Yesterday, IACP posted the work of a member guest blogger, Amy Reiley, in which she expressed her personal opinions about a session that she attended at the Annual Conference in New York. Several members have expressed their frustrations and, in some cases, their indignation about the post (in case you missed it, here is the original post).

We just wanted to take a moment to clarify that this is the work of one person, and doesn’t express the views of IACP.

We believe in bringing people together to give them the information and network of contacts to help them achieve as a culinary professional regardless of where they fall in the ever-changing culinary spectrum, whether it’s teaching, writing, developing recipes, publishing books, styling photos, taking photos, or the hundreds of other things that our members do as part of their work. The increasing ranks and varying needs of people who publish online led to the creation of the New Media section and a whole new slate of awards to recognize their work.

At the end day, it isn’t really the medium that matters, but the work itself. That’s why we changed our journalism awards a few years ago to eradicate whether a piece had appeared in traditional or new media. Good writing is good writing, whether it appears in a magazine or a blog, and whether you get a paycheck for it from someone else or not. Same thing with other areas of the culinary field.

The decision to publish this piece came about when some members read an original piece the author posted on her site and brought it to the attention of the team that runs the IACP site. The reason? It brings up issues in the ever-changing and evolving world of food writing that are worth discussing, even if the resulting discussion might be uncomfortable. It was part of the reason we held that panel, too, to create a forum for the debate and to provide information to help individuals succeed on a variety of business models.

The author’s viewpoint on the issue of marketers working with online writers and publishers is just one slice of a wider story. As has been stated here many times, we invite all members to contribute to the IACP Blog. Please email communications@iacp.com if you would like to write a post in response.

We closed the comments on the other article in order to shift them here, hopefully now with more context.

Job Description

Reporting to the Executive Director of IACP, the Director of Operations will lead internal operations and will have the following responsibilities:

• Work in partnership with the ED to create the strategic plan and implement new processes and approaches to achieve it
• Work in partnership with the ED to create the annual IACP budget
• Oversee the outsourced event producer towards the goal of delivering a Conference, Culinary Expo, Book and Blog Festival and Awards Gala that is both impactful and enjoyable for attendees and is profitable for the organization
• Manage the Conference and Awards Gala RFP process
• Manage the Program Committee Meetings
• Working in partnership with the Host City Committee and Event Producer, assist where necessary in the management of the Optional Tours and Dinners
• Working in partnership with the ED, assist in a strategic plan for IACP 365
• Manage the budgeting and implementation of IACP 365 programs
• Work in partnership with the Awards Committee to produce an awards program that is impactful to our industry and offers IACP a platform to enhance its name recognition throughout the industry, as well as with the general public
• Oversee the awards program planning, judging and book distribution process
• Working in partnership with outsourced accountants, manage IACP's accounting function, which includes overseeing and approving A/P, A/R and creation of financial statements
• Working in partnership with the ED, create and maintain cash flow projections

Qualifications

• All candidates must have a comprehensive understanding of IACP and all aspects of the organization and be driven by its mission.
• Results—evidence of the ability to consistently make good decisions through a combination of analysis, wisdom, experience, and judgment; high level of business acumen including successful P&L management; the ability to balance the delivery of programs against the realities of a budget; and problem solving, project management, and creative resourcefulness
• Strategic Vision and Agility—ability to think strategically, anticipate future consequences and trends, and incorporate them into the organizational plan
• Capacity Building—ability to effectively build organization and staff capacity, developing a top-notch workforce and the processes that ensure the organization runs smoothly
• Action Oriented—enjoys working hard and looks for challenges; able to act and react as necessary, even if limited information is available; not afraid to take charge of a situation; can overcome resistance to leadership and take unpopular stands when necessary
• General Management—thorough understanding of finance, systems, and HR; broad experience with the full range of business functions and systems, including strategic development and planning, budgeting, business analysis, finance, information systems, human resources, and marketing

Qualified candidates should send a resume and cover letter to IACP Executive Director Meredith Deeds (meredith@iacp.com) by May 24, 2012.

By Amy Reiley

Those of you who know me probably had a certain expectation when you saw I wrote a blog post called “Faking It.” (For those of you who don’t already know, I should probably add here that I’m noted as an authority on culinary aphrodisiacs.) So you see where the mind might go with a title like the one above. But that kind of faking it is old news. I’m writing this post to address a new trend that’s been fast to infiltrate the culinary world.

When I attended my first Annual Conference this year, I was more interested in connecting with other professionals in our field than in focusing on the education aspect of the seminars. However, one seminar I attended gave me far more of an eye-opening education than I could have ever dreamed.


It was on a bit of a lark that I signed up for "Bloggers & Marketers: Crafting a Rewarding Alliance." Although like many professional food writers, I maintain a blog (The Aphrodisiac Queen), I do not consider, nor ever refer to myself as a blogger. However, the seminar description mentioned monetizing and, as the editorial director of a well-established online magazine, EatSomethingSexy.com, I was interested in seeing if these strategies could apply to our business. To say that the information discussed was jaw dropping would be an understatement. I think I spent the next three hours with my jaw dangling somewhere between my knees and China.

What the seminar quickly revealed was that major as well as small, well-respected organizations in the culinary business (like Kraft, the Got Milk? campaign, Kitchenaid, etc.) are contacting high profile food and lifestyle bloggers to endorse products, create recipes, photograph dishes made with the company’s products, and conduct giveaways for reasonably substantial financial gain.


Sitting in the seminar listening to several highly respected marketers discuss the kinds of relationships they develop with bloggers, I could feel a negative current ripple through the air. For those of you who weren’t there, the majority of attendees were professional journalists, recipe developers, publishers, home economists, and editors. It was clear to me that the general feeling in the room was one of shock, discomfort, and if I’m being completely honest, probably a little jealousy. And, trust me; I threw my emotional lot in with the majority.

In addition to the marketing representatives on the panel, there were a couple of food bloggers. (At one point I wondered if they were about to be lynched—luckily, we behind-the-desk food types tend to be a peaceful lot.) When asked to talk specific monetary amounts, both the marketers and bloggers on the panel suddenly grew shy. One marketer mentioned a blogger not in attendance turning down her client because said blogger doesn’t accept less than $500 to develop and photograph a unique recipe. The test kitchen director from a major appliance company seated to my left looked at me with the same shocked expression I’m sure was painted across my mug and said, “that’s not exactly a lot.” I agreed, wondering how, depending on the ingredients, you could possibly develop and test a recipe and still make enough money for the hours of work to be worthwhile for much less. …And then I got my answer. The recipes aren’t tested.


Certainly, we could debate how much testing is enough. The test kitchen policy for my cookbook publishing company, Life of Reiley, is that the final recipe must be tested three times in the kitchen, then pass the test by a minimum of two home cooks (sometimes three depending on the recipe’s complexity) before it’s approved. If something doesn’t work out with just one of the home cooks, we go back to the start and totally retest. I know many of you test much more. I have a friend who, as an intern, once tested a cinnamon roll recipe 100 times before it was deemed fit for publication by America’s Test Kitchen. But whatever your testing policy, I know that we can all agree on the importance of ensuring that the experience of making a dish goes smoothly for a home cook.


It shocks me that some of our industry’s biggest and brightest companies are willing to farm out this kind of work to home cooks, whose skill in recipe development and writing haven’t been proven–and, at least in the case of the examples discussed at the seminar, without any control over how well the recipes have been tested. The bloggers are, essentially, faking it. And then marketers are sharing these recipes with the public—and paying hobby cooks for the kind of skilled work most of us have spent a career developing. I also can’t help but question to what extent do the companies check to ensure the resulting recipes aren’t plagiarized from professional sources. The most important message I got from the seminar was that we, the professional journalists, researchers, home economists, recipe developers, food stylists, and photographers are getting aced out of much needed work in our chosen field by stay-at-home moms and accountants with a cooking hobby.

It would be completely unfair to say that all the bloggers reaping the benefits of these arrangements aren’t qualified or don’t posses a unique set of skills deserving of the leap from Wordpress to notoriety (The Pioneer Woman comes to mind). But, in general, this trend is a glaring example of what many have complained is a general “dumbing down” of the culinary profession, particularly food journalism. At a time when legendary publications like Gourmet are shuttered, it makes my skin crawl a little to think that advertising dollars that could have helped sustain high quality food writing and recipe development, (not just Gourmet, but the great food writing and stunning photography newspapers and other magazines have lost to cutbacks), is going to people with a hobby and probably too much time on their hands.

I agree that everyone in the culinary world needs to make a living however they can—it gets harder every day! And I can see from a marketer’s perspective why it would be smart, from both a PR as well as a financial standpoint, to hire someone with a following who will work for a modest sum. But the food professional side of me is outraged. The work of great recipe developers, food stylists and photographers, and, of course, food journalists are skills, crafts honed through years of education and/or apprenticeship. If this trend continues, we’ll all be out of work. But, setting personal feelings aside, what is much worse is how this hurts the consumer. Until now, consumers have been treated to professionally created recipes, photographs, and fact-checked information on food. If this trend continues, quality communications from the food world to the consumer will be a thing of the past. Don’t we all deserve more?

From the editor: Please note that the opinions expressed by contributors to the IACP Blog are those of the contributors and do not necessarily represent the official position of IACP. We welcome posts and opinions from all members on the IACP Blog. Send your questions and comments to us at communications@iacp.com.

Before commenting, we ask that you read the follow-up post from IACP.

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Amy Reiley is the creator of EatSomethingSexy.com and writes The Aphrodisiac Queen. Follow her on Twitter @forkmespoonme.

Photo @ Boaz Yiftach, used with permission.

By Beth Somers

I’m starting to come down from the delirious high that was my first IACP Conference. Manhattan was the perfect backdrop to five intense days of eating, networking, learning, and out-and-out enjoyment. It’s been a few weeks, and I’m still reeling when I think of all of the fabulous people I’ve started to get to know as a result of the conference.

As a member of the Test Kitchen Section, being able to meet and talk to others with similar work backgrounds was one of the highlights of my week in New York. I’ve only been working in a test kitchen environment for three years, stemming from a background in baking and cake decorating. I’ve loved every minute of the professional test kitchen since I started, but meeting others who work in this small but important industry has been difficult. I’ve searched high and low, but the only networking group I’ve found specifically for Test Kitchen pros is IACP. It’s funny that I traveled all the way to New York to meet Rashanda Pruitt one of the women who works in the ConAgra Test Kitchens, about 10 miles from my own office, but it was worth it. Ditto JeanMarie Brownson, Culinary Director at Chicago’s Frontera Foods, and Marie Jirsa, Product Performance Scientist from nearby Sara Lee. I’m a stone’s throw from all of these people, but it took the IACP Conference to connect us.

The Test Kitchen Group was just the beginning. I talked with so many talented chefs, writers, and food marketers throughout the conference, but one man in particular stands out, not just because he was one of the few men at a Les Dames D’Escoffier event, but because of his easy-going and approachable demeanor. I met George Geary, a prolific author, culinary instructor, and all-around culinary whiz. He told me about his upcoming cookbook, 150 Best Doughnut Recipes, and we shared a few stories about baking doughnuts versus frying them. A couple weeks later, I received a surprising but welcome package from George that included one of his books, The Complete Baking Cookbook: 350 Recipes from Cookies and Cakes to Muffins and Pies. I was excited that he had remembered me. I thanked him for the gift via email and we arranged to meet for coffee in the near future, when his work would bring him through Chicago.

George was accommodating and agreed to meet me near my office, located in a suburban sprawl of chain restaurants and big box stores. I emailed him the address of a nearby Starbucks and looked forward to our meeting. On the day of our arrangement, I arrived at Starbucks and waited for George. And waited. And waited.  As minutes ticked by, I checked my email for a cancellation, but there was nothing. Knowing that he wasn’t familiar with the area, I sent him my phone number. Maybe he was lost or had confused one strip mall for another. A few minutes passed, and George called. He was at a different Starbucks, and he too, had been waiting. He was at the correct Starbucks, the one that I had directed him to, and I was clear across town, sipping a latte at the wrong location. In my defense, there are approximately 20 Starbucks stores in my immediate vicinity, and not a single independent coffee shop comes to mind, but I digress. To say that I was mortified would be an understatement. He had been so gracious to send his book, and to make time in his busy schedule to meet me, and I had completely botched an opportunity to get to know him and his business.

I apologized for wasting his time. George was courteous and forgiving, and even cracked a joke to lighten me up, but I am still wholeheartedly sorry about sending him to the wrong place. I hope that at some point in the future we’ll be in the same city at the same time, and will be able to sit down for a cup of coffee. Preferably in the same place.

And the moral of the story? As a whole, the members of IACP are a diverse and welcoming bunch of people who want to share their knowledge and experiences with others in the group. The Annual Conference is a fantastic way to meet people from all over the industry. What you do with all of those great contacts and information post-conference is up to you. Sign up for Speaker Series. Join IACP sections. Write for the blog or Frontburner. Arrange face-to-face meetings. And always double check the address before heading out to meet your colleagues.

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Beth Somers is the Culinary Specialist in the Test Kitchen at Wilton Industries. She also authors the blog Walloping Teaspoon.

By Dan Kohler

My third year attending the Annual Conference confirmed what the first two years had me suspecting: While the panels are informative and the socializing is good for business, it’s the active, hands-on activities that really charge me as an attendee. For me that means the annual event sponsored by The Culinary Trust and the Kids in the Kitchen committee.

Every year an event is planned in the conference’s home city to teach kids some basic yet valuable cooking skills. For the last two years we’ve had the opportunity to work with the kids only once during the conference. This year was different. The Culinary Trust planned the event to run for three weeks. We worked with the Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger teaching weekly cooking classes to a fantastic group of kids, ages 8-18.

I know everyone who works with kids says this, but I have to write it anyway: The kids are fantastic. They showed up week after week, ready to cook, ready to eat, and ready to play. We all had a great time. Who knew making smoothies could be so exciting? Seriously. Kids love a Vitamix.

The Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger is an organization that feeds 11,000 hungry people in Brooklyn every month.


Now read this: Participants are only allowed to shop at the pantry once a month.

So, where are families in need getting food the rest of the month? The neighborhood needs more support.

The Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger has been farming backyard plots for three years to supplement the food in their pantry. They teach cooking classes, pair kids with elderly community members to learn gardening and farming techniques, and provide clothes to those in need. This organization fights hard for their community.

Now it’s our turn to help out. There is a giant empty plot of land next to their headquarters. It’s been empty for nine years. Dr. Samuels (the executive director of the Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger) has tried everything she can think of to get that land for more urban farming. I called the city council member representing that district to inquire about the land. Will you join me in putting some pressure on the local government to help out? The community needs food. Farming engages everyone, from elementary school students to retirees. This is a win-win situation for the whole neighborhood.

Please call Darlene Mealy at 718-953-3097 or email her at darlene.mealy@council.nyc.gov. Ask her what the plan is for the land at 2010 Fulton Street, Brooklyn NY 11233. It's at a wonky intersection of Fulton and Hull, on Fulton between Howard and Saratoga. Again, it’s been sitting unused for nine years. Let’s change that, let’s help the Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger feed more people. Leave a comment and let me know when you call!

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Dan Kohler is an actor in NYC and the host of RenegadeKitchen.com (where this post originally appeared). You may see him hocking late-night kitchen wares or playing a creep on your television, beware. He has been a member of IACP for 3 years.

By Adam Salomone

I’ve been following, with great interest, the reverberations across the internet as a result of Julia Moskin’s recent New York Times piece on the professional ghostwriter. For those of you that haven’t seen it, you can find the original article here.

The response was tremendous, with voices from across the culinary world weighing in on blogs, websites, Facebook forums, and other social media outlets. The sentiments varied widely and included ghostwriters weighing in with their own experiences in the business, their horror stories and triumphs, as well as cookbook authors extolling the virtues of producing a work for which you get credit.

So you can imagine my equal interest in seeing Michael Ruhlman’s response to Moskin’s article, where he rebukes her general picture that ghostwriters are on the lower rungs of the cookbook-writing totem pole. The general sentiment: cookbook writing has always been a collaborative effort, whether it’s the author, editor, art director, or marketing manager pulling their weight to bring the cookbook to market.

And the subtext: nobody forces a ghostwriter into their position, and if they don’t like it, they can put down pen and paper and walk on.

In both the catalyst from Moskin and the response from Ruhlman, there is a ton of emotional connection to the craft. Both have come into the culinary writing world in their own ways and have their own history to lend to this endeavor. I think there’s more to be said for the conversation around ghostwriting as a whole (although I do agree with Michael’s point that the collaborative nature of cookbook writing is for the benefit of all).

What gets left unsaid is something that is perhaps indicative of our current digital age: that we’ve put those producing content at the very bottom of the list in terms of the importance of bringing culinary vision to consumers. We rely on our chefs and food stars, those in the kitchens across the country to convey and direct our food culture. And people follow.

I say this is indicative of our current age because it coincides with a general acceptance by consumers that all food content is created equal (as evidenced by the growing use of free recipe websites as a way to answer the age old question: “what’s for dinner?”). But indeed, those in the craft of writing about food know that this isn’t the case, that the writing of recipes and food pieces is more than just a matter of transcription, it’s the retelling of a story, it’s the recreation of an experience on the page. Show don’t tell, as they say.

And so to read Moskin’s article about the harshness with which ghostwriters are received, and then to read Ruhlman’s response, which, while it rebuffs some claims, also does validate this same lack of respect for the bearers of our culinary craft is alarming (although perhaps not unexpected). I wish I could say that I see a future in which our writers are celebrated for their talents, though I’m not sure that’s the case, at least not when we have the kinds of relationships between writer and chef that play out in the world of anonymity that comes with working as a ghostwriter.

