The Recipe for Writer’s Block

[This is post #008 towards #100DaysOfFoodBlogging, our goal to do 100 posts in 100 days as part of The 100 Day Project.]

As Tina and I have just rounded out the first eight posts towards our goal of #100DaysofFoodBlogging, blogger friend, Emma @ Fork and Good recently posted “Curse of the blogger’s block,” an honest look at why she hasn’t been posting as much recently due to her war with writer’s block. Let’s hope blogger’s block isn’t contagious…after all, we do have 92 more posts to go!

Emma’s post inspired me to think about my own run-ins with that evil block of the writer. Historically, I haven’t dealt with the same “staring at the blank page” form of writer’s block that most people describe. Rather at my worst, I haven’t even gotten to the point of staring at the blank page, because I’m too busy “working on the idea in my head.” Likely story.

Over the years, I’ve been able to mostly quiet the demon, simply by understanding it. And the best way to understand it, is to know where it comes from; i.e. what’s the recipe for writer’s block?

Get it? Food blog? Recipe? Okay, it is a stretch…

In my experience, writer’s block is simply a way our subconscious works to avoid failure. For example, if I don’t write this post, then I don’t risk someone hating it, and therefore I cannot fail. AND I can use that free time for working on more ideas in my head. See, win-win!

This fear of failure is a result of not believing what we’re writing is good enough, and is a created by a desire for perfection. The late and great author / screenwriter / TV producer Stephen J. Cannell talks about this in the video below:

Cannell says it perfectly when he states that writer’s block is caused by “the desire to be perfect.”

With this desire to be perfect comes self-censorship. We start judging everything we write and before long we’re simply not writing, because by not writing we can’t write something imperfect. And if we don’t write something imperfect we can’t fail.

Once you realize what’s causing writer’s block, it’s much easier to fight. The solution is to create an environment that welcomes–and even encourages–failure.

Hence, our #100DaysofFoodBlogging challenge to ourselves. Because we’re cranking out posts everyday, there’s an unspoken idea that by putting out a post day after day for 100 straight days, it would be impossible to expect that every single one will be perfect. The goal isn’t to have 100 perfect posts. It also flips around the definition of failure, because by the nature of this thing we only fail if we don’t do 100 posts. Thus, 100 awful posts is still a success. It’s a pretty sweet deal that ends up stopping writer’s block before it starts.

It also helps to remember that…

You are NOT out of good ideas.

You will NOT never write again.

You have written before and you will write again.

You will fail.

And you will fail again.

And then 30 more times before you succeed.

That’s okay, because failing is fun…

…and perfection is boring.

(And if you need proof that failing is fun, check out Emma’s Food Photography Blunders series. Failure never looked so good.)

#100DaysOfFoodBlogging, Thought Nuggets

One year later…

[This is post #001 towards #100DaysOfFoodBlogging, our goal to do 100 posts in 100 days as part of The 100 Day Project.]

From deviled eggs, to foodgawker rejects, to pie, more pie, and yet again pie. I still don’t think we had enough pie on the blog…

Love stories about egg cookers, pick-me-up empanadas, haiku-filled videos about sushi, and roasting fresh coffee with new friends.

We baked, cooked, photographed, ate…ate…ate some more…then ate again. (Technically, Tina did the baking, cooking, and photographing, while I did most of the eating.)

I took more pictures of food with my phone than I felt comfortable doing.

We made silly videos about restaurants.

I stalked Google Analytics for no good reason.

It’s been a year since we started this blog, what’s the point?

Looking back at our year, this food blog wasn’t the final product, rather it was a path towards an infinite number of friends and experiences. Because of this blog, we ate at restaurants, sampled food, and tried recipes that we might not have otherwise, but more importantly we met some fantastic people near and far. No B.S. Thank you to everyone who’s pinned, retweeted, commented, emailed, shared, liked, and favorited our posts. There might only be a few of you out there, but that’s a few more than we had a year ago.

Okay, jeez, put the tissues away. This isn’t the last post for the rest of forever. It is the first post of the rest of our lives. Ha. Gross. No, seriously this is like episode one in Season 2. It needs to be good, but not too good, ’cause you want to make sure you have something to build towards.

