Jack Monroe #218 A chance find at Pitsea Market

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Jelly Bean said:
Why doesn't her publisher help her with this stuff? It can't just be her fault can it? It's like she handed in her rough notes and they just went 'yep that'll do. Stench. Perfect'.
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More upper class sneering towards the poors, they must stink and stench, they can't afford soap the publishers cry, supping champagne, lol!

Also, I don't want to be that person, but, it's a bit cruel to joke about her eating Dash, I know it's only light hearted jesting, but, it's not very nice, and does look a bit nasty from us.

Doesn't excuse that Jack never looked after him properly, but, yeah, I think it's a bit much.
 
Orphan_Black said:
More upper class sneering towards the poors, they must stink and stench, they can't afford soap the publishers cry, supping champagne, lol!

Also, I don't want to be that person, but, it's a bit cruel to joke about her eating Dash, I know it's only light hearted jesting, but, it's not very nice, and does look a bit nasty from us.

Doesn't excuse that Jack never looked after him properly, but, yeah, I think it's a bit much.
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I agree with you. It makes me uncomfortable.
 
Jelly Bean said:
Why doesn't her publisher help her with this stuff? It can't just be her fault can it? It's like she handed in her rough notes and they just went 'yep that'll do. Stench. Perfect'.
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I don’t get this either. When I recipe tested the book would come back and in some parts be unrecognisable as publishers and editors turned them into house style, changed words and recipe titles, reformatted etc. There is another non vegan who writes vegan cookbooks who I have real issues with the editing in her books, as every recipe I have tried has had mistakes, like whole potatoes that never get chopped or sliced or whatever. The job of the writer is to produce the recipes but there should be a team around the other stuff.
 
MancBee said:
Sorry if anyone was upset by my post this morning. I didn't mean to cause anyone offence. The humour was probably too dark. I wouldn't want Jack to think I really meant that she would eat her pets. I hadn't thought that it could be used to demonise us further.
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❤ It was more than obvious you were just joking, but, yeah, just a tad too dark, and definitely something that could demonise us Fraus for. ❤
 
Given Trifle Defender's column must be written well in advance, this is absolutely spooky timing!
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MancBee said:
Sorry if anyone was upset by my posts this morning. I didn't mean to cause anyone offence. The humour was probably too dark. I wouldn't want Jack to think I really meant that she would eat her pets. I hadn't thought that it could be used to demonise us further.
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Agree - sorry if my post made anyone feel uneasy, never my intention and also didn't think of how it could make us look in that sense ❤
 
Fruitjack said:
I don’t get this either. When I recipe tested the book would come back and in some parts be unrecognisable as publishers and editors turned them into house style, changed words and recipe titles, reformatted etc. There is another non vegan who writes vegan cookbooks who I have real issues with the editing in her books, as every recipe I have tried has had mistakes, like whole potatoes that never get chopped or sliced or whatever. The job of the writer is to produce the recipes but there should be a team around the other stuff.
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This depends massively on the budget, the publishing company, and the author.

I started off in a publishing company as an editor of cookbooks. There's different levels of editor, ones that will check spelling, ones that will check sense and language, someone to advice on the contents. My task was to read the recipes provided and make "alternatives" to pad out the recipe count.

Often my job was to write extra recipes. For example, the book might advertise it contains 100 recipes. The author might be paid for 50. Then, because it was cheaper than developing 50 more new unique recipes, I'd be paid to do the rest, things like vegetarian versions where I'd just say "substitute the bacon for a big mushroom". It was really scammy and made me very discerning about cookbooks. Always avoid ones by people (like Jack) who churn out hundreds in a short amount of time, they will not have time to develop and test them all. These almost always don't pay for the spell check and the grammar etc, they might get a cursory check to make sure there's nothing inappropriate like anything that could be dangerous or damaging but the rest will be largely left intact.

Sometimes my job would be to read the recipes and make sure we had photos that matched each step and a total idiot could understand it. These ones would cost a lot. There's agencies that have recipe developers who'll have huge stacks of recipes you can buy off them, they'd hire their own people to take photos and sell them as a bundle. Sometimes places will buy these to make their own, or they'll sell them to bulk out a "celebrity" book.

I was so put off by the industry I trained as a nutritionist, and wrote a few of my own books. I completely agree that hard copy books are a bit of a waste of money (I do actually own far too many but I love them and get them as gifts), and so my books are cheap pdfs only. I actually make a lovely stew/casserole thing with (veggie) sausages, chard, and baked beans. I published it in a cookbook. Can I expect a cease and desist from Jack soon?
 
RobinsNest said:
This depends massively on the budget, the publishing company, and the author.

I started off in a publishing company as an editor of cookbooks. There's different levels of editor, ones that will check spelling, ones that will check sense and language, someone to advice on the contents. My task was to read the recipes provided and make "alternatives" to pad out the recipe count.

Often my job was to write extra recipes. For example, the book might advertise it contains 100 recipes. The author might be paid for 50. Then, because it was cheaper than developing 50 more new unique recipes, I'd be paid to do the rest, things like vegetarian versions where I'd just say "substitute the bacon for a big mushroom". It was really scammy and made me very discerning about cookbooks. Always avoid ones by people (like Jack) who churn out hundreds in a short amount of time, they will not have time to develop and test them all. These almost always don't pay for the spell check and the grammar etc, they might get a cursory check to make sure there's nothing inappropriate like anything that could be dangerous or damaging but the rest will be largely left intact.

Sometimes my job would be to read the recipes and make sure we had photos that matched each step and a total idiot could understand it. These ones would cost a lot. There's agencies that have recipe developers who'll have huge stacks of recipes you can buy off them, they'd hire their own people to take photos and sell them as a bundle. Sometimes places will buy these to make their own, or they'll sell them to bulk out a "celebrity" book.

I was so put off by the industry I trained as a nutritionist, and wrote a few of my own books. I completely agree that hard copy books are a bit of a waste of money (I do actually own far too many but I love them and get them as gifts), and so my books are cheap pdfs only. I actually make a lovely stew/casserole thing with (veggie) sausages, chard, and baked beans. I published it in a cookbook. Can I expect a cease and desist from Jack soon?
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This is fascinating, thank (space) you for sharing it. Every day is a learning day with the cabal!
 
TCC is genuinely like a piece of GCSE coursework or something. There is no skill involved anywhere in it. The 'recipes' are all just a really terrible version of somebody elses dish. Some of them are so thrown together I think they really were one and done and straight into the book.

I get that it was never meant to be a masterpiece, it's a recipe book for tinned foods. But it really is terrible.

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Example: didn't have a leek so made the soup without. So she only made this 'recipe' ONE TIME? And into a book it went?
 
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ChickenPorridge said:
TCC is genuinely like a piece of GCSE coursework or something. There is no skill involved anywhere in it. The 'recipes' are all just a really terrible version of somebody elses dish. Some of them are so thrown together I think they really were one and done and straight into the book.

I get that it was never meant to be a masterpiece, it's a recipe book for tinned foods. But it really is terrible.
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the intro also includes a very bitter and snide anecdote about someone who evidently 'wronged' her and is now DEAD

The whole book is extremely bad vibes imo

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