April 12, 2025 | 12-2 p.m. est

There are many ways to write about food—food reviews, restaurant criticism, roundups that adhere to a certain theme, personal essays, researched deep dives that focus on a subject of fascination that could use a closer glance or examination, critical or analytical essays where food is a lens for wider cultural exploration. As varied and diverse as food is are the ways to write, muse and reflect on food. There is not one way to write about food nor is there one way to be a food writer. 

But in a world where the stakes are heightened and writing surface level food stories feels like an ethical disservice to food’s inherent complexities, there is a chance to go deeper and pen pieces that are more meaningful. Enter writing on food as a method of reckoning with cultural memory, e.g. the idea that the writing we do on food can be an illumination of cultural remembrance and active resistance and reclamation in response to the flattening and erasure that happens especially for marginalized communities’ foods and food traditions. 

This workshop is ideal for:

• Food writers looking to deepen their approach beyond reviews and listicles

• Writers interested in exploring cultural heritage and memory through food

• Journalists seeking more meaningful frameworks for food stories

• Culture and memory workers wanting to document family or community food traditions with greater context and purpose

In this two-hour workshop, attendees will be able to apply this framework on writing food as a tool for holding close cultural memories, histories and narratives through the following: 

1. Ideation: How to connect to your inner pulse and follow your curiosities, active listening, building deeper observational skills. 

2. Sourcing & Research: Who are you talking to build your stories and why? Who are you looking to as experts? Taking inventory of both. 

3. Writing Process: Getting words down and moving past doubt and inner criticism. 

4. Replication & Supportive Systems: Building a network of readers, sources and being in-community with those you write to and for. 

The workshop will include discussion throughout and conclude with Q&A. 24 hours before the workshop begins, all attendees will receive: Google Meet details for joining the online class and a PDF of class materials to enable ease of following along during the workshop. 

About the teacher: Nneka M. Okona is a journalist who has been writing about food for nearly a decade. Her food writing has appeared in Food & Wine, Condé Nast Traveler, the Washington Post, the Guardian, SAVEUR and more.

 All sales are final and no refunds will be given. Payment plans available upon request.