About: Jonell Galloway

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, worked for the GaultMillau restaurant guide, CityGuides and other restaurant guides 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, and a biography of French chef Pierre Gagnaire. Before moving to Switzerland, she ran a cooking school called Spontaneous Cuisine in France, and in the U.S., a farm-to-table restaurant called The Three Sisters, which she owned with her two sisters. She organizes the Taste Unlocked bespoke food and wine tasting awareness workshops with James Flewellen, a wine tasting specialist. She is an active member of Slow Food and runs the food-writing website and Facebooks pages under the moniker The Rambling Epicure. Her work has been published in numerous international publications and broadcast on public radio.

Authorpreneurship

Published by Jonell Galloway + Thursday, May 7, 2015 Permalink 0

“The mystery is worth a book in itself. How could a hitherto unknown novel by Harper Lee, writer of “To Kill a Mockingbird”, remain hidden for 60 years, and why was it not published before? For all the swirling questions, there is one certainty. The book will become a blockbuster without Ms Lee so much as signing a copy. If only every author could be so lucky.

“Standing out as a book writer today requires more than a bright idea and limpid prose. Authors need to become businesspeople as well, thinking strategically about their brand, and marketing themselves and their products. There is more competition for readers’ and reviewers’ attention, and fewer bookshops to provide a showcase for new titles. In 2013 some 1.4m print books were published in America, over five times as many as a decade earlier. Publishers are increasingly focusing their efforts on a few titles they think will make a splash, neglecting less well-known authors and less popular themes.”

WHY START A FOOD OR AUTHOR BLOG?

Published by Jonell Galloway + Tuesday, May 5, 2015 Permalink 3

BLOGGING 101: WHY START A FOOD OR AUTHOR BLOG?

by Jonell Galloway

This is the second article in a series about How to Start a Food or Author Blog

There are thousands of reasons to start a blog. For authors, they serve as a complement to their main activity of writing. For recipe developers, they can be a way of sharing their recipes and of forming a community with people, and eventually leading to a book or career change. A food blogger is merely someone with a food blog, no matter the motivation.

Making money should not be a main priority, as direct revenue is rarely a viable strategy given the millions of blogs and websites out there. We shouldn’t have any illusions about that. But blogs can lead to other activities that will make you money. Your blog also allows you to establish yourself in your field of expertise. You may get consulting work, offers to write for websites, or book deals. You may be asked to develop or test recipes, or get invited to talk at conferences or workshops about your specialty or about writing.

Blogging is a format to communicate your expertise, or your story (and often a blend of both). It can start from purely a hobbyist intention, or from a professional one.

Food Blogging 101: How to Start a Food Blog

Published by Jonell Galloway + Friday, May 1, 2015 Permalink 2

Food Blogging 101: How to Start a Food or an Author Blog

by Jonell Galloway

In today’s Internet world, all writers need an online presence in order to connect with other writers and build up a readership. Blogs are one way of doing this, but writers are often intimidated and overwhelmed by the technical skills required. I still am after all these years, but I’ve learned from my traumatic experiences, so stay calm. I’m going to walk you through some basics to familiarize you with the process, and you’ll walk away feeling more confident.

Blogging requires many skills other than writing. Publishers expect food writers, like other writers, to have a writing platform these days. That is the way of the world, whether we like it or not. In this series of articles, you will discover the power of blogging, and I’ll guide you through the process of starting your blog, step-by-step. We’ll then look at how to develop your content and manage the multitude of technical and scheduling aspects involved. We’ll cover the following steps:

Wendell Berry Quotes: On the Writing Process

Published by Jonell Galloway + Thursday, April 30, 2015 Permalink 1

WHY I AM NOT GOING TO BUY A COMPUTER

Excerpts from Jordan-Fisher Smith’s interview with Wendell Berry

Like almost everybody else, I am hooked to the energy corporations, which I do not admire. I hope to become less hooked to them. In my work, I try to be as little hooked to them as possible. As a farmer, I do almost all of my work with horses. As a writer, I work with a pencil or a pen and a piece of paper.

