Project Food Blog: Ready, Set, Blog

Greetings Biters and Boozers;

This post represents my first entry into Foodbuzz's Project Food Blog.  The contest involves a series of themed blog posts in a competition format to determine who will advance to the next rounds and ultimately one food blogger will be named the next Food Blog Star!  For the very first posts, titled "Ready, Set, Blog!", bloggers have been asked to simply write about what defines them as a food blogger and why should they be the next food blog star?  Well, let me give it a shot!

I began Bite and Booze in late September 2009 and by October I realized that I had a pretty strong passion for it... though I had no idea where it would take me.  One of the first steps I took in the food and beverage blogging world was to join Foodbuzz, an organization that is now the largest online food website/community in the world.  I attended the first ever Foodbuzz festival in November and things really started to take off from there.

When I began, my main mission was to simply chronicle the many adventures and experiences of my life through the food and drinks that I consumed.  I wrote about things I cooked, restaurants I ate at, tailgate parties I attended, breweries I visited, and anything else along those lines.  I really enjoyed the online journal and scrapbook that I created, but I also realized quickly that Bite and Booze needed to be so much more.  My hometown, my community, Baton Rouge, La, needed a foodie outlet that not only added to literature of its food, but also to the culture and character.  It wasn't long before I formed relationship with the fine people at the Baton Rouge Convention and Visitors Bureau to help promote Baton Rouge through new and social media.  A local magazine, Town Favorites, picked me up to be a food writer/contributer to their publication.  I started promoting events and helping Baton Rouge get the word out about things that were going on related to food and drink.  I had begun to create a food community in Baton Rouge, not just a food blog.

Now, with Bite and Booze approaching one year of food writing, I can't even stop to imagine where the next year will take me.  I'm working on sponsorships and promotions.  I'm getting into video production to add to my social media publications.  I'm being featured in contests, delivering foodie monologues at shows, getting appearances on local television programs and mentions in the newspapers and magazines, covering foodie events from epicurean society wine tastings to farmer's market farm to table tours, and I'm growing my readership at an exponential rate.

So what defines me as a food blogger?  I think for starters it is that sense of community.  My writing and blogging seems to bring people together and unite people around something we all love... bites and boozes.  I also think it is my sense of adventure.  I'm not a niche blogger like many people that only write about health eating or solely document restaurant reviews.  I pretty much write about anything and everything I can that deals with eating and drinking.  I'll eat anything, and I'll say the truth about how I thought it tasted.  I write about travel, I write about hole-in-the-wall eateries at home.  Really it all boils down to this: "I eat. I drink. I write."

I think I've described already why I should be the next Food Blog Star.  My passion for food writing is strong, and I absolutely love what I'm doing.  If you love it too, please take the time to vote for Bite and Booze on Project Food Blog starting September 20th... I'd appreciate your support!

Thanks everyone!


ON TO ROUND 2!!!