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[writingwithfolklore]

Describing Foods - A Masterlist

                As a broke university student, I love reading about food. It’s almost like eating a real meal myself <3.

I get a little angry when characters are eating a meal and I barely get to experience it with them. In that, I mean I don’t just want to know what it is, but what it’s like to eat that food—how it tastes, smells, sounds, and feels. Is a perfect croissant still a perfect croissant without the crack of the exterior, the airiness of the pastry inside, the smell of yeast?

                Probably not. When writing about a dish, the smell, texture, technique, taste, and how it looks are all important to painting the experience, so here’s some words to use when describing a meal:

Taste:

Acidic: Sharp tasting. Often used to describe tart or sour foods as well.

Aftertaste: A different taste that remains in the mouth after eating something

Bitter: Tart, sharp, and sometimes harsh flavour.

Bittersweet: Less harsh than bitterness. Tartness + sweetness.

Bland: Has no significant flavor or texture

Briny: Just means salty. Often describes pickled foods.

Citrusy: Bright flavour like… well citrus fruits—oranges, lemons, limes, etc.

Cooling: Mimics that cooling feel—like mint.

Earthy: Reminiscent of soil. Can be used to describe wines, root vegetables, and mushrooms.

Fiery: Another word for spicy.

Fresh: Light and crisp—describes produce or herbs.

Fruity: Sweet and reminiscent of fruit.

Full-bodied: Rich and ‘feels heavy’ in your mouth. Can describe wines or soups.

Herbal: Bright, fresh, sometimes earthy from the presence of herbs

Honeyed: Sweet or candied taste like honey.

Nutty: Taste similar to the flavors of nuts. Often used to describe certain cheeses.

Rich: Full, heavy flavour. Often dishes that contain cream taste rich.

Robust: Rich + Earthy. Used for lots of wines or aged liquor.

Savory: Describes meaty, earthy dishes and soups.

Sharp: Harsh, bitter, or tart taste. Used to describe acidic foods.

Smoky: Reminiscent of the smell of smoke.

Sour: Biting, tangy, tart flavor.

Spicy: Burning taste.

Sweet: Sugary.

Tangy: Tart, biting taste—feels tingly

Tart: Sharp, bitter, or sour flavour. Used to describe acidic foods.

Woody: Earthy, sometimes nutty taste. Describes some coffees or cheeses.

Yeasty: Earthy taste reminiscent of yeast. Describes beer and bread.

Zesty: Fresh, vivid, or invigorating flavour.

Sound/Texture:

Sound has a lot to do with texture, so I've combined them for this section!

Airy: Light, pillowy texture (think inside of croissant)

Brittle: Hard but easy to break

Bubbly: Usually during heating, when bubbles rise to the surface—low sound.

Buttery: Smooth, creamy texture (think certain pasta sauces)

Chewy: Food that needs to be chewed thoroughly. Can be light and bouncy (chewy bread) or heavy (steak) and sticky (candy)

Creamy: A smooth and rich texture, comes from dairy.

Crispy: Light texture with slight crunch.

Crumbly: Food with loose structure that falls apart into crumbs.

Crunchy: Firm, crisp texture with a sharp, loud noise.

Crusty (behave): Food with a hard outer layer and soft interior (many loaves and breads)

Delicate: Light and fine, feels like it can come apart easily.

Doughy: Soft and heavy, usually pale colouring.

Fizzy: Usually liquids—a hissing sound, feels like ‘static’

Flaky: Light, characterized by layers that come apart during eating.

Fluffy: light and airy.

Frothy/Foamy: Airy bubbles, usually in a drink like a latte.

Gamey: Usually refers to meats when they’re very “meaty”

Gooey: Viscous, sometimes sticky texture from moisture in a dense/solid food.

Hearty: Firm, robust texture.

Juicy: Tender and succulent texture from liquid in a solid food (steak)

Molten: Hot, gooey

Oily: Slick, heavy, lingers on the tongue.

Silky: Fine, smooth texture that feels sleek.

Smooth: Texture free of grit, lumps, or edges.

Snap: A quick, sharp, crackling sound when broken.

