Scan Me!

Technology has literally taken over our world by connecting virtually everyone and everything with different devices and applications. A semi-new form of technology that we discussed in class this week is a QR code. These crafty little designs of “squares” show up constantly…whether it’s the barcode being scanned while you purchase your weekly groceries, or a code that looks similar to the one below found on a page of your favorite cooking magazine that will take you to a recipe’s website. If you have a smartphone and have installed a “scanner” app, then you’re going to love this. Just scan the QR code below and you will be directed to one of my favorite foodie websites…appropriately named “foodgawker.” You literally gawk…at food…delicious food. And, you know, search for recipes and food blogs along the way. Hope this works!

(Link to QR Code just incase)

Keep Calm And…

This week in class we discussed the nature of memes and looked at a variety of examples (there’s literally SO many variations out there). For our blog post we were instructed to pick a meme that had something to do with our blog (or whatever we were feeling for the day). I was kind of stumped on this because I really didn’t know what memes would be out there that had anything to do with foodie blogging…so I basically spent almost an hour on knowyourmeme.com searching through the meme database (like I said, there’s a million out there on the web). When I wasn’t finding anything I decided that I should maybe use a meme generator and create my own…while trying to do that I was still stumped and had no idea what basic meme to use and individualize. That’s when I stumbled upon the “Keep Calm and Carry On” meme. The original “Keep Calm and Carry On” was transmitted throughout the web and later a series of templates were created around the central theme “Keep Calm And…” There are tons of variations of this meme scattered around the Internet with all different phrases coming after the original “Keep Calm.” I found this one and figured it was perfect to post…who doesn’t love cupcakes? This would be cute to even find a poster of and hang on the kitchen wall for all you foodies out there.

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday everyone! Lets see what favorites have been cooked up this week…

Favorite Creative Idea: How to bake a heart inside a cupcake!

 

Recipe Via Made With Love

Favorite Homemade Candy…because everything’s better homemade:

 

Recipe Via Daydream Kitchen

Favorite No Bake Treat:

Recipe Via CenterCutCook

Favorite Take Out @ Home:

Recipe Via SkinnyMom

 

 

Creative Commons

 http://www.flickr.com/photos/sheriwetherell/2294254515/

Most blogs continuously use various sources of media to enhance the overall blog; whether it be a photo for the header, the blog’s background, or a photo or video to add to a blog post. Whatever the media use may be, the first place I would think to look for a source would be on a Google search. For one of our first class assignments for our blogs we were instructed to do an advanced Google search for an image for our header…many images were made available to use, but the main thing we look to now is were the images credible, and how do you give adequate credit for using an image that is essentially not “yours”? On this assignment, along with using the photo of our choice as a header, we also had to give the photo source credit in our About sections saying “header image borrowed from…”

This is where this week’s assignment comes in. Instead of a Google search, we were asked to use the Creative Commons search engine which provides credible sources of media through a variety of platforms (Flickr, Google Images, YouTube, etc). I had no idea this search engine, but it is actually extremely helpful in the world of “online sharing.” Since this is a blog all about yummy food, I just typed “food” into the search engine and decided to use Flickr as a source platform, figuring I would find the most results on that. And that’s where I found this lovely picture of colorful, delicious macaroons…perfect. According to the Fair Use Checklist we were provided with, reasons to support my use of this media image on my blog are the following: nonprofit educational institution use and purpose (class assignment), borrowed images are used in small quantities and appropriate for educational purpose, etc. 

Sharing Is Caring.

Helloooo Blogging World!

I’d like to congratulate myself and the rest of my Strategic Presentation class on creating our blogs and maintaining them for about a month now…it’s actually not as easy keeping up with a blog as you may think. Starting our blog was one thing, but now what’s the next step? Having people actually want to visit and follow our blogs would be nice. Since we started this blogging adventure as a class assignment, our blogs are just one in a million in the blogging world. The good news is, we can all help each other gain some followers…hopefully some outside bloggers that are interested in what we have to say.