This does prompt several questions for me that the scope of the articles, while broad, seem to leave untouched. What is the value of content in this evolving world? What is the value of the writer behind the content (even if they are not the one dictating)? How does the world of ghostwriting mirror that of other content businesses, and is the role of author becoming commoditized to whomever can do it with the least resistance (and perhaps the most cost effectively)? And what role do new content creators (i.e. bloggers) play in the commoditization of the writer? Or in the championing of the writer?

I’d love to hear other thoughts and perspectives on this from the community.

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day. He is also a newly elected board member of IACP!

By Sean Timberlake

Pinterest has taken the social world by storm. With its elegant, visually-driven interface, Pinterest reached 10 million unique users faster than any site before it. It’s considered to be the breakout social network of 2012, driving more referral traffic than Google+, YouTube, Reddit and LinkedIn combined. So what is Pinterest, and how can you use it to drive your brand? Janet Helm, nutritionist and blogger at Nutrition Unplugged, is the Chief Food and Nutrition Strategist at Weber Shandwick, affording her a unique perspective on the intersection of food, nutrition and social media.

At its most basic, Pinterest is a virtual bulletin board, hence the pin metaphor. Users post content, images and videos to themed boards; they’ll save recipes they want to try, clothes they want to buy, furniture they want for their house, ideas for planning weddings and events, and so on. 

But it’s Pinterest’s social capacity that makes it powerful. Much like Twitter, you follow others on Pinterest, and they follow you. When you pin something, your followers see it in their feed. If they like it, they can comment on it, like it or repin it into their own feed. Pinning is a one-click action, which is a major part of Pinterest’s outstanding viral power.

At 10% of all pins, food and drink is the network’s fastest-growing category. It’s also the most likely to be repinned; food and drink pins are 50% more likely to be repinned than style and fashion pins, which is a bigger category.

So how do you harness the power of Pinterest?

First of all, the same best practices and rules of etiquette for all social media apply to Pinterest as well. Be respectful, pin content from its original source, and be generous with the link love and repinning. Beyond that, there are a few things to be mindful of for successful pinning:

Provide value. Recipes, DIY projects, cooking techniques, video tutorials, seasonal ideas. Makes you more likely to be repinned.

Promote a lifestyle. Create boards that showcase the lifestyle you represent, not just the products you provide (and want to promote). Repin content that resonates with your brand, and encourage users to share their tastes/interests and experiences with your brand.

Tell stories. Use boards for visual storytelling, and let others become part of the story. For example, Peapod has people pin pics of their delivery trucks.

Get behind the scenes. Share content about the people behind the brand and let the personalities shine. Humanize your brand. The Today Show has a whole pinboard of “Anchor Antics.”

Feature user-generated content. Enable other users to create their own pins on your board by making it collaborative. Leverage customer testimonials in a visual way.

Leverage influencers. Enlist spokespeople as guest pinners. Tap a top pinner to live pin from an event, like fashion blogger Christine Martinez, who was tapped to be a live pinner for a fashion show.

Event-based pinning. Live pin events by uploading images in the moment. Curate event highlights. Create seasonal resources. SXSW, Sweet Paul food styling workshop, and Pillsbury 45 bake-off contest all did this well.

Use it as a social listening tool. Target in on your customers’ likes and dislikes, crowdsource ideas. Enhance your SEO by seeing what your customers are pinning.

Intersect with consumers. Repin, like or comment on others’ pins that align with your brand. Create activities to get consumers to interact with your boards. Lee Jeans repinned someone else’s pin on creating bins made from cut-off jeans legs. America’s Test Kitchen hosted a scavenger hunt by posting a partial image, and making users hunt for the full image on their pinboards.

Host a contest. Ask users to create special pinboards to enter. Winners can be best boards, most likes/repins or a sweepstakes. Saveur did a dream dinner party contest. McCormick Spice and the pork board each did a Pinspiration contest. But first, consult the terms of service to make sure you’re not running afoul of any policies.

Janet’s last morsel of advice? Pindiction -- it happens. Once you get started, you may find it hard to stop.

IACP members can listen to past Speaker Series here.

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Sean Timberlake is professional writer, amateur foodie, avid traveler and all-around bon vivant, as well as the mastermind behind Punk Domestics, a site for the hardcore DIY food community.

By Kathy Blake

Greek flavors, Slavic tastes, the legacy of the Ottoman Empire, and Istanbul Palace Cuisine all contribute to the range of dishes that encompass modern Turkish cooking. We got a peek at that range of flavors at the demonstration “Modern Turkish Cuisine” by Didem Senol, chef at Lokanta Maya in Instabul at the International Culinary Center during the IACP Annual Conference earlier this month.

At its core, however, Chef Senol believes Turkish cooking is all about ingredients. At each stage of her demonstration, Chef Senol passed around some of the components of the tastings she was making so that we would keep in the front of our minds her core philosophy of the importance of ingredients. A square of sweet-tart plum paste, a bowl of earthy smoked bulgur, a bit of sharp cheese with a drizzle of her father’s grassy olive oil: each an element she uses to create her dishes.

Another aspect of her culinary philosophy, she explained, is also about balancing temperature, acidity, and texture on the plate. We all nodded in agreement with this, as we munched on her crisp, pillowy, hot-from-the-oil Herbed Zucchini Fritters dressed with a cool, creamy Cucumber Mint Yogurt Sauce. I savored the interplay of the refreshing yogurt with the crunchy exterior of the fritters dotted with specks of tangy cheese. 

Chef Senol also talked to us about how having been a crossroads of trade has had an impact on the cuisine of Turkey. “It is a very big country and a mix of cultures,” said Senol, pointing out that the country touches both Europe and Asia. Intricate Palace-style meals feature slow-cooked meats with fruits, nuts, and spices. Her dishes capture some of these influences but leave out the sauces and heavy mixtures, of which she is not a fan. We experienced the aromas and tastes of this luxurious style in her delicately perfumed Molasses-Roasted Lamb Shank over Smoked Bulgur which was mixed with bits of sweet quince and nutty coriander seeds.

I left the demonstration wanting to know more about how she balances the interplay of the different foods she has access to with the diverse influences that make up Turkish Cooking. What predominates for her: Asian, Central European, Mediterranean, or a mix of several cultures? It seemed like her brief talk and tasting was far too short of a time for us to explore all the culinary wonders that this dynamic country has to offer.

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Kathy Blake writes The Experimental Gourmand, a blog about getting out and experiencing your local foodscape and interacting with those who are a part of it at farmers markets, food events, and artisan markets.

By Leah Mann

New York to me (and this is speaking from a Canadian Prairie Girl) has always been about the miles of skyline, the shops literally on every corner, the food trucks, Central Park in every season, incredible restaurants, and of course the celebrities. One of my dreams has always been to brush shoulders with Martha Stewart. Thanks to IACP my dream came true on April 2.

My Martha experience started very early. We had to be there at least an hour and half before the show, as there was no way I was going to miss it. We were also asked to wear “bright clothes” only. I just happen to have recently bought a yellow spring scarf that worked perfectly-phew! The IACP group gathered outside (I'm the one in the yellow scarf):

We entered the studio through the prep room, which was filled with colorful posters outlining the incredible story of Martha Stewart Omnimedia. You had a chance, at this point, to fill out a question sheet (if you happen to be one of lucky ones drawn to ask Martha a question—way to go Paula!).

My first impression walking into the studio was that it was just like entering Turkey Hill for Easter dinner. As we walked in, the first thing we saw was a table all decked out for Easter featuring fresh stunning floral centerpieces that popped with coral, yellow, and lilac. The studio was set up in sections from table setting, main kitchen, craft area, and the greenhouse.

One thing that surprised me was the hype and atmosphere. I was expecting something more sedate, but as we were getting ready for Martha to come out, they played J. Lo’s version of  “Let’s Get Loud” and had everyone clapping. It was great and really built the fun and excitement for the audience.

One of Martha’s guests was chef Geoffrey Zakarian from Tudor House, and they entertained us with some early-spring Easter brunch ideas. The recipes featured were a Grilled Ramp and Asparagus Quiche and a Shaved Spring Salad. We did not leave empty handed, as we all won a quiche pan and bag of Easter Jelly Bellies! Martha came back out after the show and made time for the other questions that were not answered.

Martha was exactly how I thought she would be—a brilliant, classy lady! It truly was an experience of a lifetime (especially with the Martha Stewart show ending). Thank you IACP for making dreams possible!

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Leah Mann is a project manager for CanolaInfo. She was one of the lucky winners from the March Frontburner to win a ticket to a taping of The Martha Stewart Show.

By Eagranie Yuh

Just in case anyone on April’s Food Writers, Editors and Publishers Speaker Series was looking for the ultimate way to juggle projects, guest speaker Melissa Clark set things straight: “I don’t have a magic bullet.” What she did offer was a glimpse inside the life of a New York Times columnist, accomplished cookbook writer, and busy mom.

The Juggling Act

Each month, for her The New York Times column, Clark writes three articles with one recipe each, and one extensive article with several recipes. Once a month, she also records videos that reference her column but stand on their own. While The New York Times is a perennial project, they’re not enough of a revenue stream on their own. She’s currently working on two cookbook projects: a cookbook for Franny’s, a Brooklyn-based pizzeria, and one with Bobby Deen. Clark doesn’t do much freelance magazine work these days (“a lot has dried up”) nor does she blog for sites other than her own. For her own site, her strategy is to enlighten or teach readers through recipes, tips and tricks.

If that weren’t enough, Clark also shares parenting duties with her husband (they have a 3½-year-old daughter) and cares for her aging parents.

Tip Number 1: Surround Yourself with Good People

Because Clark juggles so many projects, having a stable environment and a reliable team is important. That team includes her editors at The New York Times, long-standing relationships with a recipe tester and an editorial assistant, and a babysitter. Says Clark: “I write a lot of books because I work with amazing people [whom] I depend on and couldn’t do without…I can take an extra project because I have the help.”

Tip Number 2: Know Your Priorities

Clark’s workday typically starts at 8:30 am, though if things are really hectic, she’ll work from 6:00 am  to 7:30 am before her family wakes up. Throughout the day, she prioritizes and re-prioritizes tasks as projects evolve.

Clark says that her biggest challenge is balancing all the projects and making time for them within a week. She’s still looking for a system that enables her to stay on top of everything. While she can track the important things, she finds it challenging to deal with “the little splinters”—the little details that eat up time.

Tip Number 3: Keep Yourself Clear

While her home office is great for e-mail and working out recipe testing details, Clark gets her writing done elsewhere: at the coffeeshop, in bed, or even on the subway. The train ride from Brooklyn to The New York Times office is approximately 30 minutes, during which Clark can write two or three headnotes.

Further, because she works on so many projects concurrently, she focuses on one project per writing session. “I never bring two writing projects with me…I need to be in a different mental state for each one.”

Next Steps

As Clark wraps up her current cookbook projects, she’s thinking about her next move. In her head, she’s been writing a memoir. Given the success of her New York Times videos, there’s the allure of television, “but that’s a whole different road that I’m only beginning to start researching.”

Finally, Clark notes that to maintain the income she had six years ago, she’s had to take on more work. However, she sees opportunities for people to be creative and entrepreneurial: “There’s a lot of opportunity for people who are passionate about food.”

Plenty of you reading this are jugglers—how do you keep all the balls in the air? Any tips, tricks, or strategies you'd like to share?

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Eagranie Yuh is a freelance writer and chocolate educator living in Vancouver, Canada. Learn more about her at thewelltemperedchocolatier.com.

By Kathy Blake

“I wanted to show that Nordic [cooking] principles like foraging and smoking could be done anywhere in the world.”

                                      - Gunnar Karl Gislason of Dill Restaurant, Reykjavik, Iceland

Succulent lamb smoked over foraged hay; light, flaky cod dressed with an herb-cheese pesto and burnt rye bread (rugbrauð) crumbs; savory dried catfish flakes (harðfiskur) mixed with a brown butter sauce and a drizzle of dill oil. These were the unique and inspiring dishes created by Chef Gislason that attendees tasted at his demonstration at the French Culinary Institute during the Annual Conference.

Chef Gislason’s creations showcase the bounty of home-grown ingredients. Along with traditional Icelandic foods like lamb, dill, cod, rye bread, and gorgeous, creamy butter, he forages for many of the components that appear on his seasonally-inspired menu, like the hay that gave our lamb its smoky finish or the herbs for the pesto. 

During the demo, that hay was put in a warming tray and lit on fire.  The lamb, which had been seared and cooked, was then placed on a rack over the dying embers and covered to allow the meat to capture the fresh, dried grass-like aromas. The resulting dish of rich, fragrant lamb with tender, shredded lamb as a base was paired with sweet pickled onions and tangy pickled cabbage. 

Chef Gislason commented during his talk that people might be confused by this term “New Nordic,” but really its principles, like pickling, foraging, and smoking, can be applied anywhere. For him, this is more of a return to being open to the ingredients that are near to hand along with cooking techniques that people have relied upon for centuries. He routinely seeks out people in Iceland who are still making food according to traditional methods, such as salt cod dried for a minimum of nine months, to bring their products into his restaurant.

Having participated on a foraging expedition in Central Park several summers ago, I could appreciate what he was saying about the bounty of ingredients that grow all around us; however, lighting hay on fire or smoking anything might be a bit trickier to do in my small apartment.  What was interesting to me was to observe the reverence that Chef Gislason has for the customs and cuisine of his country and how he communicates that through his cooking to an audience looking to experience his culinary vision as well as to understand something about the Icelandic culture.

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Kathy Blake writes The Experimental Gourmand, a blog about getting out and experiencing your local foodscape and interacting with those who are a part of it at farmers markets, food events, and artisan markets.

The IACP blog has been a great source for news about the organization, but we want to make it even better. We want to add more industry news, trend stories, expanded member milestones—even op-ed pieces and essays. Anything, really, that will be of interest and use to members and keep the magic of Conference alive throughout the year. While we have plenty of ideas about the kinds of pieces we think you'd like, only you know for sure. So we'd love to hear two things: First, what would you like to see on the IACP blog? Second, what would you like to write for the IACP blog?

Write, you ask? Yes. Much like how the panels and sessions at the Annual Conference are primariy led by fellow members, that same exchange and discourse can take place virtually right here all year long. So we invite you to send your ideas for blog posts, especially those that relate to your specialty and niche within the culinary world. See a trend happening in your field that you think the wider membership would like to know about? Attend an event in your burg where you learned something that changed how you think about your work? Have a milestone that gave you a new perspective or taught you a vaulable lesson? Outraged at a piece of food news? We'd love to have you share it with us.

Comment below or email communications@iacp.com.

The April issue of Frontburner, IACP's monthly e-zine, is out (read the issue here). I hope you'll find plenty to read and think about in this month's issue, but I was particularly struck by this question from Sharon Sanders and the answer from Barbara Fairchild (editor of the weekly online and tablet food magazine, Real Eats, and former editor-in-chief of Bon Appétit):

Sharon Sanders: In a world of tweets, is there still room for tomes? I'm thinking of the inspirational ability and depth of information in books by authors such as Elizabeth David, Claudia Roden, Marcella Hazan and others.

Barbara Fairchild: I think if a seminal figure like one of them—or Julia Child, certainly—came along, that there would be an opportunity to have a “tome” again. But the problem goes deeper than just creating the work: A book publisher has to be willing to guide, encourage, and support a book like that, and that aspect of the business has changed, too. The big publishing houses have cut back in staff and promotion. There is a lot of clutter in the cookbook category because of the TV influence, and as long as those books sell well, it changes the nature of what is published.

These kinds of "tomes," authoritative texts covering specific cuisines, taught me and countless others how to cook. Most people learn how to cook from parents and grandparents, but I'm not exaggerating in any way when I say that I learned from tomes by Jacques Pépin, Madhur Jaffrey, Marcella Hazan, and Mollie Katzen. The exchange above from The Dish this month got me thinking: Who would I like to see a tome from now? Does the diversification, constant demand for content, and expansion of the range of media make such tome-writing just more difficult or perhaps less necessary?

This quickly leads me to wonder what defines a tome rather then a book in the culinary realm? Does size factor in, or is it simply influence and authority? Am I so interested in all this simply because I love the word "tome"?

What I love about IACP is that there are both tome-writers and tome-readers out there who can chime in on these weighty questions with insight and questions of their own. Please do.

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Molly Watson serves as the Communications Editor for IACP, runs the Local Foods site for About.com, contributes to Edible San Francisco, and tells stories at The Dinner Files.

By Ivy Manning

In a week full of "pinch me I'm dreaming" moments at this year's IACP Conference in New York City—including sitting next to Sarah Moulton in the audience of a panel discussion, getting a peck on the cheek from Dorie Greenspan, and taking a tour of the hallowed halls of Saveur—there was one 90-minute session that made time stand still.

As I walked into a tiny conference room for the "The Experts Are In: How to Find the Real Cuisine of a Country and Recreate It Once You’re Back Home," led by Naomi Duguid, I was shocked to find Duguid herself shepherding people into the few remaining seats in the room with her characteristic kindness and warmth.

Duguid, co-author of the award winning books including Flatbreads and Flavors, The Seductions of Rice, Hot Salty Sour Sweet, Mangoes and Curry Leaves, and Beyond the Great Wall, has set the standard in excellence when it comes to approaching cuisines from afar. With grace, intelligence, curiosity, and an incredible photographer's eye, Duguid has introduced many of us to flavors and cultures that have left us hungry for more. Duguid's newest book, based on her many visits to Burma, will be published by Artisan Books in September.

Duguid stood in front of the room without a podium and shared her secrets to being a great traveler and food writer, enthusiastically gesturing with her hands, making eye contact with everyone in the crowded room, and even tearing up at one point as she recalled a wonderful woman in Senegal who spent three days teaching her to bake bread.