Squelch: A soft sucking sound when pressure is applied. Somewhat gross.

Sticky: Gluiness in the mouth.

Succulent: Tender and juicy

Tender: Soft and easy to break down

Velvety: Smooth and rich

Smell:

Acrid: Strong, bitter, unpleasant

Comforting: pleasant, probably calls back to a nice memory

Damp: Wet smelling—probably a bit earthy

Delicate: subtle, faint, not overpowering

Earthy: reminiscent of soil

Fetid: Caused by decay—unpleasant

Fishy: reminiscent of fish

Floral/flowery: Reminiscent of flowers

Fragrant: Sweet or pleasing

Fresh: Cool, crisp, refreshing—produce, probably not cooked

Funky: Something’s gone off

Heady: Strong smell, pungent, rich

Musty: Not fresh

Perfumed: Pleasant, reminiscent of something (can be perfumed with citrus, say)

Piquant: stinging, pungent—tickles the nose

Powerful: strong

Rancid: Definitely gone off, decomposing

Ripe: Strong, usually unpleasant smell

Savory: spicy, salty, no elements of sweetness

Sour: has gone off

Spicy: Sharp, tingles the nose

Tangy: Strong and bitter but in a good way

Tart: Sharp

Woody: earthy smell, reminiscent of wood

Sight:

Usually texture gives us a really good picture of what a food looks like, so here’s some non-texture sight additions:

Blistered: Bumpy exterior.

Caramelized: Usually golden brown

Cloudy: Splotched. Almost see through if not for a slight white or grey mist.

Colourful: Bright and vibrant

Glassy: Resembling glass

Glossy: Smooth, shiny

Marbled: Two colours intertwined

Opaque: Not transparent. Can’t see through.

Ripe: Colourful (can be to a fault). Nearing the end of its edible state.

Scaly: Covered in scales, fish.

Shiny: Appears wet or glossy

Sparkling: Glimmers under the light

Stuffed: An ingredient placed inside a larger part with no additional space.

Translucent: Allows light through

Vibrant: Striking, bright

Food Prep:

How the food is prepared gives it these other attributes. If your character is familiar with cooking (or is the cook themselves!) they may describe food this way.

Baked: Cooked in an oven. Results in browned or crispy outer layer.

Blackened: When food is dipped in butter and coated with spices then cooked in a hot pan—spices darken, making it appear ‘blackened’

Blanched: Food scalded in boiling water and moved to cold water so it stops cooking. Texture comes out soft.

Braised: Food that is briefly fried in fat and then stewed in a pot. Results in seared, crispy exterior with a tender interior.

Breaded: Coated with breadcrumbs/batter then baked or fried so it turns crispy

Broiled: Food cooked with intense radiant heat in an oven or on the grill. Results in a darkened appearance and crispy texture.

Caramelized: Food slow-cooked until it’s browned, nutty, and has a bit of sweetness.

Charred: Grilled, roasted, or broiled and gains a blackened exterior and smoky flavor.

Fermented: Food that’s sat with bacteria, yeast, or another microorganism and has produced acids, alcohols, or gases. Results in a biting, pungent flavor. (Kimchi is fermented)

Fried: Food cooked by submerging in hot oil. Creates crispy, crunchy texture and golden colour.

Glazed: Food with a coating brushed onto its surface. Appears glossy with a thin, flavorful, and crisp outer layer.

Infused: Food steeped in liquid with another ingredient so it carries the essence of that ingredient. Used with herbs usually.

Marinated: Usually meat soaked in liquid containing flavourful herbs, spices, vinegar, or oil.

Poached: Food cooked in near boiling water. Results in tender, moist texture.

Roasted: Food cooked with dry heat in an oven or over the fire. Results in browned exterior and crisp coating.

Sautéed: Food cooked quickly in small amount of fat.

Seared: Food cooked in small amount of fat until caramelized. Finished by roasting or grilling. Results in crisp exterior and tender interior.

Smoked: Food exposed to smoke from smoldering wood for a long time. Results in that distinctive smoky flavor.

Whipped: Food beaten to incorporate air. Light and fluffy.

What did I miss?