Anyway, since we’re kicking off a new year here are a couple of new things we’ll be doing:

Email Subscription

We figured that after a year of blogging we should probably give ya’ll the option to subscribe to a newsletter. Don’t worry we won’t clog up your inbox, as we’ll try to keep the emails to at most two per month. The goal is to not only let you know about new posts, but to also share some links that we think are cool, send you some free stuff from time-to-time, and occasionally send you funny pictures and drawings. The first email update will likely include a picture involving alcohol, a toaster, and a DIY photobooth. Probably not the best tease, but come on, let’s be email buddies:

#The100DayProject

Some of you may have already seen The Great Discontent’s 100-Day Project, but in short it’s a collective promise to commit to making something each day for 100 straight days. Technically it started on April 6th, but you can start at any time and catch up when you can. Figured with the kick off of year numero dos for the blog, this would be a good experiment. So, we will attempt to publish a blog post every day for the next 100 days. Sure, that’s not that big of a deal, especially since a lot of blogs already have daily posts. But for a small food blog that only had 43 posts during the course of an entire year, it’ll be quite an accomplishment. My buddy Mike over at The Flying Peanut is to blame for this, so if you get tired of seeing an influx of posts here, send him hate mail. And, yes, this post does count as #1. Only 99 more to go!

—

CHEERS to one year!

Thought Nuggets

PieCake Theory

I was a bit of a picky eater as a child. Vegetables had little place in my diet, experimenting with new foods was a rarity, and my parents’ conversion to a health food/vegan lifestyle (before vegans were cool) was a huge hit to my Slurpee and candy bar diet. I spent many meals complaining, rather than embracing what was on my plate and exploring potential new foods to eat that fit within the healthy/vegan box. I was just a stupid little boy who knew nothing about PieCake Theory.

Confused? Good.

My mom recently made a PieCake. Although it sounds like a mythical love child between the Greek Goddess Piesyith and God Cakeus, it’s really much less interesting. In fact, it’s exactly what its name implies, an entire pie baked inside of a cake. I was excited to try it, because it’s yet another hybrid food gimmick that had the potential for deliciousness.

My excitement quickly diminished, as I found myself eating around the cake simply to get to the pie. And because the cake was being a real pie-block, it upset me even more. I JUST WANTED THE PIE. (Sidebar: In case you’ve not picked up this from my numerous tweets, subtle references, and Instagram pictures, I love pie like no other food. And cake is… Cake is the food equivalent of shrugged shoulders.) Anyway, back to the PieCake.

It’s odd that a dessert could bring out so much vitriol and I wasn’t quite sure why. I love pie and I don’t hate cake, so shouldn’t the simple addition of Pie + Cake = PieCake result in the following relationship:

PieCake > Pie > Cake

My mouf would disagree.

As I thought about it more, I realized that when two food items are combined, the end result is only greater than the sum of its parts if the person eating enjoys each individual part equally. Instead of the food items cooperating and elevating each other, they balance each other out in terms of deliciousness. It’s a little more complicated than simple addition, rather it requires some seventh grade algebra to illustrate.

I could eat pie almost every day. Conservatively, let’s say that I could eat pie every day except on Tuesdays (I’d need a caloric break at least once a week). Assuming there are 52 Tuesdays per year, that means I’m eating pie on the other 313 days of the year (what a fantastic year that would be). So, my Desired Annual Consumption Value (DACV) would be 313 pies / 365 days or .86. Notice that this is essentially a percentage (which I’ll get to in a second) and the highest possible DACV is 1.00.

Cake, on the other hand, I could probably eat once every other week. (And I’m talking about really good flourless chocolate cake with berries and two pounds of fresh whipped cream. Not those vegetable shortening-soaked grocery store rectangles of gluten.) A cake every other week would mean that my DACV would be 26 cakes / 365 days or .07.

Clearly my desired annual consumption value for pie of .86 is MUCH higher than my desired annual consumption value for cake of .07. We could convert the values into percentages and essentially say that during 86% of all days each year, I want pie, while in just 7% of those same days I would enjoy a cake. (Notice that the two percentages do not add up to 100%, as they are independent values. Also notice how quickly you begin scrolling down for more pictures.)

Okay, now that we know my cake and pie DACV, how does that relate to the PieCake hybrid? Well, the pie is baked inside of the cake (rather than a cake baked inside of a pie, which would be a CakePie), so by default the dish is predominantly a cake. Based on eyeballing the PieCake, I’d say it’s about 60% cake 40% pie. Those of you who are astute might recommend I calculate this part based on the ingredient measurements or weights, but this isn’t Nikola Tesla‘s blog, so please adjust expectations accordingly.