Here's a few of the points she made during the session about writing, photography, learning to cook foreign cuisines, and being open to life's experiences:

• Learn words for foods and polite phrases before you go, it can go a long way towards people opening up.
• Do some research at local markets so you're familiar with ingredients you'll see during your visit, and you'll know where to find them when you get back.
• Let go of the idea that you know anything about what it's going to be like when you arrive, those ideas can cloud your experience and prevent you from experiencing your destination. Work on letting go of preconceived notions of how your travels "should be."
• Go alone. There are many insights you will get from being alone that you would miss if you were chatting with your friend or spouse. People will talk to you more readily if you're not already focused on someone else.
• Plan to go to smaller towns to get a sense of what the people are truly about. 
• Allocate time generously. Visit just a few places and let them sink in.
• Stay at guesthouses, not hotels. Get friendly with the proprietor and long-term guests to get the scoop about the markets, festivals, good cooks, and other details of where you are visiting.
• Go to the same market at different times of the day so you can see different things happening.
• Don't skip breakfast! Eat the congee, or slippery rice noodles with pork, or whatever it is that locals eat in the morning, it's some of the best food of the day.
• Be open to being vulnerable. Free fall is a good thing. If you're open, you're much more likely to meet people and be invited to a wedding, or a party, or just to a great cook's house to learn a dish. Open those windows into the "chance-o-sphere" and great things will happen.
• Embark on conversations with everyone, all the time. Take the risk.
• Be prepared to have flat times during the day where you're not doing anything. That's the point. Just sit, drink tea, write, and let the place wash over you.
• Use a camera to take notes so you can be more present. Back in your room, write. However much you write, it's never enough.
• Never refuse food that is offered to you. It's not about what you like, it's about how to appreciate what they appreciate, to learn. Don't judge, just say to yourself, "Oh, that's a taste of 'delicious' here, how interesting."
• Make the recipes you learned as soon as you come home, and cook and eat them alone so you can concentrate on knowing the flavors. Don't make a dinner party of it, it's too distracting.
• When you make a dish from your travels at home for the first time, make it exactly how it's done there. If it's crazy-spicy, make it that way at home once. Then, if you need to change the recipe to make it more palatable for Western cooks, you can change it, but you need that baseline understanding of the dish before you adjust it. Get that "taste memory" on your palate first.
• If you do adjust a recipe, tell your readers what it's like in the place you learned it, how you changed it, and why. Be transparent and they will appreciate the information and authenticity.

At the end of the session, which in some ways felt like a mini-soul searching retreat, she was met with applause and hugs. It was truly a "worth the price of admission" session; if you're ever able to see her speak, I highly recommend it.

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Ivy Manning is a food writer and author of The Farm to Table Cookbook, The Adaptable Feast and the forthcoming Crackers, Crisps, and Dips (Chronicle Books, 2013). She lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband Gregor, retired racing greyhound Mini, and Thor the whippet-Killer of Flies. Visit her at ivymanning.com.

By Jill O'Connor

Tongues are still wagging over Amanda Hesser’s recent letter to future food writers, or as she is currently referring to it on Food 52, “Death of the Food Writer.” Ouch. As a cookbook author and food writer myself, I’ve been interested in the passionate responses of my fellow writers. With times so dire, creative and constructive thinking is more important than ever. One of my favorite sessions during the New York IACP Conference this year was “If You Want to Succeed, Stop Planning and Start Visioning,” led by CEO and co-founding partner of Zingerman’s Community of Businesses, Ari Weinzweig. This one session completely changed how I now think about my career. 

What Visioning Is—and What it Isn’t

“I usually just throw a bunch of ideas against the wall and see what sticks,” laughed one of my favorite cookbook authors as we sat down for the session. How many of us conduct our career this way--putting out fires as they crop up and grabbing any and all opportunities as they pass in front of us? Visioning, according to Weinzweig, eliminates this often desperate business model. Visioning is positive. It’s about “creating a scenario that you want to happen, not about what’s wrong with the world as we currently know it… or reactive efforts to avoid the pain of our current situation.”

Creating a vision is not the same as a creating a fantasy, nor is it a strategic plan—that comes later. You can’t plan a strategy to get somewhere if you don’t know where it is you really want to go. It is the process we should all use before we start any project, big or small. When you sit down to write out your vision, you are creating something you can get excited about, something that inspires you to get up every morning and slog through the inevitable distractions that plague us all as we work toward a long-term goal. 

The best visions are inspirational and strategically achievable—in other words, no huge lottery wins or dates with George Clooney. Make your vision a detail-rich, sensory experience incorporating your deepest thoughts, hopes, and dreams. If these dreams include travel, plenty of time to enjoy your children, professional accolades and cash—even if it includes a beautiful new kitchen with crown molding and a new Viking range, include that too.

How Visioning Works

Having a clear vision of your very best future helps maintain your course when you grow disheartened. “Having a written vision helps overcome that mid-course feeling of impending doom,” said Mr. Weinzweig. He also pointed out that if you know where you are going and what you want, you will also know where you don’t want to go and it will be easier to avoid distractions and wrong turns. 

Writing a vision of your future doesn’t make the path easy. It doesn’t sprinkle fairy dust over problems and make them go away, but it just might be the machete you need to help cut a path through the jungle. It offers clarity, hope, and inspiration. And joy.

So, as Weinzweig put it, if you want to build the cathedral, and not just lay the bricks, visioning your future may be just the ticket. I know it is for me.  

For more information see A Lapsed Anarchist’s Approach to Building a Great Business by Ari Weinzweig.

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Jill O’Connor is a cookbook author and food writer. Her books include Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey: Desserts for the Serious Sweet Tooth and Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey Treats for Kids.

By Debbie Koenig

In February my first cookbook was published: Parents Need to Eat Too: Nap-Friendly Recipes, One-Handed Meals, and Time-Saving Kitchen Tricks for New Parents (William Morrow/HarperCollins). It combines 150-plus recipes with equal parts reassurance and advice, to help new parents care for themselves as well as they do their babies.

Parents Need to Eat Too, the concept, was born in March 2009. My son’s preschool held regular “moms’ meetings,” at which we’d teach each other whatever we were good at. When my turn rolled around, I showed the group how to make ratatouille in a slow cooker. At the end of the session, one mom pulled me aside to tell me how much she’d enjoyed it—and suggested that I teach cooking to new moms, since so much of what I’d shared was specific to the challenges they face. By that afternoon, I’d laid out the basic structure, a series of four classes focused on the tricks and skills I’d developed since my son’s birth: The New Mom’s Pantry, Big Batch Cooking, The Slow Cooker, and Nap-Friendly Recipes. I announced the class on my blog and on the local parents’ message board, and within hours it was fully booked.

Before becoming a food writer, I’d worked for 15 years in book marketing—I realized immediately that I had stumbled upon a new niche, one that hasn’t been covered in this way. I put together a proposal, signed with my now-agent, Anne Marie O'Farrell at Marcil-O'Farrell Literary, and we were off and running. HarperCollins bought the book in November 2009.

Here’s how little I knew about how much work was involved in cookbook writing: Using social media, message boards, and my blog, I recruited an army of real-life recipe testers—more than 100 new moms from across the country, plus a handful on the other side of the world. Some considered themselves advanced home cooks, whereas others had never previously attempted much more than spaghetti. All had babies under a year old. Each month of 2010, we worked on one chapter. I’d email out the list of recipes at the beginning of the month, and the moms would choose—they committed to trying at least two each time they participated. Most months, I had between 30 and 50 moms actively involved. They reported back on everything from how well the instructions worked, to how they (and their partners, older children, and babies) liked the end result, to how they’d tweak the recipe if left to their own devices, to what it was like to cook with the baby. When we tested the chapter using lactogenic foods, the moms included feedback on how it helped their supply of breast milk.

Are you laughing? I am, in retrospect. I still can’t believe I made the process so much more complicated than it needed to be. But in the finished book, each recipe ends with “Mama Said,” a quote from one of my mom-testers about her experience preparing it. Their voices have added considerably to the end result: Any parent can pick this up and be confident that the recipes work.

In many ways Parents Need to Eat Too is more than just a cookbook—it’s about living a full life with a new baby in the house. It includes sidebars and sections on things like grocery shopping with baby, food safety, tips on juggling from WOHMs (that’s Work-Outside-the-Home Moms), organics, BPA, and the specific nutritional needs of a nursing mom. It has a foreword from a pediatric dietitian, who also read over every recipe to ensure they’re nutritionally sound, plus an interview with a lactation consultant.

It took me 26 months to go from “let’s make a baby!” to holding my newborn son. It took ten months longer to get this cookbook from conception to bookstore shelves. I’m still not sure which gestation was more challenging, or more rewarding. Yet I do know this: Mother’s Day is coming, and I’ve got a whole lot to celebrate.

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Debbie Koenig is a food writer, often through the filter of family or diet. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Parents, Kiwi, and Weight Watchers, among other publications. When she's not writing, cooking, or blogging, she's on the road in search of hot dogs worth the trip. Koenig lives in Brooklyn with her omnivorous husband and their non-nivorous son, Harry. To learn more, visit debbiekoenig.com.

by Adam Salomone

This year’s Annual Conference was my fourth and I’m no less amazed now than when I was at my first. It’s easy to be lulled into a sense of expectation for what IACP has to offer, to register every year with the last conference (or conferences) in mind, to make your plans based on past experience. Like conferences in plenty of other industries, the Annual Conference is an event everyone knows about, talks about, and plans for. There’s something about that sort of expectation that can make the whole endeavor feel rather predictable. Yet if ever there was a time to look at IACP in new ways and get beyond expectations, this was the year. Whether it was the stint in NYC, the introduction of the Blogger Expo, or the incredible diversity of content on everything from ancient grains to the modern cookbook, IACP 2012 had much to offer members both old and new.

2012 was a year of many firsts. The biggest was perhaps the switch from having an outside company handle the conference logistics to self-management by the IACP organization. The benefits are far-reaching, since we now have more flexibility in planning and the ability to implement richer and more productive programming. Self-management also means that more work falls to the volunteers who tirelessly bring IACP forward year after year. Now, more than ever, IACP is dependent on those who believe in and see the vision for the road ahead to help continue to build the organization. And so I encourage anyone reading this who thought “if I were doing this, I’d do it this way” or “I wish this were done another way.” Well, now is your chance.

The road ahead is full of opportunity for IACP and for its members. This year was one step in the direction of envisioning the future for the organization, one that embraces the rich history upon which IACP is built, and is also aimed at bringing younger culinary professionals into the fold to interact and learn. I can’t tell you how many people I talked with at conference who were attending for the first time. The response was practically unanimous in the scope of connections made, things learned, experiences had. I also talked with many members of IACP who had been coming to Conference for years and the response was the same. Even after so many years, we never stop learning and growing together, whether this is our tenth Annual Conference or our first.

And that is the true power of The International Association of Culinary Professionals. It’s not any one person, or committee, or conference. It’s the members—each and every one of us—that provide an incredible tapestry of experience from which we can all learn. It takes a specific kind of community to do that. And a very dedicated organization to make all of that happen.

I have never known a group of people so giving of their time or so willing to share, and it’s what has made my last four years as powerful as they have been. At a time when we continue to look for the path ahead, we must remember that it’s just as much about all of us as anything else. And in bringing members along, we are not so much changing what’s come before as building upon it.

As a member of this organization, I look forward to building what’s to come with each and every one of you.

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day. He is also a newly elected board member of IACP!

The future of food writing has been a popular topic at the IACP Annual Conference ever since I first attended (2006 in Seattle). Now our collective post-Conference motivation is being popped like a day-old party balloon. The culprit? Amanda Hesser's Food 52 blog post, Advice for Future Food Writers. The heart of the piece is simple: "Except for a very small group of people (some of whom are clinging to jobs at magazines that pay more than the magazines' business models can actually afford), it’s nearly impossible to make a living as a food writer, and I think it’s only going to get worse."

Hesser then goes on to suggest that aspiring food writers become "doers," working in the food world somehow and writing about it on the side.

She's gotten plenty of agreement, as well as more than one "I'm glad it's not just me!" response, and deserves a lot of credit for her thoughtful and honest assessment of the changes she's seen in food writing during her career so far. A more critical response from John Birdsall at chow.com clickably titled What Amanda Hesser Got Wrong adds a bit of historical perspective as well as a sunnier interpretation of the lay of the land and what it means for food writing as a whole that's worth reading.

Overall she offers what is probably sound advice. When I read her piece, however, I felt like I was back in a Greenbrier conference room in 2005 as Andy Schloss asked those of us assembled if we were food people who wanted to write or writers who liked food. If you're a food person who wants to write, Hesser's prescription is pitch-perfect. If, however, you are a writer first, it falls a bit flat. Or, is her lament about the difficulty of making a living as a food writer true for writers in general? Is it more true now than in the history of writing, a profession with a long and noble history of poor pay?

IACP is filled with plenty of working food writers. What do you think about Hesser's piece? Have you written a response on your own website or blog? What advice would you give future food writers?

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Molly Watson serves as the Communications Editor for IACP, runs the Local Foods site for About.com, contributes to Edible San Francisco, and tells stories at The Dinner Files.

By Andrea Lynn

This was my first time attending the IACP Annual Conference. Between the range of programming, advice from people who had been before, and the generosity of the IACP community, I walked away with tons of new ideas, tips, and ideas, including these three big-picture take-aways:

1. Diversifying Income is Key for Freelancers

As a freelance food writer and recipe developer, the best sessions for me were the ones where panelists were open and frank about everything, most especially financial breakdowns and income streams. Vagueness concerning money and where to find work is of no use to me. I need it spelled out, like it was in “How To Transform Your Freelance Work into a Real Career,” where Jess Thomson bravely displayed a chart with a monetary breakdown of how she diversifies to earn income from a variety of sources including cookbook writing, corporate copy, and more. I also appreciated “How to Write for Online Magazines,” where panelists offered no illusions about the pay scale, but also pointed out that websites can offer other rewards. For example, at the IACP awards, a bevy of nominees and winners were from website writing, like Tamar Adler, who won an award for her Gilt Taste essay and Cheryl Sternman Rule, who was recognized for pouring her heart and soul into her website, 5 Second Rule, for years.

Takeaway: Diversify. A successful freelance career comes from translating talents into a variety of types of work, including online. Figure out what you want from website writing and target accordingly, whether you want a published food essay to shop around for awards, more attention for your cookbook, or for just establishing a greater online presence.

2. Ask Questions from People in the Know

As a first-time attendee, I was immensely grateful for the helpfulness of the IACP community, both in the sessions and the networking gatherings. As someone trying to break into ghostwriting and co-authoring cookbooks, Melissa Clark’s panel on working as a co-writer was excellent because she was forthcoming about everything in the process, from the money amounts to ask for to other essentials of contract negotiation. There were also little tidbits I had never thought of like particulars in the font size of your name on the cookbook cover, capping the amount of the photo shoot bill a co-author has to contribute to, and the assumption that you have to be in the same city as your co-author (Clark does just fine with recording phone sessions.) Between Clark’s honesty on all avenues of co-authoring combined with the helpfulness and willingness of so many people in the IACP community, I learned that it pays to ask questions when you have them, especially before you sign any type of contract.

Takeaway: I was overwhelmed by the graciousness of so many IACP members who were willing to share their knowledge. Don’t be scared to contact people you admire and (nicely) ask questions.

3. Vision Where You Want to Be

One piece of advice I had received from an IACP conference regular was to sign up for one session that I would normally never attend. That led me to Ari Weinzweig’s “If You Want to Succeed, Stop Planning and Start ‘Visioning.’ ” I’m not alone in thinking it was one of the most inspiring sessions at IACP. It was uplifting to hear of Weinzweig’s success and how visioning had a large impact on that. One exercise we did in the class was to picture ourselves three years from that day, writing a very specific outline of our day’s duties. There has to be a vision to strive for to be successful. Don’t expect things to fall into your lap. Create a plan for what you want out of your career, and work every day toward that plan.

Takeaway: Figure out specific goals and work as hard as you can to attain them.

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Andrea Lynn is an NYC-based freelance food writer and recipe developer with a couple of cookbooks under her belt, including the upcoming, The Artisan Soda Workshop.

