Dianne Jacob, Will Write For Food

Useful Tips, Interviews, and Stories to Inspire Food Writers and Bloggers

Food Blogging

Book Giveaway: Tips Cooks Love

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TipsCooksLovePlease help me celebrate my first book giveaway by signing up to win Tips Cooks Love: Over 500 Tips, Techniques, and Shortcuts That Will Make You a Better Cook! 

I thought this cookbook reference companion might be a timely choice, based on the arguments in my most popular post, The Top 10 Terms to Avoid in Recipes. You’ll find no assumptions here about how to cook and bake, only helpful, knowledgeable information. In fact, on p. 57 is an explanation of the term “blanch,” one of the words in my list.

While I assumed Tips Cooks Love targets novice cooks, I found lots to interest me. Regarding the age-old debate about whether to lower the temperature when using glass baking dishes [Read more…] about Book Giveaway: Tips Cooks Love

Help! My Gourmet is Now Bon Appetit

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march_10_cover_vThe postcard inside the plastic-wrapped package advised “…we will be sending you Bon Appetit for the duration of your remaining Gourmet subscription term.”

And there it was, my non-Gourmet. First I got sad about Gourmet’s passing all over again. I like the way Elissa Altman summed up its demise: “Gourmet folded because it had a direct competitor under the same roof in the same genre geared to more practical and commercial endeavors, it made more money, and one of them had to go…End of discussion.”

Once I got over the fact that it was not Gourmet, I was curious to see how Bon Appetit was different. Content, for one thing. Bon Appetit is all about entertaining. Tone, for another. It’s all about ease: world-class dining made simple.

Yet most of the recipes didn’t look that easy. In fact, I got the biggest laugh from [Read more…] about Help! My Gourmet is Now Bon Appetit

Your Best Food Blog Post: What Worked and Why?

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champion food blog postWhile replying to Cheryl Sternman Rule’s comment about how to attract good food blog comments, I got an idea:

What if we all chimed in about which post garnered the most responses on our blogs, and why we think it worked?

The first part is easy enough. It’s based on the number of responses. I don’t care how many you got, as this is not a competition. Let’s skip giveaways as a category.

Next tell us why it worked. Was it the photograph? A banana bread recipe (I’ve heard that desserts are no-fail)? A personal crisis? Your baby announcement (seriously, Smitten Kitchen readers went berserk )?

I’ll go first. My biggest response was for [Read more…] about Your Best Food Blog Post: What Worked and Why?

Three Tips for Attracting Blog Comments

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attracting good blog commentsI’ve been thinking about how to attract good comments since writing my previous two posts on commenting.

The first was on the value of comments like  “Looks delicious.” It garnered my all-time highest response. I guess that’s not surprising, since that’s the response that often comes to mind when reading food blogs (or it should, if the blogger’s doing it right!). The second was on whether commenting on posts is a worthwhile strategy to build traffic.

I asked a lot of questions in those two posts, because I’m counting on you all to help me figure out the answers. This caused regular commenter Nate to ask me: “How do you structure a post or a question on a food blog post to cultivate signal and reduce noise?” Okay, I’ll give it a shot.

But first, a qualifier. My blog is a place where people discuss topics I’ve brought up, sometimes with each other! Maybe yours is not. [Read more…] about Three Tips for Attracting Blog Comments

Now That's How to Write a Review!

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criticsIt seems that when it comes to reviewing, the food blogging community is more interested in promotion rather than in a balanced critique. I can’t tell you how many bloggers have said, in comments on this blog, they only do positive reviews because “the reader’s time is short” or “I’m only going to write about it if I love it.”

Why? Rave reviews are boring. Totally negative reviews are rare and difficult to do well. How about going for middle ground, where the review is mostly positive, but acknowledges the cons?

Finally, I can point to a few examples from people [Read more…] about Now That's How to Write a Review!

Freebie vs. For Review: What's the Difference?

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kitchenscaleA blogger thought she got a product for free, then was asked to return it. On a listserv, she wrote:

“A PR person contacted me, representing a large cookware store. ‘If they could do anything for me…let them know.’ I told them I was testing bread cookbooks and could use a scale. If they could work somemagic on that end…great!

“The response I got was a link to their entire kitchen scale inventory and was told [Read more…] about Freebie vs. For Review: What's the Difference?

Must Bloggers Comment to Get Visibility?

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overloadThanks to all for the stellar conversation about the value of “Looks delicious” as a comment in food blogs. Let’s continue with a related subject that came up in the comments: the idea that it’s necessary, when you’re a blogger, to comment on other people’s food blogs.

According to Blogging 101, we’re all supposed to comment to build traffic on our own blogs. First of all, I’d like to know whether that’s true. Have you found that you have more visibility as a result of leaving comments? Do you stake out certain blogs? Do you set a minimum number of comments per week?

A related issue is how to comment with sincerity. One “A list” food blogger insists he can tell when a blogger [Read more…] about Must Bloggers Comment to Get Visibility?