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food envy
Less diet, more cooking: Frances Walsh on the simple healthy recipes she creates every day
The food blogger tells us how a serious illness turned her attention from law to the kitchen.
Frances Walsh was a banking solicitor in Dublin. Now, she’s a food guru with her own website – The Honest Project – and a drool-inspiring Instagram account to match. In this week’s Food Envy, we ask her for the story behind her snaps.
FRANCES HAD ALWAYS been interested in food, but she took the plunge to set up her blog while recovering from cancer.
“I was struggling with fatigue and wasn’t able to do much physical activity, so I needed something to focus on. At the same time, I was eating a lot healthier and spending more time cooking and enjoying food,” she says.
I loved everything about cooking, from choosing fresh produce, to the chopping and stirring and the eating of course.
“I was reading other blogs, so I thought I would start my own as a little project. At first I kept it unpublished and when I was more comfortable with blogging I made it public and set up social media accounts for it.”
Before becoming unwell, she had worked as a solicitor in Dublin – a job that involved long hours and little time for cooking.
“When I got sick, how I ate was something that I could control when everything else seemed out of my control. So that’s when I started to cook more and really enjoy it. I also learned how important eating well is to our health and wellbeing. I don’t necessarily mean following a certain diet, rather I mean cooking more food from scratch and making sure our meals are well balanced with lots of vegetables.”
For Frances, many opportunities have stemmed from blogging, including her current day job as a digital marketing consultant. “My clients are mainly food brands, with the occasional non-food brand thrown in. I love it as it gives me flexibility and I also get to work with people who are really making a positive impact on the development of Irish food and food offerings.”
So what’s the secret to making a livelihood from a passion project? Well, says Frances, it can be very difficult to grow your blog to the extent that it can provide a source of income. But if she was to give advice on this?
“Work hard on your blog, produce quality content that you are proud of on a regular basis and grow a readership. Only after that should you think about working with brands and if you do so, I would say be professional and do not expect or feel entitled to work, gifts or invites to events.”
Frances also has some strong words on social media, and Instagram in particular:
I heard someone say recently that if Instagram is annoying you, you aren’t doing it right.
But what does that mean? “If you are annoyed when you go on Instagram, it’s time to look at who you are following. Stop following accounts who irritate you or make you feel bad about yourself, take a break from the app for a little while, start following and engaging with accounts you like and whose content you enjoy.
“Ultimately we are in control and every so often we need to remind ourselves to take our power back.”
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