Blogs

I've been thinking about how to approach this post for a while now, but I hadn't really come up with any thoughts. Lindsey had asked me to write about how I find all the great food blogs I read. I wish I had some cool skill to brag about, but the real key is boredom. I think the first food blog I was probably aware of was Culinary Concoctions by Peabody. I found her through a cooking message board on The Nest. I checked out some of the links in her sidebar to other food blogs, but didn't really commit any to memory. The second blog I remember reading is Everybody Likes Sandwiches. And I read through the blogs in her link list. And after checking out some of those blogs, I checked out the blogs they were linking. And then it becomes like that old television commercial- they linked two blogs, and they link two blogs, and so on, and so on. I didn't become a compulsive reader of all of the blogs I was exposed to, but there were some that I did keep going back to to read. And eventually I had a good sized list of pages I was checking habitually. They had that certain something(s) that kept me interested, returning to see what was new in their kitchen.

Qualities I look for in blogs I read:

• Pictures- I am a visual learner, so pictures are a big thing for me. Unless I feel really familiar with the style of a recipe, I need pictures to know that this is something that looks appetizing. And I also like to know what the final outcome is supposed to look like. Most of the time I probably won't make a recipe if there is no picture. This is also why I almost always put pictures up, despite the fact that my food photography skills are severly lacking and I only have a little Kodak Easyshare camera.
• Frequent updating- This again relates to the boredom. I love doing anything but working while at work, so my long blog lists keep me entertained early in the morning, when I'm the only one here. Also during lunch while eating at my desk. And basically any other time of day, ha. Not all of the blogs I read update as frequently as I wish, but that's their prerogative as a blogger. I can just be happy to have something fresh to read when they do. And, obviously I don't always blog enough to live up to my high standards, so I can't cast any stones, ha.
  
• Recipes- Duh. Granted, I've actually only made a few recipes that I've gotten from other blogs, but even if I don't make the recipes I read, they inspire me to try different things. And I can often times pick up tips from their notes on recipes and how the cooking process went.

One of the other keys to finding new blogs for me are blog events. Blog events are a lot of fun to participate in, it gives people the opportunity to be exposed to your blog, and you to all their's. I also find a lot of interesting blogs through blog events, whether I participate or not. A great place to hear about current events to participate in is Is My Blog Burning?".

So, that's my key to finding food blogs I like- a whole lotta boredom, ha. There are so many fabulous blogs out there that I enjoy stopping by, I just don't have them all listed in my sidebar. Because I would probably need a whole other blog for that list.