Quand les poules auront des dents. / Literally, “when chickens have teeth,” meaning that will never happen.
Bresse chicken or poulet de Bresse has had an A.O.C. since 1957, which defines the way in which they are raised as well as the geographic zone in which they can be raised.
It is a French breed known as Bresse-Gauloise. The feathers are generally white, and they have a red, crenelated comb. They have blue feet and a white beard. About a million chickens are sent to market every year.
Poulet de Bresse and other poultry from Bresse — including guinea fowl, capon, hen and even turkey — is raised under strictly defined conditions, but it is not organic. They are free range and have a grass-based diet, but also eat worms and mollusks. Final fattening is with cereals and milk products in wooden cages. Bresse poultry cannot be slaughtered under 5 months of age if they are to bear the A.O.C.
Let me find what ails you, and set you to “writes”. Whether through modest adjustments or major overhauls, let’s get your prose in good health!
You are a food blogger, but your dream is to become a food writer. Writing is a craft, and like all crafts, it takes time and patience to learn. Think of it as a house. You start with a solid foundation, with a frame and a floor, but you have to finish the building so you can house your family.
Working with a writing coach is like adding a roof, insulation and siding to suit the climate you live in. The climate can be compared to the market or the type of writing you aim to do. You have to hone your writing to that market and meet the expectations of publishers and of your audience. Writing free of spelling and grammatical errors is not enough.
Here are 10 easy steps to follow to start a food (or other) blog. Food blogging can be easy if you start out right.
Keep it simple at every step, because it won’t end up being simple no matter how hard you try to make it so.
Decide on your niche and your subject. Your subject should be specific and something you know about and feel comfortable writing about. If you’ve worked at a French bakery, perhaps you know a lot about baking French pastries. For example, I studied French cuisine, so I mainly write about French cuisine. It comes easy to me; it’s within my range of knowledge. If you want your readers to be passionate, you have to be passionate yourself. If you want them to build confidence in you, you have to write with authority.
Who is your audience? Are there enough people interested in your subject to justify all the hard work? Do you have an idea of who these people might be? Go on Amazon and see how many books are published on your subject. Do a few Internet searches to see if anyone else is covering the same topic.
Define a budget. Can you afford a developer? a webmaster? I recommend both, but if you’re computer literate, it’s possible to build a website on your own.
Choose a platform. The platform you choose has a lot to do with how computer literate you are. This is not a judgment. It’s just a factor that can determine how much unnecessary frustration you risk experiencing while running your blog. If you have limited experience using computers and you want a simple, carefree site, Tumblr, Typepad and Blogger are good choices. Another advantage is that they are free, but they have their limitations. If you know Microsoft Word, know how to use a stylesheet, and feel comfortable with computers, WordPress offers more flexibility in terms of layout and functionality. It is also free. None of these platforms requires knowledge of computer coding. Wix and Medium are also free, but have limitations. None of these platforms requires knowledge of code, with the exception of a few of the cutting-edge WordPress themes. (If you don’t know code, this is a question you should ask when choosing a theme.)
If you have a hefty budget, you can make life easier by hiring a website developer and a webmaster, so you wouldn’t need the free platforms. A developer can custom build a site in code to your specifications, giving you the possibility of a beautiful, unique look, but making it necessary to have a webmaster or the developer make changes and additions, which can be costly. Think this over before starting. It will not be a one-time expense; it will be an on-going one.
If you’re building a website on a free platform, choose a theme. A theme is what you will use as the basic layout or presentation of your site (a paid web developer would do all this in code). It is what you use when you don’t have a budget for a coded website and you plan to use the free platforms. Free or low-budget themes are available for all the free platforms listed above, and allow you to browse examples before choosing. Wordpress offers free themes here.
Choose a host. The “host” is the place where your website resides. They will offer various packages at various prices. The host provides a server on which to store your blog files, as well as other necessary technical services including technical support (ask for details about this before choosing: how much time, availability, etc.), email, domain name registration, FTP access, and various other services and tools. They will offer different bandwidths (250 GB is usually the least) and disk space (5 GB is usually a minimum). How much you need depends on how many images and articles you post, of course, but a basic package usually suffices at the outset. You can always upgrade later. Ask what their average uptime and downtime are; this is what determines part of the reliability of your website. Ask how often your blog will be backed up on their servers.
