It’s the 100th issue of Observer Food Monthly this Sunday. Help us celebrate by looking back on your own foodie beginnings

Print journalists love anniversaries, especially their own. Curious as this may sound, coming from one who works for a newspaper founded in 1791, this is partly I think because we’re surprised by our own survival. We are often accused of having too much influence on the tastes of the nation, but after two decades in the business I increasingly think it’s the other way round; the tastes of the public define what we do.

So the fact that Observer Food Monthly is still here for edition 100 – a lifetime for a single issue Sunday supplement – means we are clearly doing a lot of things right.

What’s curious, looking back, is the degree to which the contents of that very first issue – published in April 2001 – established the form of what was to come. Yes, we had a fair scattering of gentle celebrity stardust: we were talking to Meera Syal about her favourite table, Josie Lawrence about her shopping habits and Christopher Walken about his life in food. The cover star was Marco Pierre White (shouty Gordon followed on issue two). But we also ran a big piece by the broadcaster John Humphrys on the challenges posed by commercial farming, a subject to which we would return time and again, with increasing subtlety and sophistication.

If I look back it is that popular, campaigning journalism which has really been given pride of place. Oh sure, we like the silly stuff too, and we have more than indulged our passion for the big name chefs, not because celebrity chefdom is all good, but because the individuals involved are fantastic copy. And they were willing to go along with us: there was the cross-dressing moment with Giorgio Locatelli and Eric Chavot (who knew he had such great legs?), the Last Supper, with Ramsay in the middle, a round of artfully flung cheese standing in for his halo. Best of all, for my money, was the shot by John Reardon – many of the very best have been – of Fergus Henderson hanging next to the carcass of a pig. He won awards. He deserved to.

But alongside that has been the hard-hitting stuff, for the most part written by the likes of Alex Renton, Andrew Purvis, Joanna Blythman and – occasionally – myself.

We’ve examined the threat to the environment from industrial scale fish farming, and that to the way of life of the Masai people because of food supply issues. We’ve had dispatches from Vietnam and Rwanda, Gaza and the rainforests of Brazil. We’ve written about school food – big time – and hospital food, and worked furiously to big up the brilliant efforts of small producers all over the country. Our food awards have become a serious fixture on the foodie calendar.

So how are we celebrating our hundredth issue? The usual way: by putting out a killer magazine. Alongside a major big name interview – we’re being coy about who it’s with until it’s out – we have 100 of the fastest, easiest recipes ever plus a big and revealing piece by Tim Adams on Starbucks and fairtrade coffee. Meanwhile our cover is on the intriguing subject of people who like to cook, and their mentors. Who got Nigella Lawson going? Who did Mark Hix mentor? And what about Ruthie Rogers of the River Café?

It’s a great subject. Rather boringly, I suspect I learned most of what I know from my mother. I was always a greedy boy and hung about in the kitchen waiting to eat, which inevitably led to me getting involved. I suspect my love of braising comes from being the son of a working mother who had to develop a strong line of long, slow cooked dishes.

But what about you? Who taught you to cook, or even just inspired you to do so? What were the lessons they taught you? Help us celebrate our 100th issue by looking back on your own foodie beginnings. And if you happen to want to tell us how fabulous OFM, feel free to do so. As to those of you with nothing nice to say, well don’t say anything at all. We’re too busy blowing out candles and we don’t want to hear it.