AFTER DEADLINE
Readers' input key in following food scene
You don't want to have lunch with a food writer if you're the kind of person who is territorial about your plate. We're forever peering over curiously, reaching with a tentative fork or chopstick, begging for a bite and then spending several minutes trying to guess what's in the dish, or how it was made.
In the same way, as editor of The Advertiser's Taste section, one of my goals is to peek into readers' dining rooms and lunch sacks to closely inspect their plates, and to eavesdrop on their conversations about food and cooking so as to better understand what interests them and what questions might be plaguing them.
A big part of this business is seeing the story that's right in front of your nose.
When a friend groused that Honolulu seemed short on good breakfast places, I at first responded with a knowing, "TELL me about it," since this has been a rant of mine for years.
Belatedly, I realized that there might be a story there, and that readers were my best source for alternatives. The two columns that followed (Feb. 11 and 18) were packed with descriptions of more breakfast eateries than I could ever have come up with on my own.
The low-carb buzz has grown into a roar and I at first assumed that folks knew pretty much all they needed to know about it: meat and fish good, bread and potatoes bad. And there are entire books on the subject flying out of the stores, after all.
But then I began listening to friends' stories about their low-carb lifestyles. And I made a visit to Paradise Foods, the low-carb store in Kailua, and I began to realize that some folks were plunging into this diet regimen with very little understanding of the role of carbohydrates in the diet, or of the fact that sources of carbohydrate differ considerably in their effect on the body.
The resulting package of stories, "Carbohydrate Confusion" (March 31), attempted to consider the issue even-handedly. More importantly, my little dip into low-carb waters introduced me to a number of subsequent story ideas with real-world ties: macadamia oil, Hawai'i's contribution to the low-carb menu; how to understand the carbohydrate breakdown on a nutritional label, and a new stir-fry bar in town that caters to low-carb eaters.
It's not from chefs or PR people that I get the story ideas that generate the most e-mails, letters and phone calls, but from getting out and about, watching what people are doing, seeing what they're buying, listening to exclamations, rants and whines — oh, yes, and from plowing through my e-mails.
There's an old rule in the feature-story business: Two starts a trend, three makes a story.
If a topic comes up more than once, it's time for me to start taking notes. (I've always regretted not acting on an early tip from a colleague here about bubble drinks, followed by a friend's recommendation. I was interested, but busy, and I let that trend get up and running before we wrote about it.)
My point: Although I write in a specialized area in which the knowledge of experts is key, "real people" are at least as necessary to creating stories that are on target.
On-target stories are those that are rooted in people's actual lives and focused on their interests and problems. Even if a Taste section story is driven by advice from chefs or veteran home cooks, farmers or people in the food industry, it should begin with average people's interests, questions, experiences and problems.
Wanda Adams is assistant features editor for food, books and travel, and edits and writes stories for the weekly Taste section. Reach her at 535-2412 or wadams@honoluluadvertiser.com.
