Dianne Jacob, Will Write For Food

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

Food Blogging

Snapping Photos at Restaurants: Should You?

by

It’s the last night of my husband Owen’s and my vacation in New York, and despite 10 days of eating meals at restaurants, he took shots of our food only once. I asked him to do so when I didn’t think anyone would notice, sitting at an outdoor table at  a casual pan-Asian sandwich shop. I wanted to experience what food bloggers go through when they’re going to blog about a dish. When we were done, however, Chef Angelo Sosa came over to say good-bye and thanks. Later Owen said the chef had been watching us. Would he have done so if we did not take the photos? I guess I’ll never know.

Let me interrupt for a moment to tell you about his sandwiches. Sosa has worked a the restaurants of Alain Ducasse and Jean-Georges Vongerichten, and I couldn’t wait to taste his cooking at a fraction of the price. The two pan-Asian sandwiches I sampled were loaded with layers of flavor and texture, and to top it off, cost under $9 each.

fishThe Hanoi-inspired Cha Ca La Vong, a tumeric-laced seared fish sandwich loaded with sweet juicy onions, a layer of fresh dill, had a sriracha mayonnaise that kept the sandwich moist.

porkThe caramelized Sweet Glazed Pork in Chinese buns, so tender it hardly required chewing, was laced with a sweet and sour sauce, onion and sprigs of cilantro.

We ate well and inexpensively in New York, including dinner with David Leite and his partner at La Caridad 78, a Latin American/Chinese restaurant frequented by cops [Read more…] about Snapping Photos at Restaurants: Should You?

Separating Hype, Opinion and Journalism

by 10 Comments

imagesWhen a food blogger emailed me recently to say she had just heard “puff piece” for the first time, I wondered who else had never heard of this term.

Her email led me to ponder the differences between hype, opinion and journalism, especially in blogs. I’m concerned, because some 84 percent of Americans say online customer evaluations influence their purchases, according to an Opinion Research Corp. survey. That means if you recommend [Read more…] about Separating Hype, Opinion and Journalism

I'd Like to Have an Argument: Bloggers are Journalists

by

images-1Recently I wrote a post about handling freebies that got a ton of attention, thanks to people who re-Twittered (re-Tweeted?) it.  Some bloggers commented that they are not journalists, and therefore rules about handling freebies, reviews, and promotions do not apply.

I wasn’t so sure, and thought I’d do some research. Let’s look at three definitions of a journalist:

According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary,  a journalist is

  • a writer or editor for a news medium, or
  • a writer who aims at a mass audience.

According to Dictionary.com, a journalist has several meanings:

  • the occupation of reporting, writing, editing, photographing, or broadcasting news or of conducting any news organization as a business.
  • the “press”
  • a course of study preparing students for careers in reporting, writing, and editing for newspapers and magazines
  • writing that reflects superficial thought and research, a popular slant, and hurried composition, conceived of as exemplifying topical newspaper or popular magazine writing as distinguished from scholarly writing.

And according to Scott Rosenberg, author of Say Everything: How Blogging Began, What It’s Becoming, and Why it Matters, “blogging could be journalism any time the person writing a blog chose to act like a journalist — recording and reacting to the events of the day, asking questions and seeking answers, checking facts and fixing errors.”

So according to each definition, food bloggers are journalists. You aim at a mass audience (your blog is public), you write in a popular, non-scholarly way, and you record and react to the events of the day (even if they occur in your kitchen), asking questions and seeking answers.

Semantics aside, most of what food bloggers write is the same format as published content. Publications have columnists who write humorous first-person essays or opinions about current events.  They have cookbook reviews, recipes and product reviews. Sure, your posts contain links, the content is usually shorter, and photography makes step-by-step recipe writing  clearer and visually appealing. But basically, it’s the same thing.

The bottom line is that you are not reinventing the wheel. You are producing recognizable, familiar material in a different medium. Therefore, rules of ethical behavior apply.

Will Julie & Julia Mean More Food Bloggers?

by

I finally saw Julie & Julia on Sunday with two friends,  Suzan Bateson, Executive Director of the Alameda County Community Food Bank; and Faith Kramer of Blog Appetit.  Faith suggested in her blog that the movie theater collect food for the food bank, and the theater obliged by giving free movie posters to anyone who donated.

The movie was was fast-paced, funny, sexy, and the food shots were gorgeous. Merryl Streep was totally believable as Child, and Faith said it was much more fun than reading Julie Powell’s blog. (I didn’t read it, and I don’t think it’s available online now.) I had such a good time that I found myself thinking, “What was all that about, where traditional food writers were jealous of Julie Powell? Can’t we all just get along?”

Connections to a few of the people involved increased my enjoyment. I met the movie’s food stylist Susan Spungen at an International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) conference years ago, when she was the food editor of Martha Stewart Living. We had a hilarious conversation about people who had informational meetings with her to ask how to get her job.  I enjoyed Amanda Hesser’s cameo, particularly because I interviewed her while writing Will Write for Food, and met her for breakfast at Balthazar in New York, where we inhaled a specialty,  chocolate bread. I also interviewed Child’s book editor, Judith Jones.

images-1My agent  suggested in an email that EVERYONE (her caps) will want to be a food blogger now. Wow, I thought. Do they not understand how much work it is, that Powell was already a writer of sorts, and that they’re not going to get the same kind of attention and six-figure advance? Julie Powell started her blog six years ago, had a great hook, and the tie-in to Julia Child was essential to her success. Plus, a food blog was a rare thing then. I read somewhere there are some 45,000 food blogs now.