By Molly Watson

I was sad to miss the Awards Gala, not so much for the gala-ness of it all (sequins and spangles have never been my style), but for the pleasure of seeing friends and colleagues accept well-deserved awards recognizing their achievements. (The chance of bumping into a culinary hero is always, of course, an added draw of IACP events!) In case you missed it too, here are the 2012 IACP Awards Winners, in all their collective, magnificent, stunning glory:

Cookbook Awards

Cookbook of the Year: Tasting India (Author: Christine Manfield; Editor: Allison Cowin; Publisher: Penguin Group Australia)
People’s Choice: Art of Pasta
American: The Apple Lover’s Cookbook (Author: Amy Traverso; Editor: Maria Guarnaschelli; Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.)
Baking: Baking Style: Art Craft Recipes (Author: Lisa Yockelson; Editor: Pamela Chirls; Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.)
Chefs and Restaurants: The Blue Tomato: The Inspirations Behind the Cuisine of Alan Wong (Author: Alan Wong; Publisher: Watermark Publishing)
Children, Youth, and Family: My Family Table (Author: John Besh; Editor: Jean Lucas; Publisher: Andrews McMeel)
Compilations: The Cakebread Cellars American Harvest Cookbook (Authors: Jack & Dolores Cakebread, Brian Streeter, Janet Fletcher; Publisher: Ten Speed Press)
Culinary History: High on the Hog (Author: Jessica Harris; Editor: Kathy Belden; Publisher: Bloosmbury USA)
Culinary Travel: Tasting India (Author: Christine Manfield; Editor: Alison Cowan; Publisher: Penguin Group Australia)
The Design Award: Modernist Cuisine (Authors: Nathan Myhrvold, Chris Young, Maxime Billet; Publisher: The Cooking Lab)
First Book – The Julia Child Award: Ancient Grains for Modern Meals (Author: Maria Speck; Editors: Jenny Wapner & Dawn Yanagihara; Publisher: Ten Speed Press);
Food and Beverage Reference/Technical: Ruhlman’s Twenty (Author: Michael Ruhlman; Editors: Bill LeBlond and Sarah Billingsley; Publisher: Chronicle Books)
Food Matters: Tomatoland (Author: Barry Estabrook; Editor: Chris Schillig; Publisher: Andrews McMeel
Food Photography and Styling: The Art of Pasta (Author: Lucio Galletto; Editor: Alison Cowan; Publisher: Penguin Group Australia)
General: All About Roasting (Author: Molly Stevens; Editor: Maria Guarnaschelli; Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.)
Health and Special Diet: Ancient Grains for Modern Meals (Author: Maria Speck; Editors: Jenny Wapner & Dawn Yanagihara; Publisher: Ten Speed Press)
International: The Food of Spain (Author: Claudia Roden; Editor: Libby Edelson; Publisher: HarperCollins/Ecco)
The Jane Grigson Award: Tomatoland (Author: Barry Estabrook; Editor: Chris Schillig; Publisher: Andrews McMeel, “Inside the Jewish Bakery” (Authors: Stanley Ginsberg and Norman Berg; Publisher: Camino Books)
Literary Food Writing: The Table Comes First (Author: Adam Gopnik; Publisher: Knopf)
Professional Kitchens: Modernist Cuisine (Authors: Nathan Myhrvold, Chris Young, Maxime Billet; Publisher: The Cooking Lab)
Single Subject: All About Roasting (Author: Molly Stevens; Editor: Maria Guarnaschelli; Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.)
The Visionary Achievement Awards: Modernist Cuisine (Authors: Nathan Myhrvold, Chris Young, Maxime Billet; Publisher: The Cooking Lab)
Wine, Beer, or Spirits: Bitters: A Spirited History of a Classic Cure-All, with Cocktails, Recipes… (Author: Brad Thomas Parsons; Editor: Emily Timberlake; Publisher: Ten Speed Press)

New Media & Broadcast Awards

Televised Culinary Series: Essential Pépin (Host: Jacques Pépin, KQED-TV)
Culinary Blog: 5 Second Rule (Cheryl Sternman Rule)
Culinary Website: Saveur.com
Culinary Product or Brand Website: Gilt Taste
People's Choice (blog): Shiksa in the Kitchen, Tori Avey
Intriguing Use of New Technology: SFA Stories, Southern Foodways Alliance (Device app that puts oral histories into geographical context)
Video Series (Short Program Format): Saveur’s “Sandwich Stories”
Audio Series (Long Format): KCRW’s Good Food with Evan Kleiman
Audio Series (Short Format): Southern Foodways Oral History: Gathering the Stories Behind Food
Humorous Video Short: “Spaghetti with 100 Sweet Tomatoes” (The Recipe Project)

Bert Greene Awards

Culinary Writing With or Without Recipes: “The Cake That Makes Our Family” (Lila Byock, Gilt Taste)
Culinary Writing About Beverages: “Beer Wars” (Kevin Cook, Playboy)
Instructional Culinary Writing with Recipes: “Eat Shoots & Leaves” (a series by Raquel Pelzel, Amanda Cohen, Aki Kamozawa & Alex Talbot, Adam Erace, Sheri Castle; Gilt Taste)
Culinary Travel Writing or Memoirs and Personal Essays: “Sibling Rivalry at the Stove” (Tamar Adler, Gilt Taste)
Culinary Writing That Makes a Difference: “Is This the Food of the Future?” (John McQuaid, EatingWell)

Awards of Excellence

Cooking Teacher of the Year: Candy Argonedizza
Consumer Educational and Communication Materials of the Year: The Beef Checkoff
Corporate Marketing Campaign of the Year: Darigold
Culinary Tour Operator of the Year: George Geary, CCP
Culinary Youth Advocate of the Year: Purple Asparagus
Entrepreneur or Business Person of the Year: Lia Huber
Food Photographer or Stylist of the Year: Todd Coleman, Saveur
Test Kitchen Professional of the Year: BJ Food Consulting
Vocational Cooking School of the Year: International Culinary Center
Wine Steward or Sommelier of the Year: John Peter Laloganes

Special Recognition


The Special Recognition Awards pay tribute to notable culinary professionals who have made significant and lasting contributions to the culinary industry and/or IACP.
Humanitarian: Ann Cooper, Lunch Lessons, LLC
Lifetime Achievement: Fedele Bauccio, CEO and Cofounder of Bon Appetit Management Company
Community Service: Bob Lewis and Barry Benepe, founders of NYC Greenmarket

Culinary Classics Book Awards

Introduced in 2011 to recognize culinary works that have withstood the test of time, Culinary Classics Book Awards can cover any culinary-related topic, must have been published at least five years ago but no earlier than 1945, and must have (1) significantly altered the way we think about food and (2) contributed in a meaningful way to the field of culinary literature. Winners include:
La Technique: An Illustrated Guide to the Fundamental Technique of Cooking, Jacques Pépin (Times Books/PocketBooks, 1978)
The New York Times Cookbook, Craig Claiborne (Harper, 1961)
James Beard’s American Cookery, James Beard (Little Brown and Company, 1972)
The Art of Eating, M.F.K.Fisher (World Publishing Company/ Macmillan, 1954)
Paul Prudhomme’s Louisiana Kitchen, Paul Prudhomme (William Morrow, 1984)

By Adam Salomone

If Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, IACP NYC broke all the rules. For those of you following along on the blog (and attending the conference in person), you’ve seen what a jam-packed few days it’s been. And that was no less true on Sunday, with back-to-back-to-back Culinary, Book, and Blog Expos happening at 82 Mercer Street, along with a ton of other great programming at the Institute of Culinary Education, among other things.

The Culinary Expo was abuzz with activity, both from professionals and consumers (this year, the Expo was indeed opened up to the consumer market, which made for a lively and interactive few hours at the show). Aside from being an exhibitor at the event, I also had a chance to walk the floor and see some of what was on offer from various vendors, sponsors, and brands. It was an incredible showing, and there was plenty of food to go around for hungry hearts, minds, and stomachs (I personally loved the salmon burgers from the Alaska Salmon Council, though the bagels and lox, as well as the Bays English Muffins topped my list as well. I am easy to please, what can I say…?).

Every year, the Culinary Expo is a capstone event related to my involvement with IACP. It’s a great opportunity to meet and talk with members, as most end up walking through the exhibit hall, while also checking out the Book Expo, which is always a lively and engaging event. This year was the first year in which IACP also sponsored the Blogger Expo, and while I didn’t have a chance to check it out, I do hope it becomes a bigger piece of the conference going forward, and that bloggers find a larger role for themselves at IACP.

All in all, it was a well-trafficked and well-received event. Members, consumers, and sponsors seemed to enjoy the interactions, while also being able to sample some of what their peers were offering throughout the day. It seemed that the Expo delivered as promised for all in attendance, and I was happy to be a part of it.

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Kathy Blake

The Annual Conference was four jam-packed days of networking, attending panels about the food business, eating, snacking, nibbling, and catching up with some of the amazing folks who work in this industry. Yesterday, I was able to see the fruits of the hard work that my fellow conference volunteers and I did together in a Culinary Expo called Taste of the 5 Boroughs, showcasing New York artisan food purveyors.

The Jam Stand

Raspberry jam with a kick of heat. Bananas with lime and rum. Wine-inflected sweet red onions. These are just a few of the great flavors Sabrina and Jessica have come up with to jazz up the NYC jam scene. I got to chat with Sabrina today and found out that we’ll be able to catch them at the markets this season. They’ll be hanging out at the Hester Street Fair for a few Saturdays. I’ll be there, too, picking up some of their flavorful jams.

Regal Vegan

Today, I found a new reason to count the days until succulent ripe tomatoes are finally in season again: Basilicotta from Regal Vegan.  I’d tried Ella’s Faux Gras at Smorgasburg last summer and had really enjoyed it. The Basilicotta, however, I think is on another level altogether with its creamy texture and bright, grassy, herbal notes, perfect for pairing with summer vegetables and pastas. I’m hoping I’ll see it for sale around the local markets because this is definitely on my shopping list.

Granola Lab

What can I say about this product?  Alex’s granola has the ideal balance of fruit, nuts, flakes, sweet, salty, savory, chewy.  Your stomach is begging you to make a breakfast this tasty.  She’ll also be in the markets this summer, so pick up a few bags for your pantry.  You can use it to make Granola-Yogurt Parfaits, which would be ideal for brunch gatherings or anytime.

Josephine’s Feast

These are some other products I’m going to be keeping my eye out for to pick up and try at home. I sampled the exotic fig jam with deep, dark notes and one of the blood orange jams, which was full of citrus perfume. I’ll need to clear off some space on my refrigerator shelves to make room for a few of these, which would be lovely with a nice cheese platter.

Brooklyn Oenology

Craig and Alie brought some of their New York State-produced wines to the expo to give everyone a taste of what local winemakers are doing.  This table had a line several people deep throughout the afternoon. I sipped a sample of the rosé, with its gorgeous watermelon hue and lovely light fruit flavors. A few bottles of this would kick off any summer party on the right note.

The Rescue Baker

These sweet treats also seemed to be a big hit at the expo, with so many great things to choose from. It was really tempting to load up on the samples of cookies and cakes. Having rescued a few people from baking projects in the past, it was interesting to see this business and hear about how it had developed.

Mitchmallows

I first met Mitch and his delicious, whimsical marshmallows at the Foodshed market last year. Since then, I’ve enjoyed seeing what flavor and design his ever-creative mind is going to develop next. In addition to his sweet, slightly spicy ChurrosMallow and a fan-favorite Ginger Wasabi mallow, I munched on these new MallowPolitans, reminiscent of the tri-colored ice cream blocks that I thought were so fancy when I was growing up. One bite, and I was right back at a childhood dinner with all the mixed up vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry flavors flooding right back.

Spoonable Caramel

Caramel really is one of my favorite flavors, so I’m enjoying it making an appearance on the artisan food scene, too. Michelle’s product is available at several local-area stores, and has been a bit hit, which is no surprise to anyone who has tasted her smooth, buttery concoctions with their great flavor balance of sweet and salt and sometimes spice. At the expo, we also got to try a new Brooklyn Butterscotch. Oh, my! I don’t think ice cream sundaes or any desserts are ever going to be the same again once they release this new caramel.

Sweet Loren’s

Loren and I had briefly crossed paths at the very busy Next BIG Small Brand Awards on Tuesday night. Her amazing cookie and brownie doughs had been the 2011 winner, so she was there to support and judge this year’s program. Of course, I couldn’t resist my favorites, her chocolatey brownie and the oatmeal cranberry, so I picked up a few samples and then hit the rest of the expo.

Leckerlee

These beautiful, pillowy, cakey gingerbread confections are some of my favorite Christmastime treats. I left them under the glass dome because if I had had access to even one of them, they would have all been gone in a flash. Sandy’s Lebkuchen were one of the hits of the Brooklyn Flea when it moved indoors before the year-end holidays in 2011. They seemed to be no less popular at yesterday’s expo, even if we are still a few months away from their peak season. I also want to give a very special shout-out to Julian of Melt Bakery (one half another fantastic local food business). He was lending Sandy a hand on this very busy Sunday, showing once again just how supportive the culinary community is of each other and of helping everyone’s enterprises to grow.

Artopolis

This table from a Greek bakery in Astoria, Queens had a beautiful array of sweets. I limited myself to a small square of flaky, buttery, sweet baklava, which just made my mouth so happy with its gooey, sweetness and a bit of crunch from each delicate layer of pastry.

Veda’s Cakes

Based out of the incubator kitchens located in La Marqueta in East Harlem, these baked goods and the photos of the cakes that Veda whips up were too good looking to resist. I nibbled on a small sample of a mini pecan pie type pastry which was buttery, nutty, and not too sweet with a great interplay between crust and filling.

Dallis Bros. Coffee

This locally-based coffee roasting company is coming up on its 100th year anniversary in the city and prides itself on responsible and fair trade practices, something that they were ahead of their time in implementing even before the current boom of artisan coffee bean packaging and production. When I went back by their table for a second round of visits to the Taste of 5 Boroughs participants, I was told that they’d been drained dry of their delicious brews.

Santé Bakery

I predict that this company will have a very busy market season this year once everyone gets to sample their unique products. Piroshki (dough filled with savory vegetables and meats) and Vatrushka (pastry round with centers of jam and/or cheese) will be too tempting for the hungry crowds to pass up while they are perusing the stalls at the Hester Street Fair.

Nutcase Crunch

As big as a fan of granola as I am, this gluten-free, nut-based product might have me swapping it out in the mornings. The sample I tasted was full of crunch with a hint of coconut and a richness and meatiness from the nuts themselves. What I also really liked was that it came in a snack size in addition to a regular bag, which is perfect for keeping in one’s desk to ward off the mid-afternoon slump.

H.S. Chocolate Co.

With Easter just around the corner, it was no wonder that lots of people headed over to this table to see what wonders they had to share.  Artisan chocolates have also become a huge hit in the local food entrepreneur scene, which is never a bad thing to my mind. I really enjoy seeing what each company does and how they interpret childhood favorites for a more adult taste sensibility.

Hot Bread Kitchen

Also based at La Marqueta in Harlem, the folks at Hot Bread Kitchen have a loyal fan following in the city.  I’d encourage you to read the story of their business and how they help low-income, immigrant women with language, computer, and other skills to enable them to build their own businesses. I’m a huge fan of their layered, buttery M’smen Moroccan flatbread (which they didn’t have at the expo). Their crisp Lavash Crackers were the base for one of the more popular snacks I put out for my guests after our holiday caroling party.

Fresh Ginger Ginger Ale

Ginger is one of my favorite seasonings, so much so that it caused the “Ginger Chicken Incident,” as it is known in my family, many, many years ago, although I’m not going to go into that here. It was great to see the all the varieties of Bruce Cost’s lightly fizzy, refreshing beverages made with real ginger at the expo yesterday. This was just the kick and pick-me-up that the afternoon needed to give everyone the extra energy to navigate all the booths. I sampled their new passionfruit flavor with its delicate tropical, floral perfume and a punch of spice from the ginger.  This will definitely hit the spot on a warm, sultry summer’s day.

Black and Blanco

I met Steve and Heidi on the last market day I attended of Smorgasburg. After I popped that first, crumbly beautifully-scented morsel of one of their organic, wheat-free Sandcastles into my mouth, all I could think was “Where were these all season?” Using New York State rye flour, which has been making a comeback after many years when the grain was just used as a cover crop, these baked treats take the word “cookie” to a different plane altogether. The Marzipan captures the creamy, sweet and floral flavor of the almonds perfectly. It’s hard to choose, but the Maple-Dusted Cardamom with its dark syrupy tones and exotic spice notes might be my favorite of their line, then again, maybe I need to go back and try them all again just to be sure.

It was wonderful to see these NYC artisan food producers at the Taste of 5 Boroughs culinary expo for the International Association of Culinary Professionals yesterday. There’s so many wonderful and delicious items being created around our city, many of them using other local and regional products thereby creating a strong economic chain. It was also terrific to see in person and on Twitter how folks were coming together to support these enterprises and the people who work so hard to bring us great things to eat.

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Kathy Blake writes The Experimental Gourmand, a blog about getting out and experiencing your local foodscape and interacting with those who are a part of it at farmers' markets, food events, and artisan markets.

By Adam Salomone

There comes a time in every conference where you either get into the swing of the thing or else surrender to the great tumult of programming, people, and participation that comes from the magnitude of any large event. Many members may have mixed feelings about where they stand for the IACP 2012 conference, but if the chatter going on in elevators and hallways is any indication, Day 3 did not disappoint.

While it was an optional event, the day got a fresh start with the Union Square Greenmarket tour, and while yours truly was not in attendance (a mix of both lack of planning as well as my inability to get up and out most mornings), the rave reviews about the Greenmarket itself make this a must-see while in NYC. If you didn’t have the opportunity to take part, do what you can to make it down there on Monday from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm (it’s closed on Sundays) to see what the local producers have on offer.

Saturday morning included a bevy of sessions around the Experts Are In programming, which is a relatively new format for the IACP conference. Essentially a round-table, small group discussion series on a number of topics, Saturday featured conversations on managing product reviews on your blog, building and securing your brand online, and discussing the value of a recipe in the digital world (just to name a few topics). These sessions have been part of IACP for the past two years, and are a great way for members to get up close and personal with the people on the front lines who are exploring these topics.

One of the Saturday morning sessions that I unfortunately missed out on, but that I was looking forward to hearing more about was the Bloggers and Marketers panel on crafting alliances across platforms. Led by the enviable Casey Benedict of Eat Write Retreat and Kitchen-Play.com, this session embodied some of the spirit of this year’s conference beyond just the fashion of food. It held the opportunity to find ways for IACP, members, bloggers, and brands to come together in productive and thought-provoking ways. 

The afternoon sessions included another panel in which I was able to participate about building digital platforms online. While I will try to remain unbiased, I felt it was a really engaging and interesting dialogue, primarily because it was aimed at technologists and start-ups in the food world, while I represented the traditional cookbook publisher trying to reinvent their role in this world. There were a number of questions about how recipe development and cookbook writing factor into the new world of online (and to this, the panel countered that cookbooks are no longer ends in and of themselves, but are a branch of a wider branding and outreach campaign), what it means to have a platform (it’s very much tied to personal branding), and how authorities can make money online in place of some traditional approaches to monetization (think of any online approach as building a start-up and the rest flows from there). The panel was well-received, and I would hope also spawned some further debate on what it means to be a cookbook author today, and what it will mean tomorrow.

