Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

That needs to be a commercial. That was great and on key! Open your wallets.

Oh now THAT was fun!

"and now we actually have to purchase the food I guess"....still giggling

I have thought about blogging for a while now. I lurk around reading any blog on baking I can find. Wine, cooking, culinary related ones.
I am trying to find my angle, my muse. Husband bought me the Smitten Kitten blog camera suggestion, Brilliant! So as for my blog it is in the works and when I get ready to post you will all be the first to know.

Actually (side issue) another reason for foodvox being the way it is with clearly fictional characters as well as myself writing is that to do it that way is a commentary on the online/blogging/virtual world in a sense . . . a world where anybody pretty much could be anybody behind the screen name.

I've seen people do this in dishonest ways online, often enough - to know that it is done often enough.

Therefore I do it honestly and up-front.
It's a reminder, even in the doing of it - of how very fragile this reality we're all chatting within can be. A reminder to myself perhaps, to not take any of it all too seriously. :)

1. I think that the publishers will continue to send you books if you get a reputation for having informative and critical reviews. There will be no point for the publishers to send more books if your reviews don't have any credibility.
2. A way to bypass the freebie dilemma is simply to say for X price, I would buy it or I would not. Just make your review relative to the price of the item and be honest about what you would do if the book wasn't free. I see wine reviews all time that rave about the wine, but then end it with well for that price, it's not worth it, despite the wine being good.

billyburgwife, you may have hit the thing right on the button in terms of how I feel about it (aside from the ethics question). Whether or not one writes a good review or a bad one or one that simply markets the book there is that thing you wrote: "go do your job now". :)

In other words something is expected in return.

Which makes it feel different to me than if I bought the book, or if I went to the library to get the book. It's a relationship that has been created simply by the act of acceptance of the gift. Not a heavy burden, but a relationship nonetheless. :)

i have some friends who do music reviews, and it's standard practice for the production companies to send free c.d.'s or whatever to the magazines and reviewing organizations, which then distribute the materials to their writers. it isn't like 'here's a present now like us' it's more like 'you have to listen to this to write about it. go do your job now.' so it seems to me that a free cookbook for reviewing practices isn't tainting the ethics, but if it makes you uncomfortable, it's always your choice :)

Based on a couple of recent comments, I'd like to add that I think it's critical that anyone who claims to review a cookbook try some of the recipes. I think it should be more than 1, as well, at least 2 or so. I just can't understand how any could say they are reviewing a cookbook (vs simply describing it) without testing the recipes.

Anyone who has spent time reading cookbook reviews on Amazon is probably aware of a certain highly-ranked reviewer who writes at great length on the content of the book but doesn't cook from it. How anyone thinks they can review, for example, a pressure cooker cookbook while readily admitting they do not own and have never used one is beyond me.

So basically, I see no problem with reviewing a free copy. I think it's more ethically pertinent to actually try the recipes.

Oh that is the best news ever! I have the biggest crush on Mark!