TheBittenWord.com
Clay and Zach
Our blog started as a New Year’s resolution. We’d been receiving several food magazines each month, but we rarely ever actually cooked anything from them. We resolved to start cooking at least one recipe from each magazine each month, and TheBittenWord.com was born. These days, we cook from about 10 food magazines every month, and also feature original recipes.
Questions
1. What’s one thing you love about independent bookstores?
Independent bookstores are the absolute best places to explore books and for finding new favorites you otherwise never would have even known about. It’s like having a really great, smart friend who tells you, “I’m reading the best book right now, and I just know you would love it!” Plus, we met in an independent bookstore for our first date, so they’ll always have a special place in our hearts.
2. What's your blogging philosophy?
Honesty. We strive to be as forthcoming as possible about our trials and travails in the kitchen. We catalog our cooking failures right alongside our successes. If we don’t like a dish -- or if we majorly screw up a recipe -- we want to share that with our readers.
3. Who are your readers?
We hear from people all over the place -- in and around D.C., as well as across the country and internationally. They range from college kids just starting out in their first kitchen, to great-grandmothers who write to us with a tip on making jam. Our readers are people who love food.
4. What’s your favorite D.C. blog?
There are lots of D.C. food blogs that we love, and we could never pick a favorite of those. For all-around news on neighborhood comings-and-goings, we rely on Prince of Petworth. (Also, we love to obsess over the apartments on the Urbanturf real estate blog!)
5. How can the analog medium of books & the digital mediums make beautiful creative babies?
We get a bunch of magazine subscriptions and we love how the iPad editions of magazines are introducing new or expanded content. You read about an orchard in a magazine, but you can see a video tour of that orchard in the iPad edition. Plus you get the digital version for free if you’ve purchased the print. We see the same model coming for books.
Three Book Recomendations
Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams at Home by Jeni Britton Bauer. This is our current cookbook obsession. Jeni has created a genius way to make ice cream. We’re finally putting our ice cream maker to work.
Tender at the Bone by Ruth Reichl. Though Reichl’s best-known book is Garlic and Sapphires, we suggest you start at the beginning of her memoir trilogy with this book. She’s had an amazing and inspiring life in food.
Stuffed: Adventures of a Restaurant Family by Patricia Volk. Someone suggested this book to us last year, and we loved it. It’s a funny and sweet portrait of a family, filled with wonderful, warm food memories.