Up next, Sunday will feature two “capstone” events: the Culinary Expo and the Book & Blog Festival, both held at 82 Mercer Street, which is an amazing space. These events are usually the highlight of my IACP experience (although this year it’s tough to say), so we’re looking forward to seeing everyone there.

We’ll be covering the various IACP events throughout the weekend, so be sure to check back at the blog often, follow us on Twitter at @IACPculinary and also tweet with us using hashtag #IACPNYC. And also, let us know as you post your own blog entries about your experiences by leaving a comment below!

I’d also like to thank Judy of @divinacucina for the great photo from today’s session, the multimedia back-up is very much appreciated!

Adam Salomone

By Lynn Kilroy

Friday’s session “How to Write for Online Magazines” proved to be a lively discussion about the highlights of online food writing and how it differs from writing for traditional print media. The panel consisted of Tara Mataraza Desmond (on the right in the above picture), writer and cookbook author;
Lynn Andriani, food editor at Oprah.com; Maureen Petrosky (in the center in the above picture), founding editor at Foodrepublic.com; Faith Durand, managing editor of Thekitchn.com and J. Kinji Lopez-Alt (on the left in the above picture), chief creative officer at Seriouseats.com.

This panel of online editors represented sites with 400,000 to 4 million unique visitors monthly. With 100+ attendees, the room was standing room only. The panel highlighted the continual changes in the world of online writing where writers are left to navigate the scene and figure out their rightful place.

Panel members included relevant information from basic terms in the online writing world including SEO, tagging, linking, ranking, and CMS. They also addressed the “pay conundrum” and the importance of simple and relevant evergreen pieces.

J. Kinji Lopez-Alt with Serious Eats, a site with more than 4 million unique visitors monthly, highlighted the importance of creating an online community where readers have a friendly place to gather. He touched on the importance of managing that community and making certain that the integrity of the site is maintained, even if it means limiting negative user comments.

“Making people feel comfortable on our site is far more important than freedom of speech,” said Lopez-Alt.

Attendees learned that with most every site, online writing versus writing for other mediums differs in tone, sense of interaction, length, and style.

The evergreen nature of writing online and archiving stood out as a large point of difference from print.  For example, “How to Cook a Chicken Breast,” with simple steps and photography, was highlighted as a topic that will always rise to the top of the search engines nightly, as readers look for helpful tips that are relevant and simple.

While many of the panelists noted that the pay for online writing is low and they are not accepting new writers, they also made it clear that they regularly work with cookbook authors and experts, including bloggers, who can help them build content. The panel pointed out the importance of finding a niche so that you can become a go-to person on a subject.

The attendees followed up with questions about the “pay conundrum” and pushed for a discussion to help them figure out how to make a living in the online food writing world.

A short discussion about the evolving value of online advertising and the value of page views ensued. The difference between mega-sites like Facebook and quantity over quality came up. It was noted that advertising values still favored quantity over quality in many arenas. Although as this continues to change, strategic advertisers and partners will look to sites that design custom content that reaches targeted readers as a more effective form of communicating messages.

The panel left attendees with the following top ten reasons why the web is good for food writers:

• Finding your own space online is easy
• More volume for equal or higher cumulative pay
• You can break into new topics and markets more easily
• You can find new audiences and network more effectively
• You have better control over your brand
• Your recipes will be better than ever
• Your writing will be snappier and your editing stronger
• You can write whatever you want
• You get credit
• You can be the entire masthead (if you want to!)

The panel made it clear that online writing is here to stay and will continue to evolve. Writers can find their place in the online landscape and continue to do what they love if they are open to accessing all the tools available to them with social media, understanding that editors are navigating the online writing landscape along with them, and remembering that creating simple, relevant content comes first.

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Lynn Kilroy is the Vice President at Sahlman Williams Food Public Relations. sahlmanwilliams.com

By Adam Salomone

Starting off with the keynote on “The Fashion of Food,” Day Two was abuzz with non-stop chatter in halls and on panels as members shared experiences, takeaways and insights from various sessions. If the live-tweeting was any indication, the opening keynote featured some great wisdom from presenters. Marcus Samuelsson’s admonition about not following trends too closely and being sure of yourself resonated with the audience, followed by the tweet:

“@MarcusCooks: I’m too slow to act on trends. I trust the story I want to tell. #IACPNYC”

It quickly ended up being followed up by another tweet from an audience participant who said that if Marcus proposed to any of the women in the audience, they would accept. We won’t speculate here, but at least the conversation was a lively one.

Breakout sessions followed on the keynote session, with everything from how to write for an online magazine to how the trends of fashion and food fit together in the real world to what cookbook editors are looking for in this new market.

The experience of IACP can indeed be singular, mostly influenced by the individual sessions you choose to attend. For my part, I was involved in a lively and informative conversation with Pam Anderson and her daughters Maggy Keet and Sharon Damelio, all from ThreeManyCooks.com. This was the first of the IACP’s “live learning” sessions, meant to give members a round-table forum for participating in discussions and then applying those lessons to the conference itself. In this case, we talked at great length about food blogging, how to build a platform (or how to better a platform if you already have one), and then how that ties into actually blogging about IACP, which is particularly useful as I write this post. The session was full of engaged and active participants, all of whom had questions about voice, branding, content editing, recipe development and more. And while we didn’t come away with all the answers, it was particularly refreshing to see that the session was actually intended as a weekend long set of meetings and check-ins to foster and mentor relationships with the various members involved. Definitely look out for more blog posts to come from those involved in that session in particular.

Moving into the afternoon, the session on what cookbook publishers want was mandatory, particularly because I was involved in the panel. Sitting on the opposite side of the table is always interesting when trying to evaluate and recap a particular session, but overall, I think the programming was well-received. This was another first, in that it was a “mix and mentor” session, where participants received one-on-one time with publishers to ask questions, pitch cookbook ideas and get feedback. I was joined by an esteemed group of publishers, including Bill LeBlond from Chronicle Books, Pam Krauss from Clarkson Potter, and Carolyn Mandarano from Tauton Press. Each was given a specific set of first-time authors looking for answers, and each author got a different perspective. Two areas of particular interest, perhaps unsurprisingly, were topics on how to get an agent, and whether first-time authors are better of self-publishing digitally. The discussions that ensued were focused, relevant and productive and all came away with actionable takeaways.

The highlight of the entire day (although the programs for the day were hard to match) was the Opening Night Party. Held at 82 Mercer Street, and featuring dishes and drinks from top chefs and mixologists, the event could’ve easily been billed as a VIP party for the NYC elite. For those that missed out (although judging from the crowd few did), the event featured small plate meals ranging from pulled pork to raw fish, a semi-nude model participating in the La Figa Project (which everyone in attendance is now more than familiar with), as well as signature drinks such as the Bourbon Fuzzy Navel. The evening was abuzz with energy, and the 82 Mercer space was perfect for the event, as members sampled bites, mingled with friends, and were interviewed on-camera about their IACP experiences.

By any count, the day truly embodied the spirit of NYC and the “fashion meets food” theme that is the centerpiece of this year’s conference. And this is just the beginning as today got underway with more on offer for those looking to listen, learn, and interact.

We’ll be covering the various IACP events throughout the weekend, so be sure to check back at the blog often, follow us on Twitter at @IACPculinary and also tweet with us using hashtag #IACPNYC. And also, let us know as you post your own blog entries about your experiences by leaving a comment below!

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Adam Salomone

The International Association of Culinary Professionals 2012 conference is in full swing. Chefs, authors, writers, publishers, media, and others descended on New York City on Thursday to kick off the proceedings with a number of engaging and delightful optional sessions that opened up the city’s culinary traditions to insiders and outsiders alike. Whether it was Italian in the West Village, Jewish cooking on the Lower East Side, or Mediterranean on the East River, members had a wide variety of options when it came to getting their foodie fix. For those that were looking to imbibe early on in the day, the programming also offered a chance to learn the basics of working with bitters at Amor y Amargo in the East Village, or try the unlikely pairing of fried chicken and martinis as it was originally meant to be.

And that’s just the beginning. Today the regular programming gets going and will feature a bevy of sessions that delve into the fashion, politics, and passion of food, writing and culinary work, starting with the morning keynote “The Fashion of Food” led by group of food professionals on the front line of the business, including Adam Rapoport, Susan Lyne, Kim Severson, and Marcus Samuelsson.

Depending on the tracks chosen, members have a buffet of options available for the rest of the day. Numerous Experts Are In sessions, spanning everything from online multimedia creation, social media development, and writing as a dramatic act, along with a “live learning” panel led by Pam Anderson and the Three Many Cooks team, where participants will have a chance to blog their experiences during IACP. As always, there will be a robust back and forth between the technical/professional development track, helping members refine and better their skills, and the food-focused track, with sessions on locally grown grains, the rise of Asian fusion cuisine, and the “next big thing” in fish.

Also, not to be missed is the session on jumpstarting your IACP connections for new members, led by Jackie Gordon.

Friday culminates with the always-in-fashion Opening Night Party at 82 Mercer, in the heart of Soho. Top NYC chefs will be on-hand preparing small bites and mingling with members, while expertly crafted cocktails, wine, and beer share table-space for eager attendees. There will also be a special presentation from the ever-eye-catching La Figa Project, where the human form meets food in the ultimate intersection of fashion and food. If previous opening night events are any indication, this is sure to be a “must-see,” especially in NYC.

We’ll also be covering the various IACP events throughout the weekend, so be sure to check back at the blog often, follow us on Twitter at @IACPculinary and also tweet with us using hashtag #IACPNYC.

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Toni Tipton-Martin

During last year’s conference in Austin, Texas, I joined the Kids in the Kitchen section to create a once-in-a-lifetime experience for the young students in my after-school gardening, cooking, and nutrition program: An afternoon of harvesting vegetables in the University of Texas Elementary School’s 20 raised vegetable beds and preparing a meal with section members, including White House pastry chef Bill Yosses at Whole Foods Culinary Center.

This year I am expanding my outreach to vulnerable children in Austin by partnering with the James Beard Foundation, the University of Texas, the Texas Restaurant Association, and Kikkoman to bring four high school culinary students from Austin to cook and serve at a reception featuring chef Scott Barton at the James Beard House on April 1.

The event is part of a pop-up art installation I curated entitled, The Jemima Code, an engaging visual history of African American cooks featuring larger-than-life images selected from my upcoming photo album and recipe book, The Jemima Code: A Gallery of Great Cooks Share Their Secrets.

Visitors to James Beard House are welcomed into the sanctuaries of America’s unsung culinary heroes by screen-printed images of black women at work in and around the kitchen hearth in slave and sharecropper’s cabins, gardens, and in shotgun houses throughout the south. The photographs of these inspirational women document their culinary contributions to American cuisine and establish an enduring legacy for the women as modern role models who once cooked meals, sewed clothes, salved wounds, and nurtured our collective character from their pulpit at the kitchen table. They encourage everyone to add a little warmth to our kitchens of granite and steel by cooking and sharing real food.

The images are taken from my historic reprint of a 1904 classic cookbook, The Blue Grass Cook Book. And, while it is an honor to introduce new generations to the women at the home of a man who once said that “food is our common ground, a universal experience,” it is especially exciting to display the image of Lena Richard in the house. 

According to researchers at Tulane University, James Beard advocated on behalf of this cookbook author, television personality, cooking school director, and restaurateur, encouraging Houghton-Mifflin to publish the recipe collection she self-published in 1939. Lena Richard’s New Orleans Cookbook originally included her photograph as its frontispiece, and her name in the title, but interestingly, when the book appeared on shelves, her image was removed and her name no longer appeared as part of the title. The exhibit photograph of Richard comes from my rare 1939 copy of that book.
 
For the past three years, these images and others have inspired elementary school students, uplifted Houston’s historic Third Ward community at Project Row Houses, and served as the backdrop during MLK Holiday pie socials where culinary/hospitality students at Pflugerville’s John B. Connally High and Austin’s Travis High practiced their craft, baking sweet and savory pies, then inviting guests to “come eat our homework.”

The professionalism, self-awareness, and pride demonstrated by these kids in the presence of these art works are evidence of the kinds of outcomes we can expect when we provide culturally appropriate experiences that engage and inspire kids toward careers in the food industry—whether those jobs are in food archaeology, anthropology, food service, or public health. Projects like this help SANDE fulfill its mission and vision that all children have the opportunity to live healthy and productive lives.

Ryan Merritt, a senior at Connally High sums up the opportunity this way: “Most people my age have never heard of the James Beard Foundation, or the IACP, but as soon as Chef mentioned those names, I couldn’t believe my ears. I thought. 'No way!' Every night this week, I could hardly sleep because of the anticipation, and thoughts of the different people I’ll meet, and foods I’ll see. My mom always wanted me to be as passionate about food as she is; her wish has come true. I am truly grateful for the wonderful opportunities my passion and hard work have brought me, and I can’t help but think, 'I’m actually going to be a chef.'"

Check out The Jemima Code exhibit at the James Beard House Greenhouse Gallery.

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Toni Tipton-Martin is a food and nutrition journalist, author of three cookbooks, and founder of The SANDE Youth Project, a 501c3 cultural heritage and culinary organization. She served as Host City Committee Chair for last year’s 33rd annual conference in Austin, Texas. Information about her projects may be found at: tonitiptonmartin.com.

By Sekita Ekrek

Take five NYC top chefs, three intrepid IACP judges, a thousand culinary professionals descending on the city, and a challenge to welcome hungry IACP members with a signature bagel and lox dish....

The Contenders

• Russell Moss, Cafe 92YTribeca executive chef
• Shanna Pacifico, Back Forty West chef
• Matt Pomerantz, bagel expert and owner of Zucker’s Bagels & Smoked Fish and Murray’s Bagels Chelsea
• Mark Spangenthal, Kutsher’s Tribeca executive chef
• Ryan Tate, former Savoy executive chef

The Results

Most Authentic

Pomerantz has been making bagels for more than 20 years, so it’s hard to mess with a classic. Fresh plain Zucker’s bagel, cream cheese, fine Scottish salmon, Lucky’s tomatoes, red onions, and capers made for the perfect deli bite.

Most Inventive

Hands down, Moss’s warm potato pancake with house cured gravlax was the most unexpected culinary delight. The hearty pancake created the perfect bed for layers of caraway and coriander crusted salmon. Topped with crispy capers and Swedish mustard dill sauce, the dish disappeared in seconds.

The Work of Art

Tate’s deconstructed plate was almost too beautiful to eat, but the judges devoured it nonetheless. A canvas of red cabbage gastrique artfully held a tender cube of milk poached lox, grilled cucumber, an everything bagel ‘cannoli,’ and fromage blanc. Creative genius.

The Classy Bistro

Pacifico’s dish oozed class. Smoked salmon, tossed with fresh greens, capers, and preserved Meyer lemons, accompanied a toasted bagel topped with house made cottage cheese and one perfect, crispy poached egg. Clean flavors and elegant simplicity.

The Decadent Gut Buster

Spangenthal’s “Rascal” took the cake for pure indulgence. Fresh poppy seed bagel layered high with baked salmon salad, Nova Scotia salmon, tomatoes, onions, chive schmear, and crowned with a dollop of salmon roe. Served with fries! An outrageous Borscht Belt classic.

The Locations

All conference attendees are invited to attend to the Bagel + Lox Brunch, hosted by Zucker’s and Acme Smoked Fish, from 12:30 pm – 2:30 pm, at Sunday’s lively Culinary Expo. Or, get in on the fun by purchasing tickets to the Culinary Expo here. In the meantime, be sure to visit these fine establishments for NYC dining at its best:

• Back Forty West, 70 Prince St. This newly opened sister restaurant to the classic Back Forty offers farm-to-table ethics and a chef driven menu, in a relaxed, rustic environment. backfortynyc.com
• Café 92YTribeca, 200 Hudson St. This casual spot offers diners classic comfort food with a gourmet twist and locally sourced kosher dairy ingredients. Gravlax is made in house. 92y.org/Tribeca/Cafe.aspx
• Kutsher’s Tribeca, 186 Franklin St. Modern Jewish American bistro fare is served in a beautiful contemporary setting. kutsherstribeca.com
• Zucker’s Bagels & Smoked Fish, 146 Chambers St. Satisfy your bagel fix with these famous NYC hand-rolled bagels and much more. Stop by Zucker’s anytime during the conference for a FREE cup of La Colombe coffee with a purchase of any NYC bagel sandwich. IACP ID required. zuckersbagels.com

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NYC food blogger Sekita Ekrek (@KikaEats) was joined by fellow IACP judges Jimmy Carbone (@Jimmypotsandpan) and Jeff Albucher (@JeffAromaCucina) for the difficult, yet highly tasty, task of judging.

By Sekita Ekrek

Doug Duda is excited about this week’s 34th Annual IACP Conference, and with good reason. Our incoming President is the Annual Conference Chair. As if heading up the many people who made the Annual Conference possible this year weren’t enough, Duda brings a wealth of industry experience to the organization. He is the founding principal of DemoGraph, a consultancy that helps clients bring culinary audiences to their brands via events, programming, media, and environments. He produces the country's largest culinary travel showcase for The New York Times, develops culinary centers, and is the host of the A&E International Television series, The Well-Seasoned Traveler.  

As the incoming IACP president and face of this year's conference, how do you feel about having New York City as the host site? 

In this economy, it’s more important now than ever before to get behind the scenes in New York and meet the people and visit the places that move so many ideas—and so much revenue opportunity—in our industry. Now is the perfect time for a New York conference.

Tell us about some of the events and speakers you are most excited for this week.

