right to number 1 of ALL books on Amazon in the first 24 hours – even my first book only managed to reach number 3 when I announced it… which was an outrageous enough achievement for a gluten-free book already!
The release of my meal planner and food diary ‘How To Plan Anything Gluten-free‘ soon followed, as well as my fourth book ‘Quick + Easy Gluten-free‘. And all three of them became Sunday Times best sellers and ‘Quick + Easy Gluten-free’ actually became #1 Sunday Times best seller that week!
I’ve honestly just given up trying to predict anything now… I even did my first demo on live TV in 2022 on Steph’s Packed Lunch and I won ‘food personality of the year 2022’ at The Observer Food Monthly Awards.
The one thing that makes all the hard work so worth it…
But what I love most of all has never changed: the lovely messages I get from you guys. Honestly, it means so much just to know that I helped to make someone’s life easier through my recipes here on the blog or my social media channels.
Trust me, I know how it feels to be thrown in at the deep end and feel like you’ll never eat anything nice ever again!! Hopefully this blog and my social channels are proof that it isn’t the end of the world. I mean… look how being gluten free has changed my life! I certainly didn’t see that one coming.
Anyway, enough about me! Why not get in touch with me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok or in the comments on YouTube and let me know about you? Failing that, you can always email me here.
Thanks for all the support,
Becky xxx