Will Julie & Julia send foodies dashing to WordPress? Can  a newbie food blog garner the same success as Powell’s, or  Clotilde Dusoulier (Chocolate and Zucchini) or Molly Wizenberg (Orangette)? Is the public still hungry for new blogs on cooking and food? Has fatigue set in for the blog-fueled memoir?

7 Guidelines for Food Bloggers on Freebies

by

free-stuffThe Federal Trade Commission has new guidelines that will require bloggers to disclose when they’re being compensated by an advertiser to discuss a product. If you read them,  you’ll see that most of the language pertains to advertising, so for now, you’ll have to read between the lines.  The guidelines don’t define  a “payment,” for example, and don’t specify what incentives other than cash must be disclosed to readers. See this Cnet story for more.

This is old territory for me, a former magazine editor who made and enforced  rules about reviewing.  Ethics rules have existed for years but are hardly uniform. At my magazines,  I thought I knew which reviewers received and returned which products, but I probably never had the whole picture. I hired a full-time editor whose job was to sift through press releases and write up products. He often hid from me the expensive gifts [Read more…] about 7 Guidelines for Food Bloggers on Freebies

Keeping up the posts — What's your strategy?

by

images 18-55-03A while back I read a piece in the New York Times called “Blogs Falling in an Empty Forest.” It said that according to a survey by Technorati last year, only 7.5 million of the 133 million blogs it tracks were updated in the past 120 days. That means 95 percent are not active with any regularity.

Whoa. I’m trying for two posts per week. It’s only been a month since I started this thing, and I am still surprised by how long it takes me to write and publish an entry. Even if it’s short, it takes several hours. What I’ve learned so far is not to start a new post on deadline day, but to have some  ideas and maybe a preliminary draft in the hopper. (Of course, when I’m advising clients about starting a blog, I tell them to come up with a list of 10 topics before they begin. Easier to dish it out, apparently.)

Looking for inspiration, I asked some food bloggers about creativity and productivity. I started with Jaden Hair of Steamy Kitchen:

Q. Do you have an editorial calendar to determine blog posts?images 11-22-09
A. Absolutely. Mondays and Tuesdays are my highest traffic days, so I usually post Sunday night or Monday morning, depending how good the TV shows are on Sunday nights. I also find time to post Wednesday or Thursday. Twice to three times a week is my norm.

Q. How far in advance do you write drafts?
A. I don’t write drafts, unless they are recipes that I’m working on. Blogging is a spontaneous medium. I write exactly how I feel in the moment and I’d just feel strange if I was writing for tomorrow.

Q. How do you keep the inspiration flowing?
A. By having fantastic support group and friends like Elise (Simply Recipes), Diane (White on Rice Couple), and Bee ( Rasamalaysia). We’re always throwing ideas back and forth, listening to each other rant and rave, and teaching each other things. We’re a team. That’s important. Plus there’s a whole ‘nother side of blogging that isn’t talked about much: the “job” of blogging. My full time job is my blog, which is very different than 99% of others. The technical and monetization side of blogging certainly keeps me on my toes. Between those three areas, I get all the variety and excitement I need for the week.

Anytime I need inspiration or feel like I need a kick in the pants, I usually start a new branch or project. My newest one is Good Bite.

Q. How many hours per week do you spend on your blog?
A. You don’t want to know.

images-1 11-22-57Then I asked another veteran, Amy of Cooking with Amy, for advice. She said she’s almost always composing posts in her head. “By the time I sit down to write it generally goes pretty quickly. I also no longer beat myself up if I only get one or two posts out a week. I try to write something then save it as a draft and return to it later to edit it.” Sarah at Lettuce Eat Kale said she keeps an editorial calendar and planannehamersky_09032_0482s a month ahead. She posts three times per week. “The best advice I got,” she said, “Is post when you can, keep it fun. If it feels like a chore or burden or added stress, then step back and think about what your goals are. So far, I look forward to writing my posts.”

Now I feel more encouraged. It’s always satisfying to reach out an talk with people who know more about this than me. I also found a terrific article on ProBlogger, “Seven Ways to Keep Fresh Content Flowing. ” And I’d like to learn more.

What about you? If you’re a blogger, how do you keep the posts coming? Do you plan out an editorial calendar? Block out time in your datebook? Write lots of drafts and store them until ready? Please share your strategies with me. I’m the new kid on the block.

Sony promotes food bloggers on J&J site

by

imagesTalk about great publicity. Sony Pictures is promoting food bloggers with links to a whole bunch of them  on its official movie website homepage for Julie & Julia.

The navigation isn’t obvious, so let me tell you how it works. Click on the white egg in the right-hand corner, and a long list of food bloggers will go by to the left. Just click on the blog name you’d like to see.

Pretty impressive, except I’m wondering why they threw in a link to Epicurious’s Epi-Log. The earliest post on that blog was a breathy report of the New York premiere focusing on name dropping and what people ate. The Sony site also provides a link to Great Grub, “a forum where you can connect with people who share your passion for food.” If that’s what Sony wanted, why not steer people to with Chow.com or Serious Eats?

Thanks to Sarah at Lettuce Eat Kale for sending the link.