Travel Writing

8 Best Practices for Food and Travel Writing

May 11, 2021 by diannejacob 9 Comments

When I started out doing food and travel writing, I had a freelance journalist’s dream job. I lived in Europe, and wrote a weekly food column for an American newspaper abroad. I was completely free to choose the topic and recipes.

My column started out at 500 words. But a few months later, it expanded. First it was 1,000 words, then 2,000, counting the recipes, too. No longer just a column, it filled an entire page in the newspaper every Thursday.

During the 7 years I worked for that paper, I wrote 350 stories about food—European, American, and Asian. All of them included one or more recipes. Since I covered a range of [Read more…] about 8 Best Practices for Food and Travel Writing

Are Sponsored Press Trips Worth Your While?

February 18, 2015 by diannejacob 34 Comments

“The author compromises her impartiality in Bordeaux, France.”

A guest post by Pam Mandel

“Oh, I want to go on press trips!”

I hear this frequently from newer bloggers. I get it. It’s so appealing to have someone else pick up the tab for your hotel, your meals, entrances fees, all the stuff of travel. When you’re writing for your own blog, there’s the added benefit of working without an editor who has veto power. You go on an all expenses paid trip, you write what you want, everyone’s happy. Right? Not always.

1. What’s a press trip anyway?

Let’s define “press trip” — sometimes called a junket or a FAM, short for familiarization — first. For this discussion, I mean a trip where media travels under the guidance of a public relations wrangler. Everything is arranged in advance. It’s usually a group tour at an [Read more…] about Are Sponsored Press Trips Worth Your While?

Get 3 Assignments to Make Travel Writing Worthwhile, says Amy Sherman

May 28, 2013 by diannejacob 35 Comments

Travel-Writer-Amy-Sherman-Moroccan-Cooking-Class

Travel writer and food blogger Amy Sherman (middle) with a translator and guide (left) and Chef Amina (right) at a cooking class in Marrakech.

Soon after San Francisco’s Amy Sherman started her food blog Cooking with Amy in 2003, she wrote about vacations, which — being a food obsessed person like the rest of us — focused on eating the local specialties. That led to writing travel stories for websites, publications, and blogs, and now Amy goes on trips once or twice a month. (Here’s a list of recent stories she’s written for Fodor’s, CitySearch and others, using clipping.me, a free website that showcases writers’ work.)

I asked Amy about who invites her on trips, how to be taken seriously, and how to make travel writing work as part of a food writing career:

Q. You’ve been comped to take some amazing trips, like a food truck festival in San Antonio and cooking classes in Morocco. How do trips like this come about?

People contact me, especially the convention and visitor’s bureaus. Sometimes I’m invited on trips because I’m a food blogger, like going to [Read more…] about Get 3 Assignments to Make Travel Writing Worthwhile, says Amy Sherman