Assignment:
Come up with three angles for three different food-related feature articles.
In addition…come up with three angles for three different food-related destination articles.
(Use different ideas than you used in the first assignment. State each angle in just a sentence or two.)
Then pick one of your ideas and write a nut graf for it. It will probably help to do a little research first.
Angles
Vulnerable populations whose food choices are limited by socioeconomic factors such as geographic distribution, restrictive government benefits, and incarceration are deprived of access to healthy, nutritive food, which leads to health problems, increased healthcare expenditure, and cyclical poverty.^1
As a nation known variously as a melting pot or a salad bowl, does America have a cuisine recognizable as fundamentally American, or is American food simply a watering-down of the world’s cuisines?^2
New Yorkers know it as a “chop cheese” and revere it as superior to its better-known Philly cousin, but its origins are shrouded in dispute and mystery only exceeded^3 in scope by its stature in the culinary pantheon of Harlem and the Bronx.
The Ozarks of south-central Missouri are famously home to raccoon hunting and some of the best trout fishing in the country, but hidden in its dairy farms and abandoned factories is a burgeoning craft beer industry.^4
In tiny Sardis, Mississippi (population: 1,700), a former New Yorker nicknamed Dutch built a brick oven in a converted theater, employing a set of pizza-making skills honed over a decade in Italy, and drawing a crowd of Sunday regulars who routinely drive an hour or more to eat the best pizza in Mississippi.*
New Orleans is a city famous for Gulf seafood, and among the most celebrated items is the oyster. While the Big Easy is home to many oyster houses, natives fall into two groups: those who eat at Felix’s, and those who eat at Acme Oyster House.^5
* This is the idea for which I have drafted the nut graph below.
Dutch Van Oostendorp followed his wife Rebecca from New York to her father’s home in rural north Mississippi. After they pursued successful careers as a PGA golf teaching pro and a swimming coach, respectively, they moved to slower environs but never lost their taste for excellent pizza. Realizing that they would be unable to find anything close to what they loved, they made a plan: Dutch would become a pizzaiolo.^6 Years later, Dutch and Rebecca’s vision has taken the form of TriBecca Allie, a pizzeria in a converted theater in downtown Sardis, Mississippi – the hottest pizza restaurant in the state. And Dutch’s army of devoted regulars, many of whom drive more than an hour every Sunday to wait for a table^7, attest to the results of his dedicated training.
End Notes
1 An important, thoughtful angle (and one that clearly ties in with some of the points you were making in your Booth piece).
2 Great question to explore with a story. My only recommendation is to consider whether there might be different ways to frame this, rather than a binary "are we x or are we y" question. I could see making a case that American food is some combination of these ideas.
3 Great. I love a good food origin story, but especially one with a sense of mystery.
4 You set this up so well - it's perfect for a topic that's probably even a little over-written about at this point (although I will never tire of regional craft beer stories). Not many stories about craft beer open with a reference to raccoon hunting...
5 I know more than a few natives who put Casamento's ahead of either of these, but I also agree these two really are the frontrunners. A fun, regional story idea.
6 Great build to this reveal. I'd actually end the paragraph here and start a new one with "Years later..."
7 Is it open only on Sundays?
Comments
Brennan,
Terrific angles, and I love this story about this pizza place in Sardis, a town I've never bothered to pull off the interstate for, but you can bet I will next time. In fact, the more you write about Mississippi, the more I want to go back there. See the bluemarks for a few specific comments.
Comments