Choose a name and register it as a domain name (your host may offer this service). Otherwise, you can do this directly with the free online platforms or with an online domain registration company. This reserves the name for you and you only and prevents anyone else from using it.
Take a few hours to familiarize yourself with the technical aspects of creating blog posts. If you’re using WordPress, do some research on the plugins you can use to enhance site capability. The Beginner’s Guide for WordPress is an excellent resource.
Please choose a color:
Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.
Write every day, even if it’s just for 10 minutes or to churn out 250 words, even if you have nothing to write about. Being a writer means you write, even when the inspiration is not there. A restaurant chef has to serve dinner to her guests even when she’s just had a fight with her banker. See yourself as a professional and you’re already on the way to becoming one.
Write about things you know. If you don’t know about something, but you’re inspired by it, do your research first. Knowing doesn’t always mean intellectual knowledge. It can also be unique life experiences or things you’ve learned in the school of hard knocks. It can even be about how not to follow a recipe because you’ve learned from your own failures.
Revise and revise, then revise some more. These days it’s easy to number your drafts 1, 2, and 3 or A, B, and C, so you can also recover whole paragraphs or chapters you’ve deleted if you decide you liked previous versions better. Drafts are not children you keep forever; you can play around with them like puzzles. They’re like Humpty Dumpty. You can tear them into little pieces and put them back together again. That’s part of the process. Never be afraid you’re destroying by revising. Think of it as perfecting a work of art.
Cut words, then cut some more. Excess is your worst enemy. There should not be a single word or sentence that is not absolutely necessary to the message you want to get across. Again, consider your writing as you consider your family. Every word is a child and every paragraph a parent. Every element is necessary to the big picture and the message, just as every ingredient is necessary to the success of a great recipe.
Practice great first lines that grab readers’ attention. There’s an art to it. When you read, take note of first lines that strike you. Writing is like theatre in that way. When the play is boring, you nod off to sleep. That’s the last thing you want your reader to do. A recipe by the name of Lemon Chicken isn’t half as appealing as Chicken filet au citron, even if it means the same thing.
Writing is not just words. Writers have to paint a picture in their readers’ minds. As you observe the world, in your mind, start using words to paint pictures to tell your readers about later. Flour is often called white, but it comes in many colors: bleached white, off-white, yellowish, white with brown specks, etc.
Don’t be a perfectionist. All first drafts are pretty bad and we have to accept that. We learn as we go, just like everything in life. Perfectionism can give you writer’s block. Accept your writing for what it is. Love and nurture it until it’s good. Care for it patiently, watering it like you do your flowers, until it grows tall and strong.
Practice flow. Put your hands on the keyboard and let it rip. You can polish it later. Just write and don’t let your brain get in the way. We talk about free association. Practice free writing and write quickly. That can even mean making lists of ideas or words and putting them together later. Free writing touches more on your creative self than on your left brain. When you don’t have time to shop for food, you go to the fridge and think up a meal using what you have. Writing can be the same way. You can connect the dots later if your central idea is not yet clear.
Develop a thick skin. Join a writing group and get feedback. Take writing classes and get more feedback. Be dedicated to your mission of becoming a food writer and use criticism as a tool to improve it and a way of understanding how readers will react. Take it gracefully and then think about it.If you develop recipes, share them with your friends and listen carefully to every comment they have. They are probably the kind of people who will be buying your books and reading your articles. Feedback isn’t always right either, but it makes you think about your craft. Your recipes don’t always turn out right, so don’t expect better from your writing.
Read and read a lot; read good writing, not bad. Read the kind of things you’d like to write yourself. If you want to write a recipe book, read recipe books. If you want to write a food memoir, read every one you can get your hands on. Read books about writing. What you read affects your own writing. Never forget that. Reading feeds your imagination by letting you step into other writers’ minds and observe their skills. You learn to cook better when you follow the recipes of accomplished cooks. Writing is no different.
