Food Blogs Are Today’s Magazines, bringing the best recipes, interesting lifestyles, and tips on cooking and dining. Your Magazine is Whisk and Dine.
What Is A Food Blog?
With a gazillion food blogs from around the world right here at our fingertips, I thought it might be good to put things into perspective and explain what a food blog is.
A food blog is actually a virtual food magazine.
Since I was a teen, I looked forward to the monthly arrival of my favorite cooking and dining magazines.
Each food magazine I subscribed to offered a different twist on cooking and dining, and I loved every single one of them.
Cooking magazines became my quiet-time friends, during my afternoon tea time. Raising four children as a single mom gave me the permission to take 30-minutes each day to sit, sip and indulge in the beautiful pages of my cooking magazines.
My escape.
A Virtual Lifestyle
We’ve come a long way from the one dimensional pages of a magazine to the vibrant, life-like photography and video action on a blog.
It seems we can almost taste what we see on the screen, reach in there and touch it.
The excitement of this new way of inspiring others led me to wanting to learn how to film and edit all my own videos.
Explore more deeply in ways of making the pages of my virtual life, really come alive for those who would visit me here.
The rookie exploration of taking my little world from simply writing about it on paper, to actually making it live for others to experience, quickly became an exhilarating experience for me.
And then something magically unexpected happened…
From A Home Girl Storyteller To TV Studios
I was invited to experience visual storytelling on television, Oh My Goodness, like, eleven times!
- Clash of the Grandmas – an entertaining, 6 episode Food Network show that airs every year for either Mother’s Day or during the holidays.
- Family Food Showdown – Nothing more entertaining than when families cook together against families that cook together, with Valerie Bertinelli.
- Guy’s Grocery Games – Season 22 Episode 24, with a bunch of us grandmas, along with Guy Fieri’s mom, for the exciting entertainment.
- The Great American Recipe – an 8 Episode series with PBS of which I had an amazing time being featured in all 8!
While I was elated with the experience, but it quickly began to whisper to me that I have new and engaging ideas for a show of my own.
It was said be in an Interview with Canvas Rebel, when asked what was my ultimate goal in what I was doing.
A restaurant, a food truck, a bakery, products, gourmet shops, writer, camera chic… none of these is what I was after.
The Visual Storytelling bug bit me and it wasn’t to be a judge on other shows, or continue to compete on other shows, it was to co-produce and host the show I have written and believe has potential for success!
Food Blogs Are A Full Time Storytelling Job
When I first started my food blog, it was two things for me; an excuse to indulge in something I love and a place to store my recipes.
Never did I imagine how much work would go into a food blog, mostly because I didn’t realize that it would attract so many new friends to want to share in my little world.
Suddenly I realized that what started out as a place to save my recipes, became inspiration for others.
Food Blogs Are Today’s Magazines
It was fast becoming that dreamy place I used to escape to for new ideas, delicious inspiration, just like my cooking magazines once were for me.
Can you believe I no longer have subscriptions to any food or cooking magazines?
I am the magazine now! Everywhere I go, some of my equipment goes with me so that I can capture my lifestyle and inspiration.
The daily work that goes into my food blog entails many aspects. Everything I cook, how I cook it, where it comes from, and so many ways to present it to capture your interest to want to try to make it too.
Knowing that I want to present it to my friends, sparks my desire to give every attention to detail.
It inspires me to think of you, as though you are coming right here to my home.
Do Food Bloggers Make Money?
Things have evolved in my food blog passion since 2015 and to date, and I never realized that other food bloggers were actually making a little money doing this.
Aside from the cost of food to prepare for my blog, there’s many other costs; equipment, props and fun table and kitchen wares that I will use.
There’s always the cost of camera, lighting, sound equipment, props and a crazy amount of stage setting.
Asking my hubby, who I only just realized had the ability to draw and paint, to paint a backdrop for me to use, was new for him.
Canvas, frames, paint and time. He did and I love it!
Advertising In Magazines
So, one day, before I stopped the subscription on my last cooking magazine I asked myself why I didn’t enjoy the magazines any longer. The answer? The ads.
Can you believe I still have cooking magazines from 1984? It used to be a time when the ads didn’t dominant the magazine.
The food, the stories and all the beautiful photography I loved to escape into, dominated the magazines not the ads.
I didn’t want my blog to become pages and pages of ads that detracted from the beauty of my blog.
Obviously it was never my intention to have to write stories to attract Google’s attention but rather yours.
Eventually, my kids explained to me, “Mom, how did you ever know about the magazines you once subscribed to?
How do you think those magazines were able to pay for all the work that went into creating them?”
What Does SEO Have To Do With My Lifestyle?
Search Engine Optimization. It’s how we find things and information today. Ask good ole Google anything and we get our answer.
How else will you find my recipes and stories for my outstanding Baba Ganoush or the Tahini Pie I created in the finale of The Great American Recipe?
Billboards, ads, banners, standing on the street corner waving a sign; that’s how! Ads.
Ultimately, I accepted the fact that I will need to conform to some of today’s way of doing things.
So long as ads on my blog didn’t dominate the pages I work so meticulously for your enjoyment, don’t deter from it.
If I am to share half a century of my experience in food, lifestyle and storytelling, I will find tasteful ways of inviting you into my world.
And yes, it would be nice if a little $$$ was thrown my way to offset the costs I incur, but… we shall see about that.
Food Blog and Lifestyle Magazine Endlessly Under Construction
We food bloggers are always constructing new ways for you and your friends to find our unique recipes.
It’s a daily intention for me to tweak the photos on older recipes and new information on recipes I wrote years ago.
Maybe my little world, right here isn’t so little anymore, and why would I want it to be?
There is a satisfying passion that accompanies sharing my talent for food, dining, gardening and experiences with all who want to join me!
Construction isn’t such a bad thing is it? Look how fabulous that new kitchen or deck is going to be after a long and tedious construction job.
I’ll keep at this, and hope to inspire you in a variety of ways, be it in your kitchen, garden, and yes… even your garage!
I believe the table... that place that draws people to gather, is the most powerful symbol of togetherness. All that happens before the table is set, the planning, the gathering, the preparing, are all an intricate part of the dance that create the mood of celebration to share with friends and loved ones.