So many children—who can pick a favorite?  I'm partial to the moments that feel like “only in New York” to me: raconteurs Peter Kaminsky, Mario Batali, Gabrielle Hamilton, and Sam Sifton on Monday at 11:00 am in the Hudson Theatre, discussing the pure pleasure of food . . . mixologist extraordinaire Dave Arnold, holding court on Thursday afternoon in Booker and Dax, the new bar he just opened with David Chang, talking about how you build a new bar in New York…the fashion world meeting at IACP at the Beard House cocktail party Saturday at 6:30 pm in honor of food/fashion diva Lee Miller…the late seating on Sunday night of The Culinary Trust pop-up created by Madhur Jaffrey and Assif Mandvi. I could go on…

More than 1,000 attendees are expected at the conference. What's the biggest take-away you wish for members old and new? 

New York looks big from the outside, but it’s a city of neighborhoods, hangouts, groups of friends, intimate moments set against a monumental backdrop. Our conferences need to make good on IACP’s promise to connect you with the people, places, and ideas you need to succeed—that’s the take-away that matters most to me.

What are some of your favorite places to eat in New York?

Anywhere outside the hotel, which is why we decided it would be crazy to build in hundreds of dollars of hotel lunches into the conference fees when you can eat better and cheaper and see the city in the bargain by going out! We’re setting up an info desk instead to provide tips to great eating all over the city, including the Times Square area.

Fill in the blank: I promise not to leave NYC without eating…

Dim sum in Chinatown and then grabbing some Hong Kong cakes from a street vendor.

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Sekita Ekrek (@KikaEats) is an ever hungry New York City food blogger and entertainment public relations consultant.

By Wendy Kirby

Didn’t get into one of the sessions you were eyeing up at the Culinary Expo? Don’t worry, there are a number of programs being presented by the Culinary Trust as are part of the Chefs Move to Schools program that are not to be missed. Chefs across the country are focused on educating children to eat healthy in order to raise a healthier generation of kids. Attend these programs to find out what you can do to make a difference.

TCT001: Chefs Move to Schools: Morning Session

Healthy eating is more than just personal choice. Federal policy has an impact – both directly and indirectly on what children eat. There are many perspectives on how to improve school lunches. In this session you will hear how the Farm Bill, Child Nutrition Reauthorization and the USDA show up on the plate. The session will include information on ideas for low cost/no cost changes that get kids eating healthier; recipes for success from a private school chef and perspectives from a New York City public school on how basic food education can change what kids eat.

TCT103: Chefs Move to Schools: Lunch Hour
 
It all sounds good in theory but how will chefs execute these ideas? Watch Chef Bill Telepan work his culinary magic by using a miniscule budget and strict nutritional guidelines to create a cafeteria style lunch. Find out how good a public school lunch can taste.

TCT204: Chefs Move To Schools: Afternoon Workshops
 
For those who work with kids this is an event not to be missed. You will learn effective strategies for creating learning objectives, lesson plans and teaching to different age groups. In addition, this workshop will provide you with information on nutrition and how to incorporate that knowledge into recipes kids will love. Finally, all of the aforementioned lessons will be tied together to help you learn how to develop kid-friendly and nutritious recipes to bring to your classroom on a shoestring budget.

TCT205: Chefs Move Mini Expo

Make sure to stick around after your session is over to network with panelists and attendees. Organizations providing resources that support Chefs Move to Schools will be staffing tables, providing information, and answering questions. This event is open to anyone registered for the morning or afternoon sessions.


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Wendy Kirby is a lawyer by day and foodie 24/7. Wendy maintains an active law practice while pursuing her passion for food writing and photography on her blog LaPhemmePhoodie.

By Adam Salomone

The social media world is alight with news of the upcoming IACP Conference later this week. If you’ve been following along, you’re probably already clued in to some of the many events and happenings that are taking place during the Annual Conference, including the panels and programming that are currently in place. If you haven’t had a chance to delve into the conversation that is happening online, now would be a great time to do so, and we have some handy tips to make the most out of social media before, during, and after the Annual Conference.

Before the Conference

• Follow @IACPculinary on Twitter, and let us know you’ll be there
• Follow the #IACPnyc hashtag for updates about the conference
• Explore the hashtag and see who else is planning on attending. Use Twitter to facilitate meeting set up in advance
• Research the IACP attendee database to see who will be at the event, cross-check against Twitter and Facebook those that you want to meet, and add them to your network
• It’s important to remember to engage with those people before the event in a meaningful way, make it clear you want to meet with them.
• Like the IACP fan page on Facebook (this is another great way to stay up to date on event happenings)
• Look through the list of “fans” to see who else is part of the group, if there is anyone you want to network with

During the Conference

• If you feel like sharing, post your schedule for each day to Twitter and Facebook, ask others who will be attending those
• Use the hashtag for #IACPnyc, as well as specific session hashtags, to tweet about specific panels you attend, what you’re learning
• Also be sure to follow the conversation online as it’s happening—it's a great way to get filled in on sessions that you couldn’t attend
• See who’s doing the most active updating of social media with helpful tweets and Facebook updates and add them to your networks
• Get involved in the conversation, especially on Twitter, by responding to other people at the conference who are tweeting out information
• Use Twitter to ask questions of panelists during certain sessions, or to ask general questions to IACP attendees
• Check-in on the IACP fan page for updates to the conference program or announcements about events

After the Conference

• Follow-up with any business contacts you made by adding to your networks on various sites
• Be sure to share any content (blog posts, photos, videos, etc) that you created during the event with your social networks
• Continue monitoring the #IACPnyc hashtag for tweets you can respond to, and respond with your own tweets about your experiences

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Lexi Van de Walle

One of the highlights of Annual Conference is the silent auction that benefits The Culinary Trust. Every year, IACP members, friends, and family of The Trust generously donate dozens of culinary items—big and small—to raise money for our programs. Every year, the lots get better and better.

Bid now or at conference on over 160 items. A few tempting items include:

• Week's vacation in Italy's Umbria region
• 2-day market to table tour of Mexico City
• VIP passes to some of the country's best culinary events
• Dozens of gourmet foods
• Cookbooks upon cookbooks, including the 50-pound, 2,400-page Modernist Cuisine
• Cookware and bakeware galore
• Electrics, like a new model Vitamix blender
• Certificates from Chef John Besh (New Orleans)
• Dinner at the famous Rao's in New York
• Cooking, baking, and butchering classes, including a 2-1/2 day course at Ballymaloe in Ireland
• Photography and styling, including a full-day multi-product/recipe shoot
• Career and writing coach sessions and other professional services

From now through March 26, you can preview items and bid online at Bidding for Good.

Then, on March 30, the auction will move to the conference location, New York's Millennium Hotel, and items will be up for grabs until noon on April 2. Bid now or bid later (absentee bidding permitted).

Click here to see all 168 lots (more being added), place your bids, and support the great work of The Culinary Trust.

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Lexi Van de Walle is the author/photographer for the Lighthearted Locavore blog, a marketing consultant connecting small business with healthy and sustainable food, and on the board of The Culinary Trust.

By Adam Salomone

New York City has often been dubbed the “food mecca of the world” and while the title has come under dispute lately as our understanding and appreciation of the culinary world has expanded, there’s no denying that the city offers a ton of great dining options for whatever you’re craving. If you’re heading to the Annual Conference—which is now just over a week away—you may want to consider some of the great eating opportunities you’ll have while there (and perhaps also make some reservations so you can grab a seat).

A group of New York IACP members, led by Jackie Gordon, have put together an extensive and mapped list of restaurants, cafés, and bars to visit. Check it out, and add your own suggestions if you have them:

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=213413059789477843014.0004ba573b3cb206e708c&msa=0

For those who might prefer a more focused list, below are a selection of diverse and delightful places I always enjoy. In no particular order, they are:

New Wonjo Restaurant
23 W. 32nd Street (b/w 5th and 6th)

Situated in the heart of Koreatown, this is an authentic Korean BBQ experience right in midtown. It’s no white tablecloth establishment, but is great for a simple yet satisfying meal. There are plenty of options here, and the complimentary first course of kimchi plates (called ban chan) is worth the price of admission. 

NOTE: Koreatown is a great spot to explore in general, New Wonjo is just one example for Korean BBQ, but the street also features great dumpling houses, as well as a number of remarkable French bakeries. 



Sip Sak
928 2nd Avenue (at E. 49th)

This Turkish spot offers a great balance of ambiance and conviviality. It’s by no means fancy, but offers a warm and inviting spot for an intimate meal for two or dinner with a group. The menu is extensive and features a variety of contemporary ethnic dishes.

Avra
141 E. 48th (b/w Lexington and 3rd)

This is the quintessential Greek experience in NYC: tons of options, whether fish, meat or pasta, and a boisterous atmosphere. It tends to fill up quickly, so if you’re planning on going, make a reservation in advance.

NOTE: Molyvos (871 7th Avenue at 55th) is another option if you’re in the mood for Greek cuisine. It is a stalwart of NYC restaurants and has just undergone an extensive renovation.

Dawat
210 E. 58th (at Lexington)

Dawat serves up fine Indian eats. This place is nothing fancy, but offers a classic meal with plenty of naan on the side. It doesn’t fill up quickly, so you’re almost always able to get a table on short notice.


Pomme Frites
123 2nd Avenue (at St. Mark’s Place)

This is more for a quick bite than a sit down meal. As the name would suggest, all they serve here is French fries, but they come with a variety of inspired homemade condiments that pair perfectly with these salty snacks. It’s a hole in the wall, so don’t expect a lavish experience, but if you need a quick pick-me-up, this is the place.


Barbuto
775 Washington Street (at W. 12th)

A go-to Italian restaurant in the meatpacking district, this is a hot-spot on the Lower West Side. While they are known for a variety of dishes, their gnocchi is simply outstanding. Be sure to call ahead as it tends to fill up every night of the week.



Nice Matin
201 W. 79th (at Amsterdam Avenue)

My final pick is classic yet casual French on the Upper West Side. Nice Matin has an intimate vibe, a knowledgeable wait staff, and food that hits the spot when you’re looking for a good French meal. I love the escargot, but everything on the menu is well prepared and worth ordering.

NOTE: Another worthy contender for French bistro/café is Ouest, also on the Upper West Side at 2315 Broadway (at 84th).

So, what do you think? New Yorkers, where would you recommend IACP members eat while they’re in town? Visitors, what’s on your must-eat list? Please share them in the comments section below!

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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

In addition to the always popular People's Choice Award for culinary books, we'll be giving two new People's Choice Awards in 2012 related to our New Media & Broadcast Awards program: Best Website or Blog and Most Humorous Video or Audio Short. Be sure to vote in each of the three polls by March 27 30 [voting has been extended!].

    Best Culinary Book
    Best Culinary Website or Blog
    Most Humorous Video or Audio Short

Remember, both IACP members and non-members are welcome to vote, so spread the word!

The People's Choice Awards winners will be announced at IACP's 26th Annual Awards Ceremony in NYC on April 2. Register now to attend the event in person, or, if you can't be there, follow #IACPNYC on Twitter as the awards results roll in.

Our Culinary Classics Book Awards are just a year old—they were inaugurated in 2011 to recognize cookbooks that have stood the test of time (see the 2011 winners here). The Culinary Classics Book Awards survey cookbooks and other culinary works published at least five years ago, but no earlier than 1945, and identify those that have both (1) significantly altered the way we think about food and (2) contributed in a meaningful way to the field of culinary literature. Books that are dedicated to any food-related subject; document or interpret a cuisine, culinary tradition, or history; or convey an important culinary sensibility or vision are eligible. We have ten classics selected by our esteemed awards committee as finalists for the 2012 awards. Choosing between them will be a tough call:

• The American Heritage Cookbook and Illustrated History of American Eating and Drinking
• The Art of Eating, M.F.K. Fisher
• The Cake Bible, Rose Levy Beranbaum
• James Beard’s American Cookery, James Beard
• The New York Times Cookbook, Craig Claiborne
• Paul Prudhomme’s Louisiana Kitchen, Paul Prudhomme
• The Silver Palate Cookbook, Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins
• Simple French Food, Richard Olney
• The Taste of Country Cooking, Edna Lewis
• La Technique: An Illustrated Guide to the Fundamental Techniques of Cooking, Jacques Pépin

We are also pleased to announce the finalists for our Awards of Excellence, which honor the range of our members' extraordinary contributions and commitments to the culinary field with awards of many categories to reflect the diversity of IACP membership. Past honorees have included such notable culinarians and companies as Rick Bayless; Guiliano Hazan; Anne Willan, CCP; Chuck Williams; Judith Jones; Denise Vivaldo; Whole Foods Market; and Cuisinart. See the Awards of Excellence finalists here.

By Marnely Rodriguez

What is it that restaurant chefs and top fashion designers have in common besides the long hours? In both instances, these craft masters start with basic ingredients and turn them into a masterpiece. These raw materials blossom into organic shapes and forms, flavors and textures, the sum of which is greater than any of the individual pieces taken alone. How is it that these tastemakers can see the unseen in the world around us, and realize that an unassuming fabric or humble vegetable can be transformed into a sensational taste-pleaser?

On Friday, March 30 from 4:00 - 5:30 pm, we’ll explore these issues in the session “From the Fields to High-Fashion Food.” Get involved in the discussion as Farmer Lee Jones of The Chef’s Garden, an Ohio-family farm known for its unusual vegetables, teams up with neurologist and chef, Miguel Sanchez Romera, to demonstrate how the creative process of plant-to-plate really works.

During this one and a half hour session, you’ll see Miguel in action as he transforms raw ingredients into couture-inspired food. Farmer Lee Jones will focus and explain the connection between farmer and chef, and how the raw ingredients from the farm can create truly magnificent dishes in restaurants throughout the country. Join us for this Friday session and see what “farm-to-table” can mean.

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Marnely Rodriguez is the author of the food blog Cooking with Books and is a freelance food and travel writer. Marnely has worked as an overnight bread baker in Colorado and a chocolate maker in Virginia, as well as a pastry cook on Martha’s Vineyard, just to name a few of the positions she's held. She has a bachelor’s degree in hotel management and is a graduate of The Culinary Institute of America. Influenced by her home, the Dominican Republic, and currently living on Martha’s Vineyard, MA, she is on an endless search for Caribbean flavors, new adventures, and gastronomic inspiration which she then shares in her food writing and recipe development.

For an event overview and speaker bios, click here. To see the whole discussion, check out the video above!

Please feel free to use the comments area below for questions or feedback. We'd love to hear your thoughts about this special joint IACP/The Culinary Trust event. If you're interested in enjoying other IACP events, be sure to explore the options at our Annual Conference, March 29 - April 2 in NYC. 

By Wendy L. Kirby

When you think about cities like New York and London, there are many images that come to mind. While you may picture the Empire State Building while contemplating New York City or Big Ben when thinking about London, world-class cities are not limited to just one appealing element. Gastronomy goes part and parcel with reflections on what a city has to offer.

Many associate London with fish and chips or an indulgent afternoon tea, however, London is no longer the land of limited cuisine. Likewise, New York is not just the home of amazing bagels and cheesecake. Culinary creativity and innovation have transformed the reputation of both cities. Thanks in part to the influence of restaurateurs, as well as leaders in media, fashion, and architecture, many cultural influences are now well represented in vibrant gastronomic communities throughout London and New York.

The session “How Food Can Make a City Famous” on Friday, March 30 (2:00 pm - 3:30 pm) will explore the power of gastronomy to shape a modern city, from the quality of life for its residents to its reputation internationally. Speakers include Donald Sloan, head of the Oxford School of Hospitality Management at Oxford Brookes University, UK, and Chair of Oxford Gastronomica, the University’s specialist center for the study of food, drink, and culture; Dr. Peter Lugosi, Reader at the Oxford School of Hospitality Management, Oxford Brookes University, UK; Charles Campion, food writer and broadcaster; and Sam Sifton, national editor and former restaurant critic at The New York Times.
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Wendy Kirby is a lawyer by day and foodie 24/7. Wendy maintains an active law practice while pursuing her passion for food writing and photography on her blog LaPhemmePhoodie.

By Karin Endy

On Tuesday, March 13, The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space will come alive with all things food and food policy when IACP presents a live event and webcast about these topics. The evening will feature a panel of notable expertise, including introductory remarks by Manhattan Borough President, Scott Stringer; Kim Kessler, Food Policy Coordinator in the NYC Mayor's Office; Michael Anthony, Executive Chef, Gramercy Tavern; and Marcel Van Ooyen, Executive Director of GrowNYC. Author Peter Kaminsky will moderate the distinguished panel. Karin Endy, a member of the IACP Board of Directors and Chair of its foundation, The Culinary Trust, will be there to share IACP's and The Culinary Trust's involvement in critical food policy issues from school lunches to farmers' markets.

The event will be highlighted by local beer and wine from Brooklyn Brewery and Brooklyn Oenology, as well as mouthwatering food from Jimmy's No. 43.

Tickets are $10 for IACP members, $20 for non-members.

The Green Space is located at 44 Charlton Street (on the corner of Charlton and Varick) in New York , and the event starts at 7:00 pm. Purchase tickets here.

About the panelists:

Scott M. Stringer is Manhattan Borough President. During his nearly three decades of public service, he has achieved tangible results for New Yorkers by forging diverse coalitions and addressing the city's most enduring urban challenges. He has dedicated himself to making Manhattan more affordable and livable, tackling issues such as housing, school overcrowding, public safety, balanced development, sustainability, and equal opportunities for underserved communities.

Kim Kessler, Food Policy Coordinator in the NYC Mayor's Office. Kim is both a mother and a lawyer. She views her role as Food Policy Coordinator at the Mayor’s Office as one of advocacy, both internally within city government and also more broadly. She believes strongly that everyone should have the ability to feed themselves and their families healthfully, that eating healthy food should not be something that takes extraordinary efforts to do, and that healthy food should be an accessible, affordable option for everyone.