[zmpl]

has anyone noticed that after the porn ban of 2018 tumblr was essentially killed from the mainstream and everyone flocked to other social media sites like twitter and meta. then those sites got enshittified to where twitter became Nazi Central and meta sites had an entire meme around getting “zucced” aka mark zuckerberg himself would ban you for saying a no-no word like fuck. and then the mainstream shifted to tiktok where infamous toddlerspeak sentences like “he got unalived by a pew pew” were born because if you once again say a no-no word like kill or gun or any other word that isn’t corporate i mean kid friendly then the algorithm will bury your post into the ground. and somehow we’ve come full circle and tumblr is now the most bearable social media site because although we can’t have female presenting nipples we can at least talk to each other like adults. has anyone noticed that at all or is it just me and the flaming skull

[silkcrows]

purity culture and media illiteracy in the form of "fiction = reality" is on the rise because conservatism is on the rise. the two are utterly interlaced and 'fandom' purity culture is 100% a way to the alt right pipeline. But none of you are ready to accept that 🤡

[going2hell4everythingbutbeingbi]

yes conservatism is on the rise yes tradwife content is as popular as ever yes pink jobs and blue jobs are fucking stupid BUT there is still such a big change in how straight women are talking about relationships online.

they're talking about how they're no longer interested in dating because their female friends treat them better than boyfriends do. they're realizing that being single is always better than being in a bad relationship. it's becoming a lot more normal and fun and hot for women to be single at any age. the women who have settled down with truly good men in truly happy relationships are encouraging other women to not take any shit because the right man won't need to be "trained". they're talking about how their mothers and grandmothers warned them to get a job and not get married, and they followed the advice.

tradwife content is performance. it's propaganda. there are so few women actually living that life. but we know for a fact that more women than ever are educated, working, and single. and all I see (admittedly in my woke ass algorithm) is women talking about how they're done settling for mediocre relationships. and I love it.

[going2hell4everythingbutbeingbi]

all tradwife content is inherently a lie. why? because those women are not stay at home moms or wives. they're work from home moms/wives.

their job is content creation. all the popular ones probably make gobs more than their husbands. and the reason they have time to set up a tripod in their spotless white marble kitchen and film themselves making cheerios from scratch is because someone else is doing all the real cooking, cleaning, and nannying.

they are not tradwives. real tradwives are not posting aesthetic branded videos on tiktok. there are plenty of real SAHMs on tiktok, and their content looks decidedly different than tradwife content. because they're not selling you a pretty packaged conservative propaganda hoax, they're filming 3x speed videos of them cleaning messy apartments that are still messy at the end.

or, more notably, there's women who used to be tradwives, before that term even existed, talking about how they work at the dollar store and live off food stamps now because their husbands left them with no work experience, three kids, and no money.

tradwife content is only appealing because it's fake. and the vast majority of women can tell that it's fake, because we're not fucking stupid.

[helenvaughans]

it really does never fail to piss me off that when the brontes come up, a lot of people are like “and REMEMBER GIRLS: the characters and relationships in “x” book should NOT be romanticized!!! 😤” whereas i NEVER see anyone being like “REMEMBER BOYS: DON’T romanticize patricide or murdering your elderly landlady!!! 😤” when discussing dostoevsky, for instance

[warningsine]

[frustratedwritersden]

I'm in different fandoms, one is an adult cartoon, the other a raunchy anime, and the other a gothic drama book. Demographic wise, the fandom with most women is the gothic one. In the three i have husbandos, ones a wannabe murderer, the other a sneaky conman, and the other a stalker and murderer.

I am ONLY given shit for liking the character in the gothic book, the other two also did big crimes but you're allowed to ship and fangirl with them. Why's that?

[depressedcatgirl]

Fighting the war on dark romance on the side of dark romance

[what-a-bastard]

Women: *have kinks*

Annoying fuckers: OH NO! If we let women have fetish material they'll think it's what a healthy relationship is!!! We can't let those dumb little girls make the mistake of thinking it'd actually be good to date a guy who kills people and kidnaps her!!!

