Thoughts & Scribbles
Sometimes I've got things to say that don't fit nicely into other categories. The marketer in me says that when this happens, I should be ruthless in curating my content and only share what's on-brand. The human being in me says categories are helpful but shouldn't stifle what I want to say. Sometimes, the human wins. So this is where I talk about other things. Current events. How I feel about stuff. A bit of food content. You know. Thoughts & scribbles.
The Breakfasts That Fueled Some of History’s Most Interesting People
Why are we so obsessed with morning routines, productivity rituals, and the daily to-dos of famous and successful people? There seems to be this pervading myth that if we set up our days like Steve Jobs, we can be as successful as Steve Jobs. This is clearly cuckoo. If I were to adopt a Jobsian routine of waking up at 6:00am and donning jeans and a black turtleneck, I’d be about as close to founding the next Apple as I am now. That is to say, really, really far away. There is no “right way” to start your day, just like there’s no “right way” to run a business. And…
Things I Know Now That I Didn’t Know Pre-COVID
The one-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic’s aggressive foothold in the United States is fast approaching. A year of cancelled plans, shuttered restaurant dining rooms, and missed celebrations with friends; of postponed weddings, remote schooling, and working from home. On this day in 2020, none of us knew what we were in store for, but we could tell that this was not like SARS or Ebola — illnesses covered at length in the media, but with little impact on our day-to-day lives. I first knew that this was serious when SXSW was cancelled just a week before it was due to begin. We had many more questions about the virus…
4 Life Lessons from Behind the Bar
No, not namby-pamby lessons like the importance of teamwork or communication. I mean, I did learn those things during my years as a server and bartender, but I’m talking actual life lessons here. These are hard-earned, sometimes painful truths gleaned from deep within the bowels of this wild industry. The kind you remember after the tears have dried and you’ve moved on to a completely different stage of life. I haven’t stepped behind the bar in about six years, but there are some lessons you just don’t forget. 1. It’s okay to ask for help The hardest shift I ever worked was an AM shift at a neighborhood bar in…
Restaurants: A Love Letter
Restaurants, I miss you. I miss the anticipation of a night out. Putting on real clothes instead of my “daytime pajamas.” Swiping on some lipstick and mascara. Looking through my jewelry to pick the right earrings, even though I almost always settle on the same pair. I miss cocktail menus, full of delicious elixirs I could make myself, but won’t. At home, it’s always red wine, bourbon on the rocks, dirty martinis, or White Claws (pink grapefruit only!). But at a restaurant, it could be a frosé, icy and refreshing. Or an Old Fashioned with fancy bitters and rich syrupy Luxardo cherries. Or something herbal with an infused simple syrup…
We can reopen restaurants. Here’s why we should not.
Across the country, states are allowing retail stores, movie theaters, and restaurants to reopen with restrictions in place to prevent the further spread of COVID-19. And while retail may be able to make the necessary adjustments to minimize risks, the nature of restaurants makes reopening a dangerous proposition. On a state level, new cases of the novel coronavirus have not been consistently going down, as this graph from the New York Times shows. And on a national level, more Americans have died from the coronavirus in the past three months than from the entire Vietnam War. So is this really the time to put groups of people into enclosed spaces…
How Classic Recipes Got Their Names
French Fries are Belgian. Quiche Lorraine is named for a place, not a person. Jerusalem artichokes are neither artichokes nor from Jerusalem. The foods we eat often have a fascinating history, from the recipes themselves to the way they got their names. I was curious about some of these famous foods and decided to figure out where they came from. From Venice to Alaska and the 1790s to the 1950s, here are the origins of some classic recipes and their names. Hushpuppies Hushpuppies are cornmeal balls that are deep-fried. They’re often served with fried seafood and some sort of remoulade for dipping. Fried cornmeal has been around for ages, but…
SXSW Canceled – The View From Austin
For the first time in 34 years, SXSW is canceled. Concerns about COVID-19 have led the City of Austin to shut down the annual festival one week before it was due to begin. Is it the brave and responsible action of a city concerned for the safety of its citizens, at the cost of hundreds of millions of dollars in the local economy? Or is it a weak capitulation to an overblown media frenzy, compounded by the signatures of 50,000 frightened people? In either case, it must have been an agonizing decision to make, and I’m glad I wasn’t the one to make it. As hard as SXSW has tried…
What a Difference a Decade Makes
It’s New Year’s Day, 2020. I’m sitting at my very messy kitchen table, sipping a glass of champagne. Kirby is playing video games. The dog is whining because no one is throwing her ball. Tomorrow, I will earn money by writing, mostly about and for restaurants. Life is good. At the start of the decade, I was 24 and not very happy. Now, I am 34 and very happy. In 2009, I was a Boston bartender with no idea what to do with my life and a deep-seated aversion to commitment. Now I’m an Austin writer who is still figuring things out but has made a life-long commitment to another…
The Art of Not Writing
There is a big difference between writing for other people and Writing for yourself. Writing for other people involves assignments, deadlines, and consequences for not meeting those deadlines. I am pretty good at it. But when it comes time to capital-W-Write for myself (by which I mean working on my own fiction and non-fiction) I have one exceptional talent that I’d like to share. It’s called Not Writing. I am world-class at Not Writing. Believe me, if there’s a topic to not be written about, I will Not Write about it with a passion and dedication that’s hard to match. I am so skilled at Not Writing, in fact, that…
The EDWC Awards -“Food Copywriting At Home” Edition
I was working on a blog for a client the other day when I had a hankering for a snack. So I pulled out the ol’ Cheez-It box from the pantry, as I love a good cheesy cracker. I was happily crunching away when I saw this on the back of the box: “Munch on our newest, cheesy, thin & crispy snack” Why? I’m literally, as we speak, munching on a cheesy, thin, & crispy snack. This copy does not make me want to try the “Snap’d” cracker. It doesn’t differentiate the new product in any way. Instead, it throws a list of adjectives at me, all of which can…