Marcel Van Ooyen is the Executive Director of GrowNYC and former Chief of Staff to City Council Member Gifford Miller and Legislative Director for the City Council. Marcel took leadership of GrowNYC in 2006. Over the last five years under Marcel’s direction, GrowNYC has vastly expanded its efforts with new initiatives including: Fresh Bodegas, Fresh Pantries, YUM, Youthmarket, and the adoption of management of the Wholesale Greenmarket, as well as introduction of pilot distribution systems. GrowNYC’s Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) initiative is considered a national model, with $600,000 in EBT sales in 2011. By responding to a diverse community and ramping up efforts, GrowNYC has gotten affordable, healthy fresh food into the hands that need it most across the city. Marcel has also spearheaded the development of new programs in response to needs in the city, including Grow to Learn NYC: Citywide School Gardens Initiative, a public-private partnership with the Mayor’s Fund to Advance NYC created to inspire, promote, and facilitate the development of sustainable school gardens in every New York City public school.
 
Michael Anthony was selected to be Executive Chef of Gramercy Tavern in 2006. Prior to joining Gramercy Tavern, he was Executive Chef at Blue Hill at Stone Barns and earlier the Co-Executive Chef of Blue Hill in Manhattan where he was recognized for his delicious, simple, and straightforward cuisine with a vigorous commitment to using local, seasonal ingredients. Before Blue Hill, he served as Chef de Cuisine at March. In 1991, Mike went to culinary school in France, and then worked at some of the world's most celebrated kitchens, including Jacques Cagna, Michel Guerard, l'Arpege, l'Astrance, and Daniel. He lived in Tokyo working under the guidance of ShizuyoShima at Bistro Shima. Mike grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and graduated from Indiana University with degrees in Japanese, Business, and French.

Peter Kaminsky is the former Underground Gourmet for New York magazine, and his Outdoors column ran for twenty years in The New York Times. He is a longtime contributor to Food & Wine. He is the author of Pig Perfect: Encounters with Remarkable Swine and The Moon Pulled Up an Acre of Bass. He has collaborated on numerous cookbooks with Sheila Lukins, Daniel Boulud, Gray Kunz, Francis Mallmann, Michel Richard, and others. He is the former Managing Editor of National Lampoon and Creator and Executive Producer of The Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for American Humor and The Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song (presented at The White House). His forthcoming book is Culinary Intelligence: The Art of Eating Healthy (And Really Well).
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Karin Endy is Chairman of the Board of The Culinary Trust and serves as liaison to the IACP Food History, Food Policy, and Kids in the Kitchen interest sections. She is also the owner of Edible Resources, a consulting company that assists non-profits and food companies with education and sustainability matters.

By Karin Endy

Chef Bill Telepan has an impressive pedigree. He apprenticed with the legendary Alain Chapel at his three Michelin-star restaurant outside Lyons. He worked with Daniel Boulud at Le Cirque and Gilbert Le Coze at Le Bernardin. From there, he spent four years as Executive Sous Chef with Alfred Portale at Gotham Bar & Grill. In l998, Telepan joined JUdson Grill, earning three stars from The New York Times. He remained at JUdson until 2004. In 2006, he opened Telepan on the Upper West Side, continuing his devotion to local ingredients. 

He's bringing his talents downtown on Sunday, April 1, 2012 for the IACP Annual Conference in what promises to be both a delicious meal and the beginning of a conversation about how and what we feed our children. Since 2008, Telepan has also been the Executive Chef of Wellness in the Schools (WITS), a New York City-based non-profit that inspires healthy eating, environmental awareness, and fitness as a way of life for kids in New York City’s public schools. Telepan works with WITS-in-Residence Cooks in public school kitchens to make school food healthier and more delicious. As the first chef involved with WITS, Telepan has spearheaded its goals by developing nutritious school menus, training cafeteria workers, and teaching culinary and nutrition concepts to students, parents, and teachers. Telepan’s daughter Leah, a student at PS-87, inspired him to join WITS and makes healthy school food a cause that he holds close to his heart.

Taste all that school food can be at a buffet lunch that is the ideal public school meal. Recipes meet federal school lunch program nutrition requirements and ingredients fall within budgetary guidelines. 

Tickets are $35 and can be purchased as part of IACP conference registration. Proceeds benefit Wellness in the Schools, The Culinary Trust, and Future Cooks Initiative. Purchase tickets at kiosk.eztix.co/kiosk/4984.
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Karin Endy is Chairman of the Board of The Culinary Trust and serves as liaison to the IACP Food History, Food Policy, and Kids in the Kitchen interest sections. She is also the owner of Edible Resources, a consulting company that assists non-profits and food companies with education and sustainability matters.

NYC knows IACP is coming! Our phones are ringing with people wanting to get involved, so we’ve added a few new tours on Thursday, March 29, and some outstanding dining opportunities. Book soon because you know these are going to go fast!

New Tours on Thursday, March 29

OPT027
Time: 10:30 am- 3:30 pm
Meet the Artisans Tour & Lunch at Arthur Avenue, the Little Italy in the Bronx with Culinary Guide Renée Restivo
A guided tour of the fabled Arthur Avenue, where you'll taste food and learn about traditions at bakeries, pastry shops, fish markets, Italian vegetable markets, and pasta stores. Taste bread from an oven that dates back to the 1890s, learn where celebrities buy their mozzarella, taste authentic products at pork shops, and discover where to buy the best cheese. We'll enjoy a family-style lunch together after the walk. 
Cost for insider's tour, demos, tastings, and lunch with wine: $125 per person 

OPT022
Time: 1:30 pm – 4:30 pm
iAdventure and the Foodie Magician's Insider's Guide to Chinatown Tour
See the mysterious Chinatown neighborhood through the eyes of renowned Food Magician Josh Beckerman. Discover hidden gems while you sample signature dishes at four of Josh's favorite restaurants and learn about several others during this guided tour of Chinatown. Josh combines gastronomy, comedy, and magic in this excursion in a way that will leave you speechless. Following the walking tour, IACP members will be treated to a seated early dinner with the Foodie Magician himself at his absolute favorite NYC restaurant, New Malaysia.
Tour cost: $85

OPT023
Time: 2:00 pm – 7:00 pm
The Chew: Studio Taping
Attend a studio taping of The Chew, ABC's new talk show, hosted by Iron Chef America's Mario Batali and Michael Symon, Top Chef's Carla Hall, What Not to Wear's Clinton Kelly, and author and nutritionist Daphne Oz.
Tour cost: $10

Optional Dining

OPT026
Thursday, March 29
Time: 6:30 pm – 10:30 pm
Purple Yam
Purple Yam, owned by IACP award-winning authors and chefs Amy Besa and Romy Dorotan, offers a special IACP-only dinner featuring five courses, wine, and a rare opportunity to learn about ingredients and traditions from the Philippines. "Purple Yam is a direct expression of how we look at food," says owner Amy Besa, "and the cultures and cuisines that we love: the Philippines, Asia, and the US." The menu will include: Oyster Kinilaw with Homemade Pomegranate Ice; Lemongrass Poached Maine Lobster with Lobster Oil, Noritaco (crispy seaweed), Philippine Heirloom Rice, and Green Mango Salad; Duroc Pork Belly Lechon (made with heritage pork); Beef Shortrib Adobo with Burnt Coconut Cream; and Buko (young coconut) Pie with Purple Yam Ice Cream. Dinner cost includes five courses, wine, tip, subway to Purple Yam in Brooklyn (a direct line from the IACP hotel), and car service back to the city. Guaranteed to be a fun party with unforgettable food and friends.
Optional dinner cost: $150

OPT225
Thursday, March 29
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
Fried Chicken and Martinis: Back to the Colonel's Legacy
This West Village dinner at The Little Owl is a collaboration between Josh Ozersky, author of the forthcoming Colonel Sanders and the American Dream, and celebrated chef Adam Sappington of The Country Cat restaurant in Portland, Oregon. Josh has reconstructed the original spice blend used by Colonel Sanders, and Adam will use that blend to prepare a traditional, Missouri-style, heritage Draper Valley chicken, fried in cast iron pans using 18th century ingredients. And in keeping with Adam's own Missouri traditions, he will pair the delicacy with classic, ice-cold martinis featuring House Spirits. Chef Harold Moore of Commerce will bring his legendary coconut layer cake for dessert, and Joey Campanaro from The Little Owl will bring a surprise or two to the table as well for this special prix fixe dinner.
Optional dinner cost: $95

OPD029
Saturday, March 31
Time: 6:30 pm - 8:30pm
Celebrating Lee Miller's Food Fashion Life: From Posing for Vogue to Making Canapes for Picasso

Moderated by Scott Givot, past President of IACP, this cocktail party at the James Beard House features an international gathering of those who influenced Lee and were influenced by her. Preview images from Becky Conekin's upcoming book Lee Miller In Fashion, while enjoying a rare opportunity to taste hors d'oeuvres that Lee served to the likes of Picasso, Miro, and Man Ray, as documented in Karen Hagen's forthcoming Lee Miller Cookbook. Expect this year’s food/fashion conference theme to come to life!
Optional cocktail party cost: $50

OTS001
Saturday, March 31
Time: 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
La Vita Dolce at ‘inoteca Vino, Cucina e Liquori Bar
Enjoy a fabulous meal at one of NYC's top Italian restaurants:  'inoteca Vino, Cucina e Liquori Bar will be your host as you enjoy a multi-course dinner, sampling highlights from the delicious menu, all served to the table family style. Dishes such as panelle (fried chickpea fritters), affetati misti, eggplant lasagnette, cavatelli pomodoro, polpette and braised organic chicken will all be perfectly paired with exceptional Italian wines. Save room, too, for an assortment of desserts as well as a chef’s selection of ripe and luscious cheeses. 'inoteca e Liquori Bar, located in NYC's Murray Hill neighborhood, is a sister restaurant to 'inoteca Vino e Cucina, voted year after year one of the top wine bars in NYC.  Co-owned by Joe and Jason Denton and Chef Eric Kleinman, 'inoteca e Liquori belongs to the 'ino Group of restaurants, which has helped redefine casual Italian dining as we know it.
Optional dinner cost: $95

OPD027:
Sunday, April 1
Time: 7:00 pm – 10:00 pm
Pasture to Plate: An American Lamb Dinner with Brad Farmerie and Adam Sappington
Join celebrated NYC chef, Next Iron Chef star, and IACP favorite Brad Farmerie, along with Beard-nominee Adam Sappington of The Country Cat in Portland, Oregon, for a feast of American lamb at Farmerie’s newly debuted American-inspired eatery, Saxon + Parole. Farmerie and Sappington will prepare multiple courses paired with wine from top producers from the Pacific Northwest. The dinner will explore interesting cuts, charcuterie, and European and American heritage preparations reflective of two of the top nose-to-tail chefs in the country.
Optional dinner cost: $95

OPM001 
Monday April 2
Time: 11:30 am – 3:30 pm
Join Jessica Harris for Lunch at The Red Rooster in Harlem
Join Jessica Harris at the famed Red Rooster Harlem restaurant. Lunch will include a three-course menu highlighting favorites from Marcus Samuelsson’s menu and a beverage. Jessica Harris will discuss how Harlem has changed over the years, and lunch will also include a copy of her acclaimed book, High on the Hog.
Tour cost: $140

How to edit your registration: Click on the link within your 2012 Annual Conference confirmation email, which came from tickets@iacp.com. Once you click on the link, you will be prompted to log in to view your current choices. Upon logging in, click on the button called "Edit Registration," which is located at the bottom of the page. Finally, proceed to make any edits and then click on "Next" to finish up. If you have trouble locating your confirmation email, please email tickets@eztix.co or membership@iacp.com to request your confirmation link. Or call either (646) 358-4957 x 102 or (866) 358-4951 x 102 for assistance.

By Kathy Blake

“I really want to give you guys the best stuff I know about creating success at the conference,” said Jackie Gordon, when kicking off her recent webinar. “A lot of people go to the conference and don’t really know what they want and don’t have a satisfying experience," Gordon explained. Based upon her personal experiences, and laced with a few musical numbers, her presentation focused on how to make this the best Annual Conference yet:

• Set an intention and then build goals for yourself while at the event. Figure out the actions that you will take during those days to meet them. Your goals should be realistic and aimed at helping you take the steps to get you from where you are now to where you would like to be. 
• Do your homework before the conference even starts by planning – with whom you'd like to meet; what specific, measurable goals you want to accomplish while there; how you will pace yourself during those hectic, busy days. 
• Open yourself up to any serendipitous encounters that might happen during the conference.
• Network, network, network. “Networking is the single most effective way to build your business and your income,” according to Gordon. She also advised us, however, that in doing so, we need to create curiosity as well as to be curious ourselves. It is not just a one-way street.
• Be prepared. Make sure you have business cards and a smart phone so that you can keep track of all the people you meet (and so they can stay in touch with you afterwards, too).
• Keep the energy going when you get home by remembering to follow up with people. Followup will allow you to continue to build your network and to work towards accomplishing your goals and achieving your intention.

Listen to the complete recording of Jackie's webinar here. Note: You must be an IACP member (and logged into the site) to access the recording.
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Kathy Blake writes The Experimental Gourmand, a blog about getting out and experiencing your local foodscape and interacting with those who are a part of it at farmers' markets, food events, and artisan markets.

Karen Adler and Judith Fertig (also known as The BBQ Queens) announce their newest cookbook The Gardener & The Grill (April 23, 2012, Running Press) along with their new website theBBQQueens.com. This follows their 25 Essential Techniques for Grilling Fish and 25 Essential Techniques for Planking (2010, Harvard Common Press). It is their 11th title on the subject of barbecue and grilling.

Judy Barnes Baker is pleased to announce the release of her second book, Nourished: A Cookbook for Health, Weight Loss, and Metabolic Balance. Nourished features menus for every occasion that can be combined to provide a full day of delicious meals that total between 20 and 50 grams of digestible carbohydrates. Substantial scientific evidence indicates that this range promotes effortless weight loss without hunger and normalizes blood sugar levels. Nourished is sponsored by the Nutrition and Metabolism Society and endorsed by Innovative Metabolic Solutions, an organization that educates medical practitioners around the world about treating diabetes and other metabolic disorders. Nourished is available from Amazon or from carbwars.blogspot.com.

Rose Levy Beranbaum is proud to announce her partnership with NewMetro Design, inventors of the BeaterBlade and other solution-based culinary tools. Rose will be the special color of her eponymous line.

The Wilton Enterprises-sponsored public television show Bake Decorate Celebrate! will air its 10th season this May and just received a MarCom Award for the 8th season. It has also won Telly Awards. Members Nancy Siler and Gretchen Homan started the show, and Beth Somers has been developing recipes for the last three seasons. Check out over 630 projects, recipes, and techniques at bakedecoratecelebrate.com.

Submit news that marks a significant milestone in your career! Member Milestones are published monthly both in Frontburner, IACP's e-zine, and on the site. Just remember: the deadline to submit is the 15th of the month for publication in the following month's Frontburner. For other submission guidelines, click here.

Enjoy more of Frontburner and our other newsletters here. (Note: You must be an IACP member to access the newsletter archives. Join now!)

By Adam Salomone

What do we mean when we say “The Fashion of Food?” Certainly food and fashion have their requisite places in our cultural lexicon, but do they intersect in any meaningful way, and if so how? Aside from the fact that you’ll find many “fashionable” people in the most popular restaurants from coast-to-coast, food and fashion have a much deeper connection.

There are many points of comparison. Take the rise of culinary talent from across the country, who have been promoted to the pinnacle of consumer interest because of a new restaurant opening or product line; or the oft-cited trend of consumers becoming more aware and interested in where their food comes from; or the stories we all hear of superbly indulgent meals being prepared for top dollar in some of the fanciest restaurants. While the threads that connect these aspects of the world of food to the world of fashion may not seem clear at first, it all comes down to one simple (or perhaps not so simple) thought:

What we cook, and eat, speaks volumes about us, just as much as what we wear.

Food has become fashion(able), and now is just as tied to the ebbs and flows of consumer interest as the latest outfits that catch our attention on the runway.

As many of you know by now, the theme of this year’s IACP conference is meant to explore this subject, with the tagline “Where Food, Fashion, and Media Connect.” Indeed, the 2012 conference will explore not just what it means to be fashionable in the world of food, but whether that is even a goal worth pursuing. The Featured Session on Friday, March 30 from 9:00 - 10:30 am will delve deeply into this question, with esteemed speakers including Bon Appétit Editor-in-Chief Adam Rapoport, Marcus Samuelsson of Food Republic (and restaurants including Red Rooster), Gilt Groupe Chairman Susan Lyne, and New York Times journalist Kim Severson.

Those who have been to the Annual Conferences of years past know that the opening keynote always proves to be thought-provoking and often opens a conference-long conversation among attendees. We hope you’ll join us as we discuss "The Fashion of Food," as it should prove to be a great foundation for focusing the learning and discussions that will fill the weekend that follows.

For conference registration, click here.
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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Marnely Rodriguez

The Millennium Broadway Hotel’s IACP preferred discount rate is set to expire on March 5. There are only a few rooms left, however, and it’s a deal you don’t want to miss. Book at the Millennium and you’ll be staying in the heart of New York City, just steps from Times Square and many Midtown attractions. It’s also going to be the center of attention for all things IACP this year! The Millennium Broadway Hotel has extended to us an incredible discount rate of $225 plus local taxes, for single/double occupancy, but this discount will only be available until March 5 or until all the rooms are booked.

