How to Tell the Most Delicious Stories About Food

Food touches culture, politics, love, sadness, travel, history and so many other corners of our lives. It runs the gamut from fuel to fine dining. For every tin of baked beans, there’s a tin of Beluga caviar. Food is a slippery, subjective topic and as much as it can build bridges it can also create divides. As brand and food copywriters, we’re interested in the language of food and telling stories that leave readers salivating and intrigued. Let’s tuck in to what makes great food writing and how to do it.

What is food writing?

We thought you might ask that and we’re afraid there’s just no straight answer. Food writing can be so many delicious things. It’s Marcel Proust’s tea-soaked madeleine, unlocking past recollections. Or Nora Ephron perfectly summing up the relationship between food and gut-wrenching emotion in ‘Heartburn’. It’s Nigella’s description of ‘Happiness Soup’; “such sunny, mood-enhancing yellowness that it overcomes even the most pervasively innate cynicism”.

One thing’s for sure, whether it’s a novel or The New Yorker’s food pages, food writing is about a lot more than food.

The best meals we ever eat are as much about where we are, why we’re there and who we’re with, not just how things taste. Great food writing captures all of this; the highs, the lows, the atmosphere, the why, as well as describing the tantalising tastes and textures that make a good dinner so darn joyful.