My BlogHer Food Recap

After the big win on Thursday night with the UL and their Side of Safety event I wondered if perhaps the rest of the trip might be less rewarding. I shouldn't have though. The first morning I met up with my friends Carol and Selena and their friends and had breakfast. Selena is gluten free and while I had never considered this as a problem for me when we went to Chez Panisse I realized how much this MUST be a problem for other gluten free folks. BlogHer in their infinite brilliance set up a completely gluten free buffet area so anyone who was gluten free didn't have to worry about cross contamination. It was a lovely thought, I appreciated it and would even have been happy to have EVERYTHING gluten free.

Friday I was slated to speak during the early afternoon values track. I spent the first morning session alternating between thoroughly enjoying my beginning photography session and scared witless about speaking in front of people.

Lunch was meh as far as food choices went but I was completely too nervous to eat. I don't think I ate more than 3 bites of pasta and a bowl of soup so can I tell how it was? No, not really. The soup was good, the pasta had a new Kraft Cooking Cream sauce which would make a nice alternative to cream of mushroom soup in casseroles, if you like that sort of thing. I slunk off to the bathroom to collect myself for a while before I headed into my session.

I met Mrs. Q. first off outside the meeting room getting prepped for not having her photo taken, she totally set me at ease. I don't know what she said or if she said anything at all but after meeting her and then instantly meeting up with the moderator, the smooth Elaine Wu, I was set. I stuttered through my first five minutes then settled comfortably into an hour and a half of talking about why we feed our kids crap, how we can change that and WHY we should. I loved every minute of it. The other 2 panelists were: Diana of Dianasaur Dishes who teaches folks in her hometown how to cook the real foods offered by food banks and blogs about eating low cost yummy meals and Mrs. Q. who is spending a year eating a school lunch in America (poor thing). Both wonderful blogs and I HIGHLY recommend following them.

Saturday was another HOT and beautiful day I spent the morning session between two panels that I enjoyed a lot. But the big thrill was going on a scavenger hunt with Flavorstitch author Selena at the ferry building. We basically JETTED off the bus and I drug her high and low around the ferry building on Foodspotting's Savory Scavenger hunt list. We finished it so fast we also did the Sweet Scavenger Hunt and still had time for lunch. The prizes for each were 500 dollars and 250 dollars respectively. They called the winners after the last session with beautiful and amazing Penny de los Santos and before the closing conversation with Gluten Free Girl Shauna, Molly Wizenburg and Michael Ruhlman about the heart and soul of a chef. Selena and I decided to split the winnings whatever they may be so we would have a better chance of winning. After 3 cards were drawn and they were NOT ours I was pretty sure we wouldn't win. They drew the Savory Scavenger hunt last and when they drew Selenas business card she screamed. LOUDLY. In my ear. I think it stunned me and I didn't immediately realize we HAD WON a 500 dollar shopping spree from cooking.com, wow of course we are splitting it because Selena ROCKS and did not take it back immediately upon winning. ( I love that girl!)

Selena, Me and Heather

So my impression of BlogHer Food is this, I WON, I CAN SPEAK IN PUBLIC AND I'M A WINNER. WIN WIN WIN. Some like to complain about national sponsors and to them I say if you can put on a show without national product sponsors I say invite me. Otherwise shut up and have another cookie.

cookie mecca

Yes the egos were there, some earned, some deserved and some should jump in a lake. I take about as much crap from lame bloggers who need to socially climb and use me as I do from my kids, that is to say NONE. I don't have time for that, I have a message and dammit I have prizes to win!

Party(s) recap tomorrow. I think. I'll try. I swear

Peace and Love--