If you’re still with me (as if you’re THAT busy at work), then to figure out my cumulative DACV for PieCake, we would have to multiply each DACV by its corresponding percentage and add those together:

.86 Pie DACV x 40% = .34
.07 Cake DACV x 60% = .04
.34 + .04 = .38 PieCake DACV

Thus, the PieCake DACV is .38, which falls between the pie DACV of .86 and the cake DACV of .07

Pie > PieCake > Cake

So, assuming each individual component is not equally delicious, the PieCake Theory kind of makes sense and explains why I was dissappointed and was forced to search out only the pie. However, if you follow through on the math and assume that you love each individual component equally, the results would indicate that no hybrid foods could ever taste better (only equal to) their individual components.

But what about the CRONUT?

By my theory above, even if you loved doughnuts and croissants equally at the highest level possible, the best case scenario would always result in equality across all three foods:

Cronut = Donut = Croissant

But that’s simply false, because I would argue that based on taste, texture, and the glorious sounds of heaven that herald me when I bite into a cronut, that the actual relationship is:

Cronut > Donuts = Croissant

Now that makes no freaking sense at all (from a seventh grade algebra standpoint).

E X A C T L Y.

Eating is NOT a science. Cooking might be, baking definitely is, but eating and enjoying food cannot be predicted with numbers, calculations, and made-up theories from a nobody food blogger.

Just because I don’t like PieCake and I can sort of prove it with a faux-theory (based on my own flawed estimates), doesn’t meant that YOU won’t love it. And it doesn’t mean that I won’t eventually find a PieCake that I do enjoy. And that goes for all food.

So, PieCake Theory isn’t about calculations or even really pie and cake. It’s about the idea that you should give all food a try, regardless of past experiences or whether somebody else likes it or not.

And to my younger self, just because I tried a few vegan foods that I didn’t care for, I shouldn’t have assumed that I would hate them all. If I had based all vegan eating on my childhood experience with “wheat meat,” then I never would have opened up the possibility to enjoying an outstanding fried tofu dish at Maple Ave Restaurant (which will eventually be discussed in a later post).

And yes, it’s odd that a dessert filled with dairy and eggs could teach me something about vegan eating, but pies are powerful.

Cakes are okay, too.

PIECAKE RECIPE

Pardon the poorly-lit iPhone photo.

My mom used this recipe from the Home & Family television show, with some modifications. She used a cherry filling rather than blueberries and made a half-recipe (one layer). I recommend skipping the part with the cake.

Thought Nuggets

foodgawker Rejects

The deeper into food blogging we immerse ourselves, the more we’ve discovered the power of foodgawker. Acceptance from them can lead to an explosion of hits on your site, while rejection helps to load the bullets of a gun pointed at your ego. Without knowing of its ALMIGHTY POWER, I submitted a photo from our deviled egg post and was rejected for being too dull. No biggie. It probably wasn’t quite up to the level that it should have been anyway.

Maybe spending years aspiring to be a screenwriter somehow prepared me to expect a very high amount of rejection out of life. Maybe I have low self-esteem (BWAHAHAHHAHA). Or maybe we just haven’t been rejected enough times to build up a hatred/envy/hunger for foodgawker acceptance.

Part of me is afraid to submit too many photos–not necessarily for fear of rejection, but for the fear of addiction. I picture myself staying up late, running off the high from submitting photos. Calling in sick to work so I can compulsively check my phone for acceptance emails. All eventually leading to a binge of cocaine and heroin for “creative inspiration.” And is foodgawker going to pay for my rehab?

Too real. Anyway…

To help facilitate the hunger for acceptance, foodgawker recently tweeted a PDF of submission guidelines to remind everyone of what they’re looking for in a food photo. While the tips were technically accurate, I think they were a little too “dull” (to use their word). Sometimes it helps to know what NOT to do. So, I thought it might be helpful to offer up a few specific samples of “foodgawker rejects” and what their corresponding unedited rejection comments might look like.

Rejection Reason: What happened to the food?

Rejection Reason: We do not, nor have we ever accepted selfies. And why are you eating a slice of bread in what appears to be a bathroom?

Rejection Reason: This is just a picture of your dog. Yes, you have a handsome dog, but this is a #foodporn website.

Rejection Reason: Not that kind of food porn…

Rejection Reason: We don’t respond to grammatically incorrect threats.

Rejection Reason: We do not accept bribes. And come on, a dollar?

Rejection Reason: Closer, but this is just a piece of toast. Have you even been to our website?

Rejection Reason: This is clearly just a photo of our website. And WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THE BREAD?!

Maybe one day (far into the future when we’ve completed rehab), we’ll be able to provide a post full of useful advice and examples of accepted foodgawker photos. But until then, there WILL BE BREAD!

Get in my Mouf

Food Stories

The Recipe for Writer’s Block

One year later…

CHEERS to one year!

PieCake Theory

foodgawker Rejects