Sweet Confusion
Baskin Robbins, Ben & Jerry, Coldstone, Krispy Kreme, Dunkin’ Donuts, Starbucks, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf… The list can go on an on about my favourite dessert/cold drink stores. Writing about these stores is pretty fun and cool, but what point can I make out of it?
I want to write about something that carries a significant purpose and be effective at the same time. Saying that ‘I like this store because of this and I like this kind the most because of this’ sounds pointless. It does show my interest for food and sweets, but the writing itself doesn’t seem to have a clear voice.
Which new direction can I take to turn this around? I want to write about something that’s interesting enough that won’t lose the audience’s attention, something that will make them want to read more. In order to do that, I know I need to find a topic that I know a lot about and that I’m passionate about so that I can do whatever I want with it.
I’m interested in food, that’s for sure. Coming up with new recipes or making my own variation of an original recipe is what I enjoy doing. I always take photos of the finished products as well to look back at them any time I want. It’s also a pretty nice way to look at my progress and creativity. I once thought about making a cook book of my own, too. Filling in all the pages with my creations of food, photos, and funky decoration that makes everything ‘pop’ out of the page.
Food is often portrayed negatively since food is one of the biggest problem that people have in life. Food can lead to death and serious disease/illness. It’s pretty surprising how food, a ‘must-have’ in our life to be so threatening and harmful to human beings. But food to me means all the positive things I can think of.
I often think that I was born to be around food forever because in Korea, there’s a special ceremony when a child has to pick an object out of a bunch when he/she turns one. Each object means different things. Parents prepare pencils (symbolize intelligence), money (wealth), strings (long life), paint brush (wisdom), and finally traditional Korean rice cake which symbolizes abundance in food. Yes, I chose the rice cake. Although the meanings are just simple sayings, my case may be true. Since I was little, I grew up watching my grandma cook traditional Korean foods which not a lot of people bother doing in the modern days. Those are all available in supermarkets. But I really am lucky to have grown in this type of culture where food was always near me.
In fifth grade, when I moved to Canada, after experiencing more varieties of food and being exposed to the western culture of “baking”, my interest in food just bloomed like a big lotus. My favourite channel was the “Foodnetwork Channel”. I could literally spend all day watching it. Couple of my favourite shows included Barefood Contessa, Everyday Italian, Sugar, Party Dish, Surreal Gourmet, Hell’s Kitchen, Paula’s Home Cooking, and 30-minute Meals. After watching the show, I would pretend that I’m a host of my own show and would narrate through the cooking process.
Back to my confusion about my writing, I might like writing about my recipes, but the question is ‘will it be interesting?’. In addition, I want to find a topic within the category of food that can be expanded in many different ways. What I’ve realized by writing posts based on my favourite comfort foods of my childhood is that I can’t really play around with that topic a lot. I want to be able to go into different directions within the same topic. I don’t want to be jumping over several topics, but maybe one broad topic that’s versatile in many ways. But I don’t know what could be the perfect topic for all this. Or maybe I might just have to change my perspective and find a way to jump between other topics and still make it neat. The reason why I don’t want to go back and forth about different topics is that it confuses me and it looks really messy, and things don’t really flow well.
I also kind of thought about making an online cook book of my own, but the biggest problem with me is that i don’t know how to make recipes interesting and distinguishable from other ones. I think I have enough photos and information to make this happen, but again, it has to be different from others.
So what are my options? Select a broad topic that’s versatile enough for me to write about numerous matters, if so, what would be the ideal topic? Or, should I go with my own cook book? That does sound interesting and fun since i’ll be using my own recipes and my creations, but it should be somewhat entertaining, too.
May 2nd, 2008 at 9:24 am
I hope our talk about writing creative recipes within writings about life, and food’s role in different situations, helped.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Western culture revolves around food. There is always food at any social gathering, event, meeting etc. I think that is why I am drawn to your blog, because I’m used to being surrounded by food ALL the time. Watching the food network and looking up new and interesting recipes are just a norm here.
I like your idea of having an online recipe book. I think it would be an easy reference to use when in a hurry. It’s a lot of work collecting recipes and creating new ones though, but worth it in the end. The best recipes I’ve found, are a collaboration of a person’s favorite foods. For example, many clubs around here put together a cook book as a fundraiser. Each memeber contributes a few of their favorite recipes and adds it to the book. If you asked friends and famliy ( or others) for recipes you would have enough good ones for an online cook book in no time.