Why do farmers farm, given their economic adversities on top of the many frustrations and difficulties normal to farming? And always the answer is: “Love. They must do it for love.” Farmers farm for the love of farming. They love to watch and nurture the growth of plants. They love to live in the presence of animals. They love to work outdoors. They love the weather, maybe even when it is making them miserable. They love to live where they work and to work where they live. If the scale of their farming is small enough, they like to work in the company of their children and with the help of their children. They love the measure of independence that farm life can still provide. I have an idea that a lot of farmers have gone to a lot of trouble merely to be self-employed to live at least a part of their lives without a boss.― Wendell Berry, Bringing it to the Table: Writings on Farming and Food
Our first book, Mastering the Art of Food Writing, under our own imprint, The Rambling Epicure LLC, will be out as an ebook this coming spring.
Mastering The Art of Food Writing is an up-to-the-minute guide not only to writing well about food, but to finding out where you fit into the broad spectrum of food writers. If building a readership for your writing — whether or not you already have a platform — is as important to you as writing well, then you will benefit from the innovative teaching we do in these pages.
Mastering the Art of Food Writing is a book for the seriously ambitious. Watch this page for updates. And, using the form below, please write to us, meanwhile, about your own experiences in getting a food writing career off the ground.
A weekend in the Trastevere neighborhood of Rome lets you live and feast like a real Roman, if only for a short time. It is rich in history and culture, and plenty of fun and good food to boot. A little hotel we’ve found near Piazza Santa Maria will let you melt into this hidden corner of Rome.
A Little History about Trastevere
This side of the Tiber was Etruscan, until the Romans claimed it around the 6th century B.C. It was incorporated into the city of Rome’s 14 quarters by the Emperor Augustus with the “Trans Tiberim.” Thus the name, which means “across the Tevere,” the Roman name for the Tiber.
It was a plebian quarter, where the servants and laborers and the free citizens of Rome’s as well as sailors, fishermen, Phoenicians and Jews lived. It would be the principal Jewish quarter of Rome until the end of the Middle Ages, when the Ghetto, across the river from Trastevere, became the residential area to which Jews were henceforth restricted.
Renaissance Romans began building more noble villas around the edges of the ancient quarter, but the Trastevere of today retains its medieval, labyrinthine layout, full of narrow, winding alleys. It remains a working class neighborhood, with children playing soccer in the street, old people sitting on their stoops, and families gathering around a table in the street to visit. Trastevere lies between the western banks of the river Tiber and the Janiculum hill, one of Rome’s storied seven hills, that looms above it. It’s but a short 15-minute walk across the Tiber to the ruins of ancient Rome, the “salon” of Rome with its extravagant fountains, and only a little bit further by foot to St. Peter’s Square and the Vatican. One of the liveliest gathering places is the square in front of the church of Santa-Maria-in-Trastevere, construction of which began early in the 3rd century with the church completed in the mid-4th century, and ultimately completed in Romanesque style in the 12th century, then converted in several other centuries, giving it an unusual combination of Ancient Roman details and varied architectural features from later periods. The octagonal fountain in the piazza is an ancient Roman fountain restored and enlargened in the 17th century by Carlo Fontana.
Santa Maria with church, with ancient Roman foundation in center. The piazza is full of life at night.
What to See and Do in Trastevere
The Church of Santa Maria in Trastevere
Santa Maria in Trastevere is undoubtedly the oldest church in Rome, and deserves several visits if you want to appreciate its full architectural and historical depth. Most of the mosaics date from the 12th century. They are illuminated at night, and the golden light of the façade fills the piazza with a warm glow.
12th-century gold mosaics in Santa Maria in Trastevere
The 22 granite columns lining the nave are said to have come from the ruins of the Baths of Caracalla; the capitals are adorned with the heads of female pagan deities.
Numerous Roman funeral inscriptions can also be found in the church.
Eating and Nightlife
There is no shortage of reasonably priced osterie, trattorie and restaurants that serve authentic Roman food in a no-frills setting. The neighborhood is timeless, with its mix of historical architectural periods and lively local residents; it remains quintessentially Roman. If you want to pretend you’re Roman for a weekend, this is the place to do it.
