Food Writing

Overview

Food Writing is a diverse and dynamic genre, with great opportunities to take a home interest to a wider audience, via an online and/or print presence. Food blogs and online social platforms all offer opportunities, as well as many print/online magazines and newspapers with regular food writing columns and articles.     

This course covers the basics of writing a food blog, developing recipes and feature articles, and honing your own style and online/ print presence. It also gives you a brief introduction to the history and science of food, current trends; vegetarian, vegan, cooking for food intolerances, supporting local producers, sustainability, low carbon, and growing your own fruit, herbs and vegetables.     

Students will learn how to effectively research, write and evaluate their own engaging and attractive food blog entry with recipes. They will also interview a local food producer/ retailer/chef to gain an insight into the world of food and evaluate the results.  

Programme

Activities and tasks will be embedded into each unit so students can practise the techniques they have learned and develop their skills. Students will be encouraged to share their own work and participate in discussions on Blackboard. Alongside the learning materials on Blackboard the tutor will be on hand via email to answer any queries and provide guidance throughout the course. They will also participate in the online discussions.    

• Unit 1 - A short introduction to the history of food.
• Unit 2 - Blogs and recipe writing. 
• Unit 3 - Developing some ideas for your own food blog.
• Unit 4 - The Interview.
• Unit 5 - Developing your style.

  Conclusions   

• Live Teams Meeting – a celebration! At the end of the module the tutor will hold a live webinar to bring all the strands of the module together and students can submit questions to be answered.   

Learning Outcomes

On completion of this module, students should be able to:  

1. Demonstrate an understanding of the range of food writing available, current trends and influences across blogs, books and magazine and newspaper articles.  
2. Discuss and evaluate the changes to food writing, rise of online platforms, availability and change in ingredients, and some history of food writing.  
3. Conduct an interview with someone involved in the world of food production and critically evaluate the responses.  
4. Analyse and evaluate the information they have collated to create a short written piece with photographs and recipes suitable for an engaging blog entry, the interview can be incorporated into this process.  
5. Have an awareness of copyright and libel issues when writing material.   

Assessments

1. Blog entry inclusive of inspiration and background to 2 recipes with photographs (the interview may be incorporated into this piece) (500 words; 60% of the overall mark) 
2. Critical portfolio Reflections on the process of developing and researching the final piece, how they would position it within the market (online or otherwise) and strategies for building an audience/online presence. (300 words; 40% of the overall mark) 

Reading Suggestions

Reading suggestions will be offered throughout the course. 

Entry Requirements

This course is for everyone. No previous experience is needed and there are no formal entry requirements.

What Do I Need?

As this is an online course, you would need the following:

• Internet access
• Access to a laptop or computer with a web camera and microphone; the use of headphones might also be of benefit
• Use of the Chrome web-browser where possible.