Writing Process blog tour

“The Pen is mightier than the sword!” …and iin this modern day and age,  ‘The internet is mightier than the pen!’.  It’s been only 5 months since I started blogging publicly but I feel like I have been doing this for ever! The culinary exchanges and the interactions with fellow food bloggers has been the best part of my blogging journey! Everyone has been so incredibly kind, friendly and supportive. What a delightful bunch! I hadn’t heard of the ‘Writing process blog tour’ until Chef Julianna from Foodie on Board asked me if I wanted to participate. I instantly liked the idea of the tour, because it is yet another way for us to get to know other bloggers better and to learn about their writing process.  The Writing process blog tour is nothing but a chain journey of sorts where we talk more about our thinking/writing process by answering some questions and then invite 3 other bloggers to post the following week.  They in turn,  invite 3 others who post the following week, and so on and so forth we go… touring each others’ blogs. How wondrous, isn’t it ? 🙂

OK first a little more about Chef Julianna of Foodie on Board who was so kind to nominate me and my blog as one of 3 blogs. To see her post on the tour and learn a bit more about her, click here. ‘Chef Julianna’ is really an apt way to address her since she is such an amazing cook! She has an impressive collection of cookbooks that she lists out on her blog!  Check out her recipe index too for an amazing array of creative recipes- she recently did a Moroccan series – for eg. the Moroccan chicken potpie  .  I was first bowled over by her extremely innovative Mango and shrimp wonton cups. Do go and check out her blog!

Here are the questions that I have been asked to address in this tour and these are the same questions that I will ask of the nominees:

1.  What am I working on?

Well, I have tons of stuff that I would like to write posts on! When I started the blog, I wanted to mainly document traditional Kerala recipes and also other international recipes that I had learned to make over the years. To me documenting traditional tried and tested recipes is a huge thing – I would like my children and the future generation to not miss out on the traditional recipes. But this does not mean I am not open to trying new recipes. In fact the exact opposite is true – I absolutely love to try and experiment with new dishes too all the time! Hence to answer the question’What am I working on? ‘ – Well I regularly record my traditional recipes as and when I cook them also doing a video recording for some; then I also record any other trials and experiments where obviously only the successful ones would lend themselves ultimately to a post!  In short, I have tons of recipes on my phone and loads of pictures on my computer! And then every weekend I decide on a particular recipe and do the write-up.  In addition to recipes, I also would like to research on food related topics and write summary articles too. Wow, so much to do AND so little time! 🙁

2.  How does my work differ from others of its genre?

I try to focus on ‘healthy and fresh’. Of course that does not mean I don’t do any desserts! 🙂 But I try my best to make a recipe ‘healthful and delicious’ at the same time! And what’s my deifinition of ‘healthy’? – healthy food to me means eating a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables, using whole grains whenever possible and avoiding unnecessary additives and artificial ingredients. And the biggest thing you can do is to ‘cook fresh meals everyday’ !

I also know that there are a lot of other bloggers out there who share my passion for good, home cooked fresh and healthy meals.  So I am not the only one doing this!

3.  Why do I write what I do?

One of the reasons I decided to blog was because I had wanted to document my mom’s traditional recipes and also write about lovely memories that I had with her. Writing about her recipes was a way for me to keep her alive always and to think about those precious moments from my childhood and youth. I do want to write more than just plain recipes – after all there’s always some story attached to a recipe if you think hard enough and that’s what I try to do. I also like to write about my family and my kids and the wonderful moments we share.  After all as John Lennon said ” Life is what happens to you when you are busy making plans.”

On the food and health topic, I like to write and share my research on foods and about general food/health related issues. This is much more time consuming and therefore I have not been able to do as much as I would like to.

4.  How does my writing process work?

The writing as such is whatever comes naturally. As I mentioned before, my focus is to share recipes and then any interesting stories that come to mind is what I write. Most of the times it’s not even a story but as I begin to type my post for a recipe, my thoughts usually wander a bit and then eventually settle on something and then the words just come out naturally.  I am certainly not a great writer by any means and I do hope that my writing gets better over time 🙂 Attending a ‘writing workshop’ is on one of my ‘to do lists’ !

Now, I would like to introduce  3 other bloggers whom I have come to greatly admire and who also so kindly agreed to join me on this tour and share their writing process stories! Here are these 3 blogs in no particular order. Do check these blogs out:

My Kitchen Moments– Aiswarya from My Kitchen Moments blogs very simply about authentic vegetarian south indian/kerala recipes.  What I really love about her is that she too (like me) believes in sharing traditional recipes. Some of her recent posts that I really loved are ‘Banana stem stir fry’, Jackfruit seeds sambhar – Now these are really very traditional recipes that could get easily lost with time if we don’t document them. So hats off to Aiswarya and her blog!

Kloe’s Kitchen – Kloe of Kloe’s Kitchen is a lovely young lady (not sure if I should call her a lady or a kid! – she is only 16! ) who has impressed me so much with her amazing and kind spirit.!  She not only blogs about yummy baking recipes but also about DIY projects.  Such an inspiring and level headed teenager!

Detox Mama – Detox Mama of Detox Mama is another smart and inspiring young woman (and mama!) who is passionate about food and health and about alternate/holistic medicine etc. She has some unique recipes like green plantains with avocados and delicious smoothies like honeydew melon smoothie!

Please enjoy exploring the blogs of these 3 very fine bloggers and look for their Writing Process Blog Tour posts on June 9, 2014.!