Staying at the Millennium offers an incredible opportunity to meet and network with other IACP members, get together with friends old and new, and also enjoy the convenience of having the conference sessions a quick elevator ride from where you’re staying. Miss that last room and want to share a room (and the cost!) with a food-loving friend also attending the conference? Check our roommate discussion forum and get a head start networking with IACP members!

When booking, don’t forget to mention our Group Preferred Rate Code, IACP032812. A credit card is required for every reservation, but will not be charged. If needed, cancellations must be made 72 hours before your arrival to avoid charges on your card. Remember, there are only a few rooms left, so book today!
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Marnely Rodriguez is the author of the food blog Cooking with Books and is a freelance food and travel writer. Marnely has worked as an overnight bread baker in Colorado and a chocolate maker in Virginia, as well as a pastry cook on Martha’s Vineyard, just to name a few of the positions she's held. She has a bachelor’s degree in hotel management and is a graduate of The Culinary Institute of America. Influenced by her home, the Dominican Republic, and currently living on Martha’s Vineyard, MA, she is on an endless search for Caribbean flavors, new adventures, and gastronomic inspiration which she then shares in her food writing and recipe development.

Seattle and Puget Sound members enjoyed a convivial evening at the West Seattle cottage home of Kate McDermott (artofthepie.com) on February 16. Attending were Judy Barnes (carbwars.blogspot.com), Zoe Bartlett (intentionaltable.com), Linda Brandt, Marilyn Carlson, Kathy Gehrt (discoverlavender.com), Pranee Halverson (ilovethaicooking.com), Jennifer Lewis (smallfoodbiz.com), and Joanne Naganawa. Members shared information about their cornucopia of skills and their individual businesses. An impromptu demonstration on how to create a website and use social media was given by Kate. And all were buzzing about the mid-March opening of chef Greg Atkinson’s new Northwest bistro, Restaurant Marche (restaurantmarchebainbridge.com), just a ferry ride away on Bainbridge Island.

Be sure to say hello to members Pranee, Zoe, and Jennifer who will be attending the Annual Conference in NYC next month!

For more information about upcoming grassroots events or guidance on planning one, contact IACP Headquarters at info@iacp.com or Susi Gott Séguret, Grassroots Events Committee Chair.

By Adam Salomone

You’ve been waiting. We’ve been waiting. With breath bated, and (hopefully) mouths full of good food, we’ve all watched as the calendar slowly ticked away the days to the annual awards announcement. Well friends, wait no longer, because that day is today. With gleeful anticipation, it is our pleasure and honor to present the 26th Annual International Association of Culinary Professionals awards finalists for the Cookbooks Awards, New Media & Broadcast Awards, and Bert Greene Awards. You can see the full listing at the link below:

http://www.iacp.com/press/more/2012_finalists_for_26th_annual_iacp_awards.

This year saw a diverse and vibrant set of entries across all categories. As you’ll see in each of the categories, the finalists highlight both the culinary talents that we all know and love, as well as those that are up-and-coming, whether as authors, chefs, food entrepreneurs, or beyond. There is much to be said for being included with such a distinct group, and as much as those receiving nominations may feel a singular delight, at the IACP, we feel a great honor in being able to select from such a qualified group. We deeply value the faith and trust that the culinary world puts in the organization as we select those included. We hope you feel that this year’s nominees represent the community of which we all are a part, and that you’ll give them a warm welcome and hearty congratulations both today and at the awards unveiling set for Monday, April 2. The awards evening in New York City is sure to be a can’t-miss event.

Sign up to attend the Awards Ceremony & After Party here, if you haven't already.
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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Adam Salomone, Photo by Elena Hernandez

Modernist cuisine. No two words in the culinary world seem to excite such a spectrum of reactions, from starry-eyed adoration to deep-set vitriol for what has become a bit of a misunderstood field of food exploration. For those who fall on the latter half of the spectrum, modernist cuisine may seem like a bunch of hocus-pocus, because, honestly, submerging a vacuum-sealed pouch of steak in a sous vide bath for three days seems hardly efficient or challenging in a culinary sense. For those who look lovingly upon this new frontier for food, modernist cuisine is less about the flash and fashion of high-tech gadgets, and more about having a better understanding of how our food “works.”

The movement is perhaps best represented by its namesake product – Nathan Myhrvold’s Modernist Cuisine, a six-volume, 2,400-page behemoth that tracks the rise and trajectory of the movement. When talking about the book and its author’s grand vision for modernist cuisine, readers, cooks, and consumers invariably gravitate towards extreme examples (i.e., emulsified passion fruit that’s made to look like an egg) that are relatively outlandish when it comes to broader culinary applicability. Less talked about, however, are the explorations into how our senses perceive “taste,” how searing food actually doesn’t seal in juices, and how using weight to judge cooking times for meat can be a useless exercise. In short, things that all cooks or culinary entrepreneurs would want to know to better their understanding of food and how they use it.

So what do you think? Is modernist cuisine a worthwhile pursuit for the broader culinary arena, or will it be relegated to those corners of the cooking market reserved for food geeks? As part of the upcoming IACP Anuual Conference, we’ll be talking about just this issue in the session "What’s to Know About – and What Should We Care About – Modernist Cuisine" on Saturday, March 31 from 2 to 3:30 pm. Join us as we talk with Aki Kamozawa and H. Alexander Talbot, authors and bloggers; Cesar Vega, PhD, research manager for Mars Botanicals; and Bill Yosses, White House pastry chef and lecturer at Harvard University’s Science & Cooking series, about where the modernist cuisine movement has been, where it’s going, and why you should care.
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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Adam Salomone

The Early Bird discount has since expired, and we’re sad to see it go. But there’s still hope for those of you looking to take part in the conference at a discount. We've opened up the day pass and single event ticket options. These are particularly useful for members who can’t stay the entire weekend or who want an à la carte approach to the conference, picking and choosing the sessions and events that make the most sense for them.

Day pass tickets range in price, from $125 for Thursday to $350 for Friday through Monday. Also keep in mind that on Thursday, we have some great culinary walking tours and other optional events, though they’re filling up quickly so grab them while you can.

The single tickets cover specific events throughout the conference, including the Opening Night Party on Friday ($150), the Culinary Expo ($25), the Blog and Book Festival ($10), and the Annual Awards Ceremony and Gala ($150).

All in all, these options are meant to give members the opportunity to experience the conference in any way they want. Over the coming weeks, we’ll give you a sneak peek at some of the exciting programming coming up at the 34th IACP Annual Conference to help you decide which sessions are best for you.
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Adam Salomone is the Associate Publisher at the Harvard Common Press, a Boston-based cookbook publisher. A lover of food, wine, and spirits, Adam enjoys talking, thinking, and writing about the intersections of food as they impact our lives every day.

By Karin Endy

Joined by renowned chef Tom Colicchio, six “Top Chef” chef’testants, and members of the Dallas Cowboys at Kleberg/Rylie Recreation Center in Dallas, Mrs. Obama participated in a “Top Chef”-style cook-off with students from the Dallas Independent School District, which has earned more Healthier US School Challenge Gold Awards than any other district in the country.

The First Lady also unveiled a new Chefs Move to Schools website, chefsmovetoschools.org. The site is a one-stop shop for chefs and schools, allowing them to sign up for the program; access training, recipes, and resources; and learn how chefs and schools across the country are partnering to create healthier school environments.

“Chefs Move to Schools has been a huge success with thousands of chefs teaming up with schools to prepare healthier meals and teach students about healthy eating, and now we’re excited to take this program to the next level,” said First Lady Michelle Obama. “ChefsMoveToSchools.org will make it even easier for chefs to connect with schools and share ideas with each other. So I’m counting on chefs and schools across our country to go to the website, sign up, and start cooking!”

The site was created thanks to a new coalition of leading culinary, nutrition, and school organizations that will oversee the Chefs Move to Schools program. Leading the coalition is the American Culinary Federation and School Nutrition Association. Also joining is The Culinary Trust, Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs (BEN), Harvard School of Public Health, International Corporate Chefs Association, SupermarketGuru|The Lempert Report, National Food Service Management Institute, Partnership for a Healthier America, Share Our Strength, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The Chefs Move to Schools program began in June 2010 as part of the Let’s Move! initiative, dedicated to solving the challenge of childhood obesity within a generation. Through the program, chefs partner with schools in their communities and work with teachers, parents, and school nutrition professionals to help educate kids about food and nutrition. The goal of the program is to promote chefs as the catalyst for creating a new nation of child food advocates and start turning the tide on unhealthy eating behaviors.

Approximately 3,400 chefs and 3,350 schools across the nation have signed up for the program to date. Together, chefs and schools have developed gardens, introduced salad bars to cafeterias, created healthier school meal recipes, hosted educational demonstrations, and empowered kids with the knowledge they need to make healthy decisions.

Visit chefsmovetoschools.org today to learn more or to register as an official participant.

The Culinary Trust provides grants to volunteer chefs participating in the Chefs Move to Schools initiative. On April 1, 2012, The Culinary Trust is joining with IACP to provide a full day of programming to support culinary professionals working with children. Workshops include how to prepare the ideal public school meal with Chef Bill Telepan; three approaches to encouraging healthy eating with Brian Wansink, Ellie Krieger, and Chef Bobo; nutrition basics for culinary professionals; and lesson planning with experts from Columbia University Teacher’s College. For registration and more information visit the Annual Conference page.

About The Culinary Trust

The Culinary Trust is a 501(c)(3) not for profit organization founded in 1984 by Julia Child and other members of IACP. It gives culinary professionals the tools and opportunities to understand and act on critical issues in the world of food. The Culinary Trust supports the Chefs Move to Schools initiative by providing grants to chef volunteers, and by providing educational workshops and content supporting their initiatives. For more information, visit theculinarytrust.org.
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Karin Endy is Chairman of the Board of The Culinary Trust and serves as liaison to the IACP Food History, Food Policy, and Kids in the Kitchen interest sections. She is also the owner of Edible Resources, a consulting company that assists non-profits and food companies with education and sustainability matters.

By Brian Yarvin

The word fashion usually implies something you wear. We don't wear food or food photos, and yet they have trends and styles that are important to follow. Where do we look when we want to see what's happening? Or more importantly, how do we look to see what’s next in the food photography world?

Fashions in Food Photography – on Friday, March 30, 11 am - 12:30 pm – looks to explore where the world of food photography has been and where it’s going. This is a panel of some of the most knowledgeable people in the field, including Don Morris (Fine Cooking Magazine), Laurie Buckle (Better Homes and Gardens), Romulo Yanes (former photographer for Gourmet), and Susan Spungen (formerly of Martha Stewart Living). These experts have all played an important role in determining the character and style of food images for trend-setting national publications. Their experience has given them a deep understanding of how food photography evolves. 

All too many chefs, food photographers, and cookbook authors are surprised to learn that they are somehow in the style business. If you're in that group and feel lost, you can start right here. Learn what's in and what's out right now, and what the most fashion-forward photographers and designers are doing. After this panel, you'll never be caught shooting last year’s trend again.

Still haven’t signed up to join us in New York? Early Bird Discount ends today! Register for the 2012 Annual Conference now.

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Born in Brooklyn and raised in Queens and Long Island, Brian Yarvin has had a passion for food that began with childhood visits to Chinatown and Amish Country. In addition to being a photographer for almost forty years, he is an instructor of food and commercial photography at the Washington School of Photography in Bethesda, MD and a writer on food, farmers, markets, and restaurants. Brian lives in Edison, New Jersey with his wife Maria.

Overview

Whether the New York conference is your first or your fifteenth, you want to get the most out of it. They say 80 percent of success is just showing up, the other 20 percent is in the planning.

In this webinar, Jackie Gordon will help you sharpen your strategy, skills, and mindset in order to:

• Get clarity about what you want to achieve at conference;
• Examine whether your career/business model is set up to win;
• Get real about what your obstacles have been up to now and how to get around them;
• Develop a results-driven plan to maximize your productivity; and
• Hone your interaction skills to keep opportunities from slipping through your fingers.

Jackie Gordon

Jackie is a singing chef and business coach who mixes food, music, and humor with valuable information when she trains, speaks, and entertains people because it’s a wonderfully effective way to learn and retain what you learn. After working in just about every capacity in the food industry, she has a new platform “Hey! Feed Yourself: Sharpen Your Business Skill Knives.” Her mission is to help culinary colleagues create what they need to "feed" themselves by having more money, time, and/or freedom. In 2003, Jackie and Barbara Gulino created the workshop “Six Degrees of Connectivity: Speed Network Your Way to a Successful Conference and Beyond” specifically for IACP, and have since presented it at several IACP conferences and for other food organizations.

New Platform: heyfeedyourself.com

Website: jackiegordon.com

Blog: The Diva That Ate New York
Twitter: @divathatateny


Webinar Instructions

Click here (IACP members: please log in to access.)

Note: You must be an IACP member to take advantage of our Speaker Series. Join now, so you don't miss the opportunity to learn from the amazing culinary talent lined up each month!

Conference Information

If you haven't yet explored our Annual Conference offerings, view highlights here or the detailed program by clicking below. We hope you'll join us in New York City, March 29 - April 2.

By Laura Loesch-Quintin

Synonymous with farm-to-table dining, chef Dan Barber’s acclaimed restaurants Blue Hill at Stone Barns and Blue Hill in Manhattan have drawn droves of hungry diners for their refined menus showcasing local, artisanal fare. Part of a movement to inspire a local and sustainable food system, chef Dan Barber’s approach is admirable and widely applauded. Yet, a meal at either restaurant is well beyond the means of the average diner, a reason for which New Yorker writer Adam Gopnik questions the reality and durability of this possibly idyllic model.

Asked if farm-to-table dining is just the latest fashion, these two friends will amicably debate the matter, whilst Williams College professor and Gastronomica Founder and Editor Darra Goldstein moderates the lively discussion. Who will win this cordial tête-à-tête? We’ll let you be the judge.

Seats are still available on Saturday, March 31, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm, for this Annual Conference featured session, “Is Farm-to-Table Just the Latest Fashion?”  

Members, view more information about conference and this session here. Non-members, take advantage of this great one-time membership offer before signing up for conference!
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Laura Loesch-Quintin is a freelance writer and the voice behind the recipe blog gourmettenyc.com. When not cooking or writing, she can be found working in restaurant PR and volunteering for such events as the IACP Annual Conference.

Jump to event details.
Sign up via the IACP conference registration page.

By Karin Endy

As Chair of The Culinary Trust (TCT) and an active participant in several well known NYC-based non-profits, I have planned and attended too many culinary fundraisers with internationally renowned chefs. Planning meetings toss around names and ideas for multi-course dinners and taste-arounds. I have found myself jaded and cynical.

But TCT can't rehash the same multi-course dinner or taste-around, even if it features great chefs! We need an event that will bring out culinary professionals, even those weary of the usual fundraising recipe. We need an event that connects to TCT's mission and programs. We need an event that relates to New York City, this year's IACP Annual Conference host city.

I started thinking about what I love about New York City, the only hometown I have known. Most of all, it is the diversity of the people, and the culture you can taste as you walk from Astoria to Jackson Heights to Flushing. TCT is dedicated to preserving culinary heritage, and our newest program, Stories About Food, reaches across generations to share personal food memories and experiences. But how do you capture all of this in one evening, in a way that will excite IACP members to buy a ticket to a fundraiser?

IACP members who attended the 2010 Annual Conference in Portland may remember that we were treated to a preview of the award-winning film Today's Special. Starring and co-written by Aasif Mandvi of The Daily Show, it tells the story of Samir, a sous chef who dreams of becoming the head chef at an upscale Manhattan restaurant. When he is passed over for a promotion, he impulsively quits with the intention of going to Paris to  apprentice under a master French chef. Dreams must be put aside though after his father Hakim has a heart attack and Samir is forced to take over Tandoori Palace, the nearly bankrupt family restaurant in Jackson Heights. 

Samir’s relationship with his parents and his heritage is immediately put to the test. He has been estranged from his father since the death of his older brother, and his mother Farrida, played by legendary cookbook writer and actress Madhur Jaffrey, is consumed with finding a wife for her remaining son. While Samir is being forced to forsake his dreams, he is desperately trying to master Indian cooking to salvage the family business.

Luckily, he crosses paths with Akbar, a taxi driver, passionate chef, and worldly raconteur (portrayed by Naseeruddin Shah, star of Monsoon Wedding). Akbar inspires Samir and teaches him to trust his senses more than recipes; to stop measuring his life and to start truly living it. With Akbar’s guidance, Samir has a chance to rediscover his heritage and his passion for life through the enchanting art of cooking Indian food.

If you missed the screening in Portland and didn't catch the movie in theaters, it's not too late. Today's Special was just released on demand and on DVD. Or you can watch the trailer here.  

And if you want to experience the spirit of Jackson Heights directly, a menu designed by Madhur Jaffrey, and humor provided by Aasif Mandvi, I have an event that even the most jaded culinary professional can't refuse! For one night only, on April 1, L'Ecole in New York City will be transformed into Tandoori Palace with Samir (Aasif Mandvi) and producer Nimitt Mankad in attendance and with a warm welcome at the first seating from Madhur Jaffrey.

Join The Culinary Trust as we connect food and community across generations and share a taste of New York City.

Event Details

Sunday, April 1, 2012
Early seating: 5:30 - 8:00 pm; late seating: 9:00 - 11:30 pm
L'Ecole, 462 Broadway at Grand, New York

Tickets are $150 USD and available on the IACP conference registration page. Proceeds benefit TCT's many philanthropic programs, including scholarships and grants for students and professionals, cookbook preservation and restoration, continuing education, and grants for hunger alleviation. For more information about TCT, click here.

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Karin Endy is Chairman of the Board of The Culinary Trust and serves as liaison to the IACP Food History, Food Policy, and Kids in the Kitchen interest sections. She is also the owner of Edible Resources, a consulting company that assists non-profits and food companies with education and sustainability matters.