At the weekend I was lucky enough to be invited to attend Blog North #4 with my lovely friend Sam who was speaking at the event. I’ve been watching the Blog North events with a keen eye after missing out in tickets to their first event a few years ago which I thought would have been super relevent. I’d seen this one, but as it was aimed at foodie bloggers I wasn’t sure it would be relevant. But, oh was I wrong. We arrived at the uber cool Duke Studio’s to be greeted with a washing line of biscuit badges to write our names on in icing sugar. Is their a better sort of name badge than an edible one?
As I was there with Sam, I sat in on her sessions about blogger engagement and what Taylors of Harrogate are looking for with their partnerships which was super useful as she not only discussed what Tayors as a company are looking for but it was really useful to hear what other bloggers want from partnerships. But actual attendee’s got to choose from two of four sessions, with Paul Winch Furness teaching food photography, award winning Emma Sturgess running a workshop on the art of food and drink writing and the lovely Cindy, my Travelling Notebooks partner discussing growing you readership through social media. So notonly did I get to go along to the event, and meet some super cool people, but I got to have a proper catch up about London with Cindy too (and discuss the rubbishness of southern water!)
Lunch was served in the form of some North African/Middle Eastern street food from Cafe Moor in Leeds Market, with soup and cous cous and tagine and literally the most delicious baklava I have ever tasted. And you know the best thing? They’re at Glastonbury too, making Falafal. Can not wait to eat it ALL!
We also got the chance to hear from the lovely Lynn of Clandestine Cake Club, who has graciously agreed to come and chat to out WI and Leigh Linley too – both of whome have just had foodie books published as a result of their blogging!
Then, well, then, there was cake. Seriously, all the cake, ever! And some amazing goodie bags too.
And if that wasn’t enough, we got to head down to the Gallery on the ground floor to sample Bompass and Parr’s latest crazy invention – the Whiskey Tornado, which is basically a whirl of whisky vapour that you inhale. Now, I am not a massive fan of whiskey, but they did tell us about a cloud of G&T they created which sounded amazing – if anyone wants to build me one, well, you know where I am!
Ooooh, and one more thing, check out this new service we found out about, Hash Gordon, which pulls in photo’s from the web and lets me show you all the images tagged with #blognorth4