Memoir

“Memoir Has to Risk Something,” says John Birdsall

August 30, 2016 by diannejacob 18 Comments

Food writer John Birdsall has won two James Beard Foundation awards for intensely personal essays.

A few years ago, I went outside my comfort zone. I contacted a stranger and asked to meet.

The stranger was John Birdsall, now a double James-Beard winning writer and essayist. At that time he was a restaurant reviewer for a local newspaper here in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I loved his restaurant reviews.

John has since moved on to narrative non-fiction or personal essays, often about the intersection of gay culture and food. I know he’s already won awards and was published in prestigious places, but I feel like he’s just getting started and has so much more to offer us.

Here’s his take on restaurant writing, personal essay writing, and taking risks. He also has good insights about his former writing and the role of an editor. I asked him to write his answers (rather than me interviewing him), so you can get a sense of his style:

Q. How does your background as a restaurant and catering cook influence your food writing? Do you believe that people who write about food should have professional experience or culinary training?

A. For a long time I didn’t think it did: Cooking seemed a prelude disconnected from [Read more…] about “Memoir Has to Risk Something,” says John Birdsall

Do You Know These Five Essentials of Food Memoir Writing?

March 31, 2015 by diannejacob 19 Comments

Kathleen Flinn has published three acclaimed food memoirs.

A guest post by Kathleen Flinn

Who writes three food memoirs? Before they’re 50 years old, no less? There’s me, Ruth Reichl, Nigel Slater… it’s not a long list. Food memoirs are tricky, though. Here are some things I’ve learned along the way:

1. Conflict drives narrative.

Your grandmother might have made beautiful dumplings. You may be obsessed with kumquats. But does your story pass what my journalism mentor called the “Who Cares” test?

Ultimately, readers keep turning pages because they want to find out [Read more…] about Do You Know These Five Essentials of Food Memoir Writing?

Molly Wizenberg: “Let Your Writing Speak for Itself, and Be Proud of It”

February 4, 2014 by diannejacob 95 Comments

Food blogger Molly Wizenberg, whose writing career expanded to include two memoirs. (Photo by Kyle Johnson)

At Food Blog South recently in Birmingham, food blogger Molly Wizenberg shared her story of leaving graduate school and jumping into the unknown with her blog, Orangette. She spoke about taking risks, setting high standards, the importance of showing up, and how blogs are a powerful tool for writing.

Here’s an excerpt from her talk, which Molly graciously allowed me to share with you. It’s an inspiring piece about one young woman’s determination to stick with blogging, no matter what life events come along. If you’re feeling conflicted about blogging, or even writing on a regular basis, pull up a chair:

“I […] started Orangette in 2004. I have to tell you, I was so giddy to have a place to write for myself, not for professors; to have a place to let myself fall down the rabbit hole of food; to have given myself permission to go after something that made me so happy. I think you probably all know that feeling. There’s nothing that can beat that feeling.

I didn’t know then what I wanted to do with my blog, other than gush about [Read more…] about Molly Wizenberg: “Let Your Writing Speak for Itself, and Be Proud of It”

Agent Couldn’t Sell Her Memoir, so Cookbook Author Publishes it Anyway

September 17, 2013 by diannejacob 14 Comments

It took Kitty Morse 10 years to write her memoir. Her agent couldn’t sell it, even though she was an award-winning cookbook author. (Photo by Owen Morse.)

A guest post by Kitty Morse

As a cookbook writer with nine books under my belt, I always harbored a desire to write a memoir centered around Dar Zitoun, the riad that my father willed my brothers and me 50 miles south of my native Casablanca. I fantasized about writing my own story, free of editorial constraints such as word counts. But how? I was just a cookbook writer.

Frances Mayes’ bestselling Under the Tuscan Sun provided the impetus I sought. Her stories of restoring a Tuscan farmhouse struck me as similar to those I experienced at Dar Zitoun. I too was living on two continents and learning to deal with [Read more…] about Agent Couldn’t Sell Her Memoir, so Cookbook Author Publishes it Anyway

Food Studies at Universities Now Includes Blogs, Memoirs and Recipes

June 25, 2013 by diannejacob 41 Comments

Food Memoirist Judith Newton was surprised to learn her book is studied in university classes. (Photo by Eliot Khuner)

A guest post by Judith Newton

Judith Newton is Professor Emerita in Women and Gender Studies at U.C. Davis. Her recent food memoir, Tasting Home: Coming of Age in the Kitchen won an IPPY (Independent Publishers Award) in May. She blogs at Tasting Home and the Huffington Post.

In American Food Studies classes, college undergraduates read the food blogs Smitten Kitchen, Orangette, Pinch My Salt, and The Pioneer Woman Cooks with the keen eyes of anthropologists studying the customs of an unfamiliar land.

They analyze the values embodied in recipes, cookbooks, food-related memoir, and fiction. They also study film, cooking shows from classic [Read more…] about Food Studies at Universities Now Includes Blogs, Memoirs and Recipes

Go On a Quest: Write a Food Memoir

August 28, 2012 by diannejacob 61 Comments

Food memoirs are shaping up as “quests” these days, quite tidy and well organized. If you can master the form, there’s room for your story.

But first, as always, you’ll have competition from chefs, who are still writing traditional memoir. Typically, these books bore me (except for Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential). But then I read Blood, Bones & Butter, an adrenaline-fueled memoir of Gabriel Hamilton’s relentless ambition to make good food and find love. It won the Beard award for Best Writing & Literature earlier this year.

Like Bourdain, Hamilton has the writing chops to craft an exceptional story. Lest you think these two were both just chefs when penning their memoirs, The New Yorker published Bourdain’s first story, and he had [Read more…] about Go On a Quest: Write a Food Memoir

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