The Conversation
What’s the recipe for success? A blog! While the Internet is flooded with food bloggers, only a lucky handful get the opportunity to turn their posts into cookbooks. We scoured the web for the best blogs-turned-books and, trust us, you’re going to want to cancel all of your weekend plans to test out their recipes!
1. Easy Gourmet: Awesome Recipes Anyone Can Cook ($17): While this cookbook doesn’t come out until September 2, author Stephanie Le’s I Am a Food Blog was voted the best blog of 2013 by saveur.com. So basically we know this book will rock.
2. Ripe: A Fresh, Colorful Approach to Fruits and Vegetables ($16): This book, inspired by the blog 5 Second Rule, encourages people to embrace veggies. And with 75 recipes, it’s sure to turn even the biggest fruit and veggie haters into lovers.
3. They Draw and Cook ($16): With more than 100 hand-illustrated recipes, this book comes from the brother/sister team behind the blog with the same name. The colorful cookbook has recipes from across the globe that range from everyday eats and drinks to desserts.
4. The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food From My Frontier ($17): You’ve seen her successful Food Network Show, but what you may not know is that the Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond, got her start as a blogger. Her recipes are easy to make and always delicious.
5. Absolutely Avocados ($13): Do we even need to say more? You’re our hero, Gaby Dalkin.
6. Make It With a Cake Mix ($13): We love nothing more than a dessert that is semi-homemade. Lizzy Early from Your Cup of Cake did the sweet research for us, bound and printed it!
7. Melt: The Art of Macaroni and Cheese ($20): What happens when two bloggers combine forces? This. Thank you, Vanilla Garlic and The Culinary Life.
8. Sally’s Baking Addiction ($16): Sally McKenney’s blog-turned-cookbook has 75 indulgent recipes that will give anyone a sugar rush.
9. Food in Jars: Preserving in Small Batches Year-Round ($15): All. About. This. Buying more mason jars, stat.
10. Make the Bread, Buy the Butter ($11): The Tipsy Baker tackles 304 pages of kitchen experiments, tips and tales that answer all of your cooking questions.
11. Breakfast for Dinner ($14): Is there anything better? The most recent publication from blogger Love and Olive Oil has us drooling on our keyboards.
12. The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook ($23): This book, the love child of the blog Smitten Kitchen, was named one of Cooking Light magazine’s “Top 100 Cookbooks of the Last 25 Years,” and also received the IACP Julia Child First Book Award.
Who are your favorite food bloggers? Have they published cookbooks? Share your finds and favorites below!
Kim was born and raised in New Jersey. The true definition of a “fan girl,” her friends make fun of her because she speaks in teen. But she’s okay with that because boy bands are her Kryptonite. On a typical night you can find her reciting lines to a Full House rerun and testing her latest baking experiment.
More From Recipes
It can be intimidating to step out on your own and build a business from the ground up. As part of our collaboration with Office Depot, we're talking with Selfmade alum and solopreneur Colette Lawrence, the faith-based motivator and relationship builder behind The M.E.E. Movement, about ways in which women in business can find success.
B + C: How did you know M.E.E. Movement was your business to start?
The M.E.E Movement represents motivation, empowerment, and encouragement for women. It is what represents me. I did not know at first that it was my business to start, but then the thought of monetizing what I loved came to me. It scared me, however. I registered the business in July 2020 and have been slowly building my wings since.
B + C: What's one strategy that's helped you start your business?
Thinking through and researching what the requirements are to start my business, and then asking questions of people who are in the business. Not all advice worked; however, it helped me to figure out what I needed to do and not to do.
B + C: Did you always know life coaching would be your entrepreneurial path?
(Smiles) No, I did not. I 'stumbled" on it. I knew that people were always coming to me for advice and I found that I loved having conversations with them, especially with women, young and old.
B + C: What was your most valuable takeaway from Selfmade?
My most valuable takeaway was the first day of training: Get out of your own way. There were a lot of great moments and important takeaways from every presenter. However, getting out of my own way, pushing past doubts, was for me my most valuable takeaway. Doing something that I had never done before took courage. If I do not focus on what is happening with me mentally then I cannot deliver to my clients successfully.
B + C: What's one piece of advice you would give to female entrepreneurs on the brink of starting?
Get out of your head. You have something to offer. You have what you need to succeed so go ahead and do it.
B + C: How do you stay motivated?
I stay motivated by listening to music and listening to motivational speakers, and sometimes someone will just reach out and talk about the impact that I made in their life. That adds the extra juice or sauce I need to pummel through the day.
B + C: What's your best organizational tip?
Keep a diary and journal. It's the best way for me to keep organized and it also provides a source motivation as I record not only my "losses" but my wins as well.
B + C: Who inspires you in the entrepreneurial space?
Shirley Toliver – She motivates and empowers and makes me always want to show up.
B + C: What has receiving the Office Depot scholarship to Selfmade done to help you start or grow your business?
The scholarship was a blessing in that all the areas that were covered offered valuable information that I needed, from social media to HR. As a new business owner, I needed to know this to increase my own personal awareness in what it takes to run a successful business. The candidness of the presenters made it easy to see myself in their shoes and helped me to realize that I can also get there.
Thanks Colette! You can follow The M.E.E. Movement on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
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Head to Office Depot's Selfmade page to check out even more amazing business resources (and discounts!) to help you accomplish more on your entrepreneurial journey. These offers are available for a limited time only, so be sure to take advantage of all this goodness while supplies last. Want to join the next Selfmade cohort this summer? Check out all of the scholarship details right here.
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