Old cellars and stables have been converted into bars, discos and cafés, providing a lively nightlife scene, with customers spreading out into the streets when the weather is fine.
Signs like this demonstrate the colorful character of the locals, and offer contrast to our notion of contemporary, ultra-chic Italy.
Sidewalk cafés and restaurants preserve the romantic character of Old Italy, spilling out onto the streets. My favorite source of restaurants in Rome is David Downie’s Food Wine Rome. David is half Roman, and sees food through the eyes of a Roman. His recommendations are all about the authentic and the unpretentious, and you’ll seldom find tourists in the places he recommends.
Hotel
While the Hotel Santa Maria is located in the very heart of the vibrant Santa Maria neighborhood just steps from the piazza, within the walls of this converted 16th-century convent, it’s so quiet and peaceful that you may think you’re staying in a remote Tuscan country house. The renovation is simple, but tasteful, with classic Roman terracotta floors and well-fitted bathrooms. Bedroom furnishings are tasteful, solid-wood reproductions. Almost all rooms are on the ground floor and give onto the courtyard. The few that do have a room above them (near the rooftop terrace) are not so quiet due to the tile floors. Otherwise, the clientele is quiet and respectful.
Courtyard with orange trees where you can eat breakfast or have a drink
One enters the hotel courtyard through a large, locked iron gate, so security is good. The L-shaped convent-cum-hotel with an inner courtyard enclosing a small orange grove boasts wrought-iron tables and chairs for leisurely sitting in the sun or eating breakfast when weather permits. The breakfast room is in a converted cellar, with breakfast consisting of an international and Italian buffet with something to suit everyone, offering freshly squeezed orange juice and coffee from a professional espresso machine.
The small rooftop terrace is furnished with chic wooden lounge chairs and armchairs. It’s a great place to have a drink before dinner, read in the early evening, or sunbathe during the day. The view of the surrounding rooftops and balconies of Trastevere is a photographer’s dream. All rooms have satellite television and air conditioning, as well as Wi-Fi, which can sometimes be unstable. Bikes are available for rental at the reception.
How to Get There
If you’re flying, take the train from the Fiumicino Leonoardo da Vinci airport station to the Trastevere station, about a 30-minute train ride, then take a cab, which should take about 10 minutes. This should cost around 15 Euros all-inclusive, versus approximately 50 Euros with tip for a cab direct from the airport. A cab ride from the Termini train station to the hotel should cost around 15 Euros. The hotel is lost in a winding street and difficult to access by car. Even taxi drivers get confused with all the one-way and dead-end streets. Study your map and know the names of the surrounding streets and squares, because the driver may be forced to let you off in another street around the corner from the hotel.
Practical Info
Reservations: http://www.htlsantamaria.com Address Vicolo del Piede 2 – 00153 Rome – Italy Tel. (39) 06 5894626 – Fax: (39) 06 5894815 Click here for map: Map to Hotel Santa Maria
Jonell Galloway grew up on Wendell Berry and food straight from a backyard Kentucky garden. She is a freelance writer. She attended Le Cordon Bleu and La Varenne cooking schools in Paris and the Académie du Vin, worked for the GaultMillau restaurant guide and CityGuides in France and Paris and for Gannett Company in the U.S., and collaborated on Le tour du monde en 80 pains / Around the World with 80 Breads with Jean-Philippe de Tonnac in France; André Raboud, Sculptures 2002-2009 in Switzerland; Ma Cuisine Méditerranéenne with Christophe Certain in France, At the Table: Food and Family around the World with Ken Albala, and a biography of French chef Pierre Gagnaire. She ran a cooking school in France, and owned a farm-to-table restaurant, The Three Sisters’ Café, with her two sisters in the U.S. She organizes the Taste Unlocked bespoke food and wine tasting awareness workshops with James Flewellen, is an active member of Slow Food, and runs the food writing website The Rambling Epicure. Her work has been published in numerous international publications and she has been interviewed on international public radio in France, Switzerland, and the U.S. She has just signed on at In Search of Taste, a British print publication, and is now working on two books, What to Eat in France and What to Eat in Venice.