My wife types my work on a Royal standard typewriter bought new in 1956 and as good now as it was then. As she types, she sees things that are wrong and marks them with small checks in the margins. She is my best critic because she is the one most familiar with my habitual errors and weaknesses. She also understands, sometimes better than I do, what ought to be said. We have, I think, a literary cottage industry that works well and pleasantly. I do not see anything wrong with it.

What would a computer cost me? More money, for one thing, than I can afford, and more than I wish to pay to people whom I do not admire. But the cost would not be just monetary. It is well understood that technological innovation always requires the discarding of the “old model”—the “old model” in this case being not just our old Royal standard. but my wife, my critic, closest reader, my fellow worker. Thus (and I think this is typical of present-day technological innovation). what would be superseded would be not only something, but somebody. In order to be technologically up-to-date as a writer, I would have to sacrifice an association that I am dependent upon and that I treasure.

ITALIAN-STYLE CINNAMON & RAISIN BISCOTTI

Published by Jonell Galloway + Wednesday, April 15, 2015 Permalink 0

Biscotti Picnik collage 1 bis

by Rosa Jeanne Mayland

“Biscotti” (pronounced “bee-scoat-tee”) are relatively new to me. Actually, a few years ago (about 6 years ago) I had no clue what they were. That is quite understandable if you consider the fact that I’ve lived all my life in Switzerland and never travelled to Italy (I passed through that country when going to Greece, but I doubt that this can qualify for holidays) nor to America where this speciality is widespread…

I was introduced to these Italian cookies when I received James McNair and Andrew Moore’s “Afternoon Delights” for my birthday in 2003. It was love at first sight. The very second I lay my eyes on the picture that illustrated their “Almond Biscotti” recipe I knew that I had to bake them immediately in order to satisfy my curiosity. Since then I have not seized being a big fan of this crispy treat.

Before I moved away from home and started cooking for myself, I had never really tasted any Italian pastry apart from “Amaretti Macaroons” and knew absolutely nothing about “Biscotti”. Here in Switzerland, the only biscuits that can be compared to them are oven-dried brioche slices called “Zwiebacks”. Although they taste more like sweet bread than cookies and are far from being as sweet or having an identical shape, I always enjoyed eating those delicious rusks.

Interview with Keith Reeves, Editor of In Search of Taste

Published by Jonell Galloway + Sunday, April 12, 2015 Permalink 1

In Search of Taste food magazine, front cover Issue No. 1

by Cynthia D. Bertelsen

Something very exciting is happening this month. A brand-new food magazine – In Search of Taste – is due out in Britain. Forget any stereotypes of British food that you’re hauling around in your mind.

International in scope, In Search of Taste promises stunning imagery, artistic nuances, and a sense of beauty in a world fraught with terror and suffering and pain, reminding us of the very things that makes us so human: cooking and cuisine and culture.

The following interview with In Search of Taste’s editor, Keith Reeves, offers us a taste of what we can expect. As Reeves so rightly says, “Eating and drinking are the most important things anyone must do, and selecting what to eat and drink is the most important decision we all undertake.”

What prompted you to start In Search of Taste? Tell us a little about the background. Was there an epiphany moment or did the idea come slowly?

Epiphany carries far too many connotations of urgency and divine inspiration. Intermittent revelations better describe the magazine’s journey, with gathering flickers rather than one blinding light. But we’re still en route!

I initially felt that there were more than enough column inches written on the subject of food and wine and to attempt further comment was perhaps foolhardy. But when I looked closer, simple and direct dialogue seemed scarce. There appeared to be something of a drift towards entertainment and a move away from straightforward and helpful information.

Venice in Mind: Ponte di Gheto Novo

Published by Jonell Galloway + Monday, March 23, 2015 Permalink 1

by Jonell Galloway

Reflections of the sestiere of Canareggio in the canal, taken from the Ponte di Gheto Novo, literally the “new ghetto bridge,” leading from Canareggio to perhaps the oldest Jewish ghetto in the world.