[bauliya]

i think villains in general provide better, more epic romances because they're allowed to go to extremes. they're allowed to put their love over the greater good. they're allowed to be selfish. the best a hero can offer you is number two, because their duty comes first. villains, though. villains will burn down the world for a last kiss goodbye.

[cake-writes]

[divinesong]

Yea, sure. Until YOU or people you love are among the victims for someone else’s love and the villains won’t care. Would also like to point out that some villians(Kuvira, for example) have been willing to sacrifice/throw away love interests for their own goals.

[bauliya]

idk about you but existing in the real world gives me and my loved ones immunity from the actions of fictional villains. hope you manage to get your family out of star wars.

[brightlotusmoon]

[iamnotmereally]

After Will comes out Mike says "wait. I'm also gay" and everyone slowly gets up and says 'and me'

[randalltier-deactivated20230711]

[dumpy-dump]

[chriscdcase95]

You ever notice how in fandoms, there people who claim to like a character, or ship and such (or even dislike said characters) ?

But then you go and read their takes on these characters, and it's so utterly divorced from who they are in canon, that they don't even resemble the characters they claim to talk about ?

And I'm talking, in a way that can't be chalked up to being just an AU or Canon Divergence for a fanfic. It's the genuine fandom perception of these characters. Fandom describes them one way, canon shows them another.

And when it comes to disliked characters it's for things that...flat out don't exist in canon or at best grossly exaggerated. And it gets to the point where I question...do you even like (or hate) the characters you claim to ? Or just the AO3 OC's you slapped the canon names onto ?

[lesbianlyonelb]

I just wrote 8 pages when I haven't written in months and was beginning to think I'd never be able to again. Idk what it is, but I am sharing and manifesting this energy for every writer who sees this. May you write 8 quality pages effortlessly and find joy writing once more

[rubyjones]

Create your own book cover - without generative 'AI' | Ruby Jones

Get more from Ruby Jones on Patreon

Too many writers are using generative 'AI' to make their book covers, so I've written a guide on how to make your own cover for free or cheap without turning to a machine.

If you can't afford to pay an artist, you CAN make your own!

I hope this is a helpful overview that covers the basics and points to some free resources.

[rhube]

I annoyed my cat by writing this and not playing with her; you might find it useful?

[copperbadge]

This is a fantastic guide not only to the technical aspect of cover design but the aesthetic aspect as well!

[naamahdarling]

This is GREAT STUFF. Highly recommend! Exactly the techniques I have used on covers in the past, and they look great!

[rubyvroom]

Can I watch a great film knowing the actresses in it were terrorized and mistreated the entire time? Can I watch a football game knowing that the players are getting brain injuries right before my eyes? Can I listen to my favorite albums anymore knowing that the singers were all beating their wives in between studio sessions? Can I eat at the new fancy taco place knowing when the building that used to be there got bulldozed eight families got kicked out of their homes so they could be replaced with condos and a chain restaurant? Can I wear the affordable clothes I bought downtown that were probably assembled in a sweatshop with child labor? Can I eat quinoa? Can I eat this burger? Can I drink this bottled water? Can I buy a car and drive to work because I’m sick of taking an hour each way on the subway? Whose bones do I stand on? Whose bones am I standing on right now? 

[moniquill]

[dearydeerling-deactivated201904]

On one hand, it’s a privilege to be able to choose to acknowledge these horrors or not–we’re going to acknowledge that privilege. On the other hand, I once attended a lecture by the explorerer-conservationist Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s daughter and son and they had a lot of opinions about what we could do to help the environment and the ocean and I talked about how in my country, we have to drink bottled water, because it’s a desert and there’s only salt water all around, but we’re contributing to pollution and all of these things…

And she looked at me and told me not to fall into the trap of “activist guilt.” I couldn’t remember the exact words, but, it was the first time I’d heard the term and it took a weight off my shoulders.

We do what we can. It’s so much better than giving up entirely or not doing anything at all because we can’t do it perfectly. It doesn’t benefit anyone in the end if we just sit around feeling guilty about every little thing in life. I’d just joined tumblr back then (haha, so like, eight or nine years ago at this point?), I was being exposed to way more than I’d ever been before (I was previously just into feminism and animal rights/wildlife conservation/environmentalism since I was a kid), and it was weighing on me.

