Dianne Jacob, Will Write For Food
Useful Tips, Interviews, and Stories to Inspire Food Writers and Bloggers
caption =”Al fresco sunset dinner the night before the conference, at the nearby Hilton.
You know what I discovered about food bloggers at Eat.Drink.Blog in Australia and at my dinner talk with food bloggers in Auckland?
They’re just like food bloggers here in the US and in Europe. They’re excited to [Read more…] about Food Blogging in the Land Down Under
Recently The Daily Meal listed the 25 Top Food Blogs of 2012, based on their own formula.
I started thinking about the relationship between food magazines and food blogs, how food magazines are doing, and where readers are going in this new online world. Let’s take a look:
A. National Food Magazines. Here are the annual paid circulations of US top national food magazines:
My workshop earlier this month at Ba Ba Reeba in Chicago. (Photo by Anjali Pinto)
Work comes to me in the wackiest ways, and I’m grateful for all of it. Most recently, I donated a copy of Will Write for Food and an hour of consulting time to a fundraiser at Purple Asparagus in Chicago. The winner was Jasmine Huffman, marketing manager of Lettuce Entertain You (LEY), a group of 85 nationwide restaurants with corporate offices in Chicago.
Instead of taking the hour for herself, Jasmine hired me to come teach about food writing in a three-hour workshop. Class met at Cafe Ba Ba Reeba, a hot Chicago restaurant I have tried to get into and failed. We talked about food writing on Twitter and Facebook, how to connect with customers, and for our first exercise, we shot cell phone photos of food.
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Yes, as part of my varied career, I studied photography in journalism school and was once a newspaper photographer. It was fun to run around and help people with [Read more…] about Want a Food Writing Job? Try Restaurant Marketing
While preparing for my trip to Australia for Eat.Drink.Blog next month (I know! So lucky.), I came across this article in the daily paper there. It portrays food bloggers as naive amateurs willing to flog products, people, and restaurants.
A PR firm invited a handful of Australian bloggers to a demo of dried soup stock by Chef Marco Pierre White. The author of the article ridiculed food bloggers for writing about the event and endorsing the product, as did several others he quoted. A sample:
“Do you know how many newspapers ran [news] stories on Marco Pierre White during his visit?” asks Ed Charles, a prominent Melbourne blogger and freelance journalist (who did not attend the event). “None. Firstly, because most people under 40 haven’t heard of Marco Pierre White, given he hasn’t cooked in a commercial kitchen since 1999. And secondly, because what PR people have realised is that bloggers are a nicer audience to deal with than journalists. Very few bloggers are critical and if you give them something to write about they will just publish it.”
Ouch.
But then, I say the same thing when I speak at food blogger conferences. I am tired of [Read more…] about Are Food Bloggers Pushovers?
Hey, cause for celebration, possibly. I just found out the Kindle version of my book, Will Write for Food, is the 16,620th Most Highlighted Book of All Time on Kindle — just a few points below The Qur’An and Start a Cupcake Business Today.
Is this good news? I have no idea.
But it’s info I didn’t have before, and potentially helpful. Now I can look up what people highlighted and see that they tweeted quotes from my book. (That’s how I found out about this phenomenon. Someone included @diannej in the tweet).
Kindle users sign an agreement granting Amazon permission to store information, including the [Read more…] about The E-Book You Wrote is a Spy
Eight-time Beard award winner Colman Andrews, now at the Daily Meal.
When a PR query from The Daily Meal appeared in my inbox, I jumped at the opportunity to interview the website’s accomplished editor about today’s food writing scene.
I was not disappointed. Below, you’ll see that Andrews is honest about how hard it is to be a freelance food writer, and why he feels fine about not paying for content.
I’ve been a fan of Colman Andrews since interviewing him for the first edition of Will Write for Food in 2004. Saveur magazine, which he cofounded in 1994, remains my favorite national food magazine. Andrews was its editor-in-chief from 2001 to 2006.
Now Editorial Director of The Daily Meal, Andrews has had a long career as an editor, author and writer. He’s an eight-time James Beard Award winner, most recently winning Cookbook of the Year in 2010. Here’s what he says about today’s food writing scene:
Q. You’ve done a lot of restaurant reviewing in the last few years. Is there enough work for freelance restaurant reviewers today?
A. It’s become crowd sourced. The power of Yelp reviews. There was just a study in the American Economic Journal about how a difference of half a star in a Yelp rating can make or break for a restaurant.
The issue there is whether there’s a place for a professional restaurant critic anymore. Would people rather [Read more…] about Q&A with Colman Andrews: He’d Never Recommend Food Writing As a Career
Lunch at BrookLodge in County Wicklow, where we feasted on roast pig and dined in an apple orchard.
I’m just back from a fabulous trip to Ireland and England, where I taught two food writing workshops. They were in the planning stages for a long time, and I can’t say enough about my hosts.
I’m pushing through jet lag to tell you how it went and show you a few photos. The main part of the trip was to Ireland. Like me, you probably knew about the rolling green farmland, the charming towns and pubs, and the narrow country roads. But did you know about the how friendly the locals are, and how proud they are of their excellent Irish food? That’s what I discovered.
Dorcas Barry and me. (Photo by Owen Rubin.)
Chef and blogger Dorcas Barry was a generous host. She arranged for sponsorship by Bord Bia, the Irish Food Board; and Failte Ireland, which promotes Irish tourism. She also hosted my husband and me for dinner, making a traditional Irish meal of ham, cabbage, potatoes and parsley sauce.
My class took place in County Wicklow at BrookLodge, a hotel complex built around an organic restaurant, The Strawberry Tree. The night before, a group of us attended a private farm-to-table wild and organic dinner that included [Read more…] about My Food Writing Workshops in Ireland and London