Electronic collaboration and sharing is key as we try and promote our blogs. I’m sure that the majority of us have Twitter accounts which allows for endless sharing to the Twitter universe. If you have any interest in my blog, or even think some of you Twitter followers may…help me out! You can tweet something about food (which literally everyone loves to read about on social media now a days) and mention my blog in the tweet. You can even use tags such as #food #yummy #recipes #cooking…anything along those lines that would connect other bloggers right here to my blog. I have created tags of my own on my posts, as well as categories for my posts, which will hopefully help when trying to reach out to my follower base.

There are also other Internet platforms that encourage sharing such as Facebook, Instagram, even several Google platforms. Give sharing my blog a try and lets see if I can get a substantial following base (you know, more than about 5 readers that are just my classmates). Good luck with your blogs as well!

Friday Favorites

Can’t believe another week has gone by…figured I give a little favoritism to my favorite day of the week.

Favorite Recipe (perfect for people who eat all the cookie dough before baking the cookies…cough cough…me):

 

Recipe via jamhands.net

 

Favorite Festive Idea:

 

 

Favorite “Food Art”:

 

 

Favorite Cooking Helper:

 

 

Favorite Copy Cat Recipe:

Recipe via Budgetsavydiva.com

 

 

Oh Hello There Delicious…

Recipe for Dark Chocolate Lava Cakes via Cannella Vita

 

That is all.

 

Friday Favorites

TGIF!! Here’s a couple favorite finds of the week!

Favorite festive find:

Chocolate Stout Cupcakes….Recipe Here!

Favorite Recipe:

Chocolate Cobbler Recipe

Favorite Foodie Secrets:

Favorite Food Too Pretty to Eat:

Wise Wednesdays

If there’s one fact all of my food blog followers should know about me, it’s the fact that my ABSOLUTE favorite food in the entire world is chocolate chip cookies. It is the one the I can eat every day for the rest of my life and never get sick of (trust me, I don’t think I’ve gone more than 3 days in a row without eating one). I actually have some sitting aside in the kitchen for dessert later…already can’t wait to indulge.

Since I’m such a chocolate chip cookie fanatic, I’m extremely picky with the way I believe they should be (taste, texture, temperature, look, etc). I have tried several different cookie recipes (my favorite yet is one by “Crisco”), but I’m still eager to find what makes the BEST chocolate chip cookie. My ideal cookie is on the larger side (where having one is JUST enough…but you can’t help but have two), a gooey chewy center with slightly crisp edges, and a perfect amount of chocolate chips. Through cookie recipe searching online, I found an article that gives great tips towards making a perfect chocolate chip cookie. So here are some words of the wise for cooking baking:

1. Butter should be at room temperature (cool)
2. Cream the butter itself first, then add in the sugars
3. Find the perfect ratio between brown sugar and white sugar to use (more brown sugar means softer and chewier)
4. Add eggs one at a time rather than all at once
5. Refrigerate the dough AT LEAST an hour prior to baking (helps the cookies set and bake better)

Following these tips and other sound baking methods should prove to provide the best and chewiest chocolate chip cookie…I’ll have to give it a try!

To read the full article click here!

Link

Blog Screencasting…Click Me!

For this blog assignment we were introduced to the software application Jing. Using Jing you can create a customized screenshot picture or video of your computer screen and can share it with people through a link uploaded through the Jing website. I was extremely impressed with the usability of this software and luckily had no difficulties using it (unlike the other softwares used for our weekly assignments).

I created a Screencasted tour of one of my favorite blogs to follow…Lauren Conrad’s. It’s basically just your general girly blog with posts about fashion, makeup, decorating, etc. I gave my “tour” of her blog referencing the Dunn article we read for class about “interior design tips” to make your blog user friendly. I think Lauren follows all of these tips when creating her blog. She has a simple theme that’s easy on the eyes, has a header that describes her overall blog, her “front rooms” are explicitly labeled and take you exactly where you want to go, and her “garage” or “widgets” are plentiful and link to various parts of the blog.

I actually enjoyed using this Screencasting application and found myself talking for way longer than the suggested two minutes…oops. Hopefully it’s not TOO painful to watch or listen to for the whole time. Like I said, I really like the usability of this application and may use it for a variety of things when needed in the future. It may come in handy when needing to send a picture of a map for directions to a friend (like shown in the Jing video), or even if you need to make a tutorial video and send it to someone.