Lisa Lotts is a freelance writer, food photographer, recipe developer and owner of the blog Garlic & Zest.
Lisa Lott’s work has been featured in a multitude of online outlets including Honest Cooking, Men’s Fitness, Today, Better Homes & Gardens, BuzzFeed and Shape, to name a few.
Her food photography stretches beyond her blog. Lisa styles and shoots dishes for restaurant menus and websites and she aspires to photograph a cookbook.
Having grown up in Southeastern Virginia, Lisa has a natural affinity for well-seasoned cast iron skillets, Smithfield ham, soft-shell crabs and old fashioned oyster roasts.
Lisa’s approachable fare tastes like home.
Lisa Lotts Show Notes
Contact:
Garlic and Zest
Facebook
Instagram
Pinterest
Twitter
Books:
The Foster’s Market Cookbook
The Jimtown Store Cookbook
Questions:
What did you do before you became a food blogger?
What was it like being a pharmaceutical rep?
Why did you start blogging?
Did you know it was going to be about food?
When did you start blogging?
Do you have your original blog posts or have you updated them?
Did you have a camera right away?
What do you have now as a camera?
Is it a Nikon?
How did you pick the name of your blog?
When you started, how many times did you used to publish a post?
How long did it take for you to go from 2 – to 3 or 4?
How many days a week do you cook for the blog?
How many drafts do you have ready to be published?
Is there a number that you feel like you can’t go under?
Do you feel that you’ve always cooked the way you do for the blog or do you think it’s different now?
Do you photograph with natural light or do you use artificial?
Where do you usually photograph your food?
Once you started, how long did it take you to start making money?
How did they find you and did you ask them?
Did they feed you?
What tipped you over the edge to make money, and not the first two years but when you felt like you were really making something?
Do you have people that help you?
So you do it all yourself, including social media SEO and all that other stuff?
How long does it take you to write a post?
What do you find is the hardest thing about blogging?
Do you use a tool to keep you focused or keep track of what your doing?
What is your favorite social media platform and why?
How many iterations of the website have you had?
What was the name of the person who did the audit for you?
What’s your biggest food failure?
What is your favorite marketing tool?
How long have you been using tailwind?
What is the one thing you can’t live without in your kitchen?
What is the brand?
What is your favorite cookbook?
Can you give advice to someone either in their first year or just beginning to food blog?
When you first started did you have a plan mapped out on what you were going to do and how you were going to get to where you wanted to be?
Elaine, you did it again! Another great interview. I really like Lisa, she is a very sweet lady and her recipes are fantastic.
Thank you Laura!! I so appreciate all your comments!
Very interesting interview, Elaine! I love Lisa’s photos!
Thanks Beth! Lisa is a great gal!!
Very interesting and fun interview! I love Lisa’s blog, her recipes are delicious and I so wish I had her photography skills, I hope I’m getting there…
Patty, you are very talented! And yes, I love her blog too!
Of course Aunt Lynn’s famous pumpkin bread recipe made the cut! It’s the best. Great interview.
Thank you Natalie! I have to check out her recipe!