Simply Recipes: A family food blog powered by an excellent strategy

For many years, Elise Bauer was a busy executive working in the Silicon Valley for an internet software company and as a strategy and marketing consultant. A member of a large family with two excellent cooks for parents, she eventually began posting family recipes to her website.

 With a staff of just “one and a half” (consisting of Elise and acclaimed food blogger Hank Shaw working part time), www.simplyrecipes.com  now receives a whopping one hundred thousand visitors per day and was voted best food blog overall at the 2006 Food Blog Awards.

We love how the blog is faithful to its family roots. Many of the recipes are original recipes, old family recipes or those collected by the family over the last 30 years. They are tried and tested in the family home, and reviewers on the site are asked to maintain the same level of etiquette that they might use as an invited guest in the family home.

Though many of the recipes on the site feature sophisticated flavors and cooking techniques, the descriptions and instructions are written in a way that is easy to understand and follow. Here is a seasonal recipe for homemade eggnog which exemplifies the blog’s overall tone, with a familial context and a tried and true original recipe: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/eggnog/.  

Elise Bauer will be presenting on how to Build Traffic while Building the Food Blog of your Dreams at Food Blogger’s Camp 2011 at Grand Velas Riviera Maya. Visit http://www.simplyrecipes.com/  for more excellent recipes and learn more about Food Blogger’s Camp here: http://velasresorts.com/files/foodbloggercamp/index.html.