A blog post takes between five and ten hours to make.
I know that sounds like a lot. I thought it sounded like a lot when I first started timing it. Then I kept timing it and the number kept being right, so I stopped arguing with my phone timer and accepted it.
This section is where I write about that.
What goes here
The mechanics of how karacooks actually gets made. Photography setup, including the Domino’s pizza box I use as a reflector because it works and sometimes dragging out the big collapsible reflector is not worth the time and effort. The Nikon Zfc and the 105mm macro lens and the natural-light-only philosophy. The editing process. The writing process. The “okay this draft is actually three different posts pretending to be one post” realization that happens around hour four. The cost of doing the work, in hours and dollars and the occasional ruined batch of ingredients.
Outtake posts. The shots that didn’t make it. The chaos that made it impossible to get the shot. The “we’ll have to reshoot” moment that always comes thirty minutes after I’ve put everything away.
Workflow posts. How a Sunday deep-dive gets built. How a recipe post is different from a deep-dive post. How a Friday Roundup gets assembled in real time on a Friday morning with coffee. The publishing schedule and the calendar and the running list of ideas. The way an off-the-cuff thought becomes a half-drafted post becomes a published thing six weeks later.
Tool posts. What I use. What I’ve tried and abandoned. What I keep recommending to other bloggers when they ask. (I don’t run affiliate links on most of this; when I do, they’re disclosed up top.)
The occasional honest accounting of what it’s like to keep a blog going for sixteen years, through redesigns and platform changes and the slow grinding work of writing into the void until enough people show up that it stops being a void.
What does NOT go here
Posts about what karacooks is about live in About and Where I Stand. Posts about why this blog talks about food politics or African American foodways or anything else live in Food & Politics or the relevant section anchor. This category is specifically about production: the work behind the work, not the editorial stance behind the work.
Personal essays that happen to mention the blog don’t go here either. If the post is about a relationship or a memory or a moment that incidentally involves writing karacooks, that’s Personal. The test: is the blog itself the subject of the post, or is the blog just the setting? Behind the Blog is for posts where karacooks-as-a-production is the actual subject.
The pets
I’m naming them now because they are going to feature heavily in this section whether I plan for it or not.
Remy is always underfoot. Always. The 105mm macro lens has a minimum focusing distance of about a foot, and Remy has decided that distance is where he belongs. Most of my outtakes feature a pit bull nose creeping into the bottom of the frame.
Finn left footprints in a focaccia once, and I baked it anyway, and we ate it, and it was delicious. He has done worse since. He will do worse again.
Callie photobombs every photo session in one way or another. Sometimes she’s the reason a shot doesn’t work. Sometimes she’s the reason a shot works better than I planned. There is no predicting her. There is only photographing around her until she gets bored.
If you’re here for the food, the pets are part of the deal. If you’re here for the pets, welcome; you’ll find them in Personal too.
How to read this section
If you blog or want to start blogging, some of this might be useful. I’m not running a course or selling a system; I’m just writing about how I do this thing I do, and you can take what’s helpful and leave the rest.
If you’re already a KaraCooks reader and you’re curious about what it looks like on the other side of the post you just read, that’s most of what this section is. The 5-10 hours. The pizza box reflector. The cat on the focaccia. The reshoot at 9pm because the light went sideways. The truth about why some posts get pushed and others get fast-tracked and what “draft mode” actually means in the back of WordPress.
It’s not glamorous. None of it is glamorous. That’s sort of the point.
P.S. The Domino’s pizza box really does work. I will die on this hill. If you have a better DIY reflector solution, the comments are open and I am genuinely interested.
P.P.S. Yes, I time my posts. Yes, it’s still 5-10 hours. Yes, I have tried to make it less than 5 hours. No, it doesn’t work; the posts get worse. There’s a floor to this kind of work and I’ve found mine.
P.P.P.S. If you’re reading this anchor and thinking “I had no idea blogging took that long,” welcome. The internet does not generally advertise how much work goes into the content you scroll past. This section exists partly to be honest about that.