Lucky Girl

                                                                      The SF Chronicle, my homebase for the next 5 months. 

I’m truly a lucky girl. I scored the only extern site I applied to—the San Francisco Chronicle. This is my dream job—I'm doing exactly what I want to do. 

                                                              My first grocery run to Whole Foods! This is apparently a light load.

As an intern for the Food & Wine section (published every Sunday), I’m responsible for testing about 80% of the recipes that are published in the newspaper and magazine. I have to go grocery shopping and must follow each recipe to the tee. I then have to choose what props to use (i.e. plates, bowls, platters, cups) and style the dishes for our weekly photo shoots.

                                                                    A spare rib recipe that I tested was portion-cut for family meal.

                                                                            An enchiladas with rajas recipe that I tested.


If I’m not testing recipes, I’m writing articles that are assigned especially for me. Right now I’m juggling three product reviews that will be published in the December 5 issue. I'd like to think of myself as the editorial staff’s go-to girl. I write, make cold calls to different restaurants, update databases, organize the behemoth we call our wine cellar. Every aspect of this job is fun. If we aren’t testing that day, I’m usually cleaning out the test kitchen fridge, utilizing leftovers to make our staff lunch or "family meal" with. On Friday, for example, we had some carrots, Napa cabbage, beef tri-tip, green onions, and snow peas sitting in the fridge—so I made fried rice for everyone. We have some leftover turkey breast from our Thanksgiving shoot that I will utilize for a casserole tomorrow.

The moderately paced flow of this job is what’s most enjoyable. I don’t have to worry about producing mass quantities of food in a short amount of time or making sure that my customers’ food is cooked and seasoned to their exact specifications—my job is to make sure the recipe that we’re featuring works, tastes and looks good. 

And then there’s the wine tastings! Wine is a huge part of the food section, on Friday for example, we were shooting a story on the top 10 best food + wine pairings. We get a vast array of wines and liqueur from various manufacturers, and every week a sommelier or wine specialist comes in and we taste-test an assortment of like-wines and decide on which to feature! It’s all a part of the education process…really.

Cheers,

Kelly Rae