As long as humans are humans and living flawed lives, many consumed by greed, there will not be anything in this world untouched by evil.

I usually avoid stuff that says it was made in China or other cheap looking knockoffs, out of fear of them being made in sweatshops (now, I know even a lot of big brands use those…), it’s exhausting. Then, I read something about how people who actually lived and worked in those would still buy this cheap stuff and how this shocked the foreigner reporting on it, but they just looked confused like, it’s what they can afford and them avoiding consuming it isn’t going to change the whole system from the ground-up.

… it went on about how “money talks” and choosing where to put your money still feeds the whole capitalist system and is nearly a way of comforting yourself, but you not buying doesn’t mean everyone else isn’t. What needs to be tackled is at a much higher level than any of us can reach.

Of course, I’d still, given the choice, give my money to companies I agree with and I’ll boycott what I know to support awful stuff, but I also feel no superiority over this and know now it’s not as black and white or easy as I thought it was.

This is the same reason that moral purity “you can’t enjoy [x] because it’s Problematic ™” is such nonsense, because nothing is pure. There’s something bad about everything if you dig deep enough. As long as we lived in flawed human societies we’ve got to make the best of what they offer us. If you have the choice and means, please, do support those who do good, but also, don’t beat yourself up over not living up to an unattainable ideal.

No one can. You’ll just make yourself so miserable, you either burn up and stop fighting entirely or you’ll make yourself a non-productive, depressed heap just out of a bleeding heart left unchecked. You can’t make a change to this world if you refuse to engage in it.

Have a related article with self-care tips for activists.

[catvincent]

Purity is one of the worst, most harmful myths humans ever invented.

[vickytokio]

Rebloging for this amazing reply telling us how to actually handle this, because yeah, sometimes I’ll simply shut down trying to find something that doesn’t cause harm to anyone

[cicadianrhythm]

Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.

[maddie-grove]

A lot of people genuinely do hate or dismiss romance novels because they think all sexual frankness in fiction is immoral and harmful, or because they think women (and only women) are too stupid to know fiction from reality, or because they think it’s gross and laughable for women (especially ones they don’t consider fuckable) to have sexual desires, or because they automatically assume that anything popular with women is inferior, or because they only care about fiction being formulaic or light entertainment when it’s something women like. This doesn’t mean that every romance novel is great and deep and progressive, but these people aren’t coming from a good place with their criticism and they don’t deserve a pass.

[answeringmysister]

These are also among the oldest, stalest, frozen hard opinions to have. I have texts from the 17th c saying that women can't attend plays and operas because they'll think its appropriate to cheat on their husbands and abandon their families. There's texts from the 18th c about how women can't read novels because they'll think its appropriate to cheat on their husbands and abandon their families. There's texts from the 19th c about how women can't use the postal service because they'll think its appropriate to cheat on their husbands and abandon their families.

Are you noticing a theme? If you think 'yeah but its different because these are romance novels', I'm sorry to break it to you but you are indistinguishable from a 17th c English preacher. Get better soon, glad to see that you haven't been limited by a normal mortal life span.

[knifefightscene]

How does anyone even find the time and energy to hate watch and hate read stuff I don’t even have the time to love read and love watch stuff

[knifefightscene]

The only things I hate read are academic textbooks and the only things I hate watch are online classes recordings

[power-chords]

Oh my god the notes of your post @prettyboysdontlookatexplosions you were not kidding. The casual contempt is astonishing. Apparently everyone is capable of a rich and dimensional fantasy life except for straight women, who as we all know are a monolith of sexually incurious matrons trying to cope with their miserable lives!

[prettyboysdontlookatexplosions]

i was in fact really really not kidding 🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃

[secretlyatargaryen]

It's kinda funny to argue that sex scenes in books should be "emotionally transformative" and then call other people conservative.

[alicentsgf]

no you do not need to hold fictional characters "accountable". they are not real.

[alicentsgf]

[theyellowallosaurus]

[frustratedwritersden]

Better with Bob needs to read this