Coffee Breaks are 30-ish minute chats over Substack LIVE with the paid members of this community. It’s a chance to learn more about them and their work and talk about some of the real challenges and opportunities as a food writer today.
I learn something new every single time I talk with Elizabeth and this conversation was not an exception. For example, I did not know that Elizabeth helped write the American Heritage Dictionary or that the word Sangiovese comes from the Latin phrase blood of Jupiter. These are the kinds of fun facts you learn when you talk to a former Latin teacher turned food writer.
Elizabeth is the kind of person we all want at a dinner party because she is full of interesting facts and stories about everything under the sun. Elizabeth has the heart and mind of a story teller and we are all better off for her willingness to write so many of them down and share them with us.
About Elizabeth
Elizabeth is a Latin teacher turned food writer and recipe developer who writes a regular column for her local newspaper, the Berkshire Eagle. Thankfully for all of us who do not live in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, she shares those articles with us in her Substack newsletter, CulinUrsa.
I got to meet Elizabeth in person twice this year, which was honestly such a treat. We both attended a Food Writers Retreat organized by the magnificent Jenn Sharp in March. Then, this summer, I got to meet Elizabeth for lunch in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Over tacos, I asked Elizabeth what compelled her to sign up for the retreat, and she said she honestly didn’t know. She didn’t know Jenn or the other people attending the retreat, but something inside her told her to go, and she listened.
I love this story because it’s such a good lesson in listening to yourself and following that small, sometimes very quiet voice that says, “just do it”.
Had Elizabeth not listened to that voice, I wouldn’t have met her in March, we certainly wouldn’t have had tacos together in July, and I wouldn’t be inviting you to listen to us chat on October 13. I am grateful that she did.
The goal of Mastermind for Food Writers and The Food Writers Business Lab isn’t simply to gather more information. It’s to build a better business alongside people who genuinely want to see each other succeed.
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Questions?
Send a direct message to Rebecca Blackwell, or leave a comment on this post.
