Join us for our Open Evening at Leiths on Thursday 12th March 2026, 6:30–8:30pm, and discover how the Culinary Diploma can launch your career in food.
Join us for our Open Evening at Leiths on Thursday 12th March 2026, 6:30–8:30pm, and discover how the Culinary Diploma can launch your career in food.
A food writer’s responsibility is to write about food or write about the process of creating it for either educational or entertainment purposes. For each food writer, they may be required to represent food or the process of creating it through descriptive and insightful language. Some of the types of content food writers are responsible for creating include blogs, books, magazines and reviews.
A food writer might collaborate with a chef to create a cookbook, or they may work independently, which would be more applicable to the casual blogging food journalist. Most often, individuals in this role are employed full or part-time under a company or chef, whilst freelancers may opt to create content around their personal experience with food or may work contractually with an individual in the industry.
The nature of this role means individuals have a relatively ‘normal’ work-life balance, often working an average of 7-8 hours per day. Freelancers may find they have more time available than their full-time employed peers.
Those wanting to pursue a career as a food writer do not need to be specialised in the culinary arts; however, it provides a strategic advantage to have an enhanced understanding of various aspects of preparing, cooking and presenting dishes.
Emerging into this career requires individuals to demonstrate a range of skills, which include:
The salary an individual will earn working as a food writer can be quite varied, depending on whether they’re freelance, the nature of their work and the business itself. The current UK average within this role sits between £25,000 and £40,000.
Employment type:
Employed
Working hours:
—
Potential Salary:
£25,000 – £40,000
Work/Life Balance
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Author of A Splash of Soy & Coconut & Sambal 🌶
Lara Lee is an Australian chef and food writer of Chinese-Indonesian heritage. She is a regular contributor to Food52, the New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Food & Wine, Bon Appetit and the Guardian. Her first book, Coconut & Sambal, was named one of the best cookbooks of 2020 by the New York Times, the Guardian, Eater, National Geographic and many more. A Splash of Soy is her second book, and she is currently working on a children’s book about Lunar New Year.
Chef & Cookbook Author
Olia Hercules was born in Kakhovka, in the South of Ukraine. She trained at the renowned Leiths School of Food and Wine, then worked as chef de partie in restaurants, including Ottolenghi, and as a recipe developer. Her first book, Mamushka, went on to win the Fortnum and Mason Award for best debut cookbook and was followed by Kaukasis, Summer Kitchens and Home Food.
After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Olia co-founded a global initiative to raise money for Ukraine through cooking, #CookForUkraine, which has raised over £2 million pounds to date.
Olia was featured in Vogue UK’s list of top Most Influential Women of the Year 2022. Olia and her friend and #CookForUkraine co-founder Alissa Timoshkina won awards from 50 Best Restaurants (Champions of Change), Guild of Food Writers Special Award, as well as the OFM special award for their work on the initiative.
Olia’s family memoir Strong Roots: A Ukrainian Family History Through War, Exile and Hope with Bloomsbury will be published on June 19th.
Olia runs online workshops through her community platform on Patreon and teaches in person cookery classes at home in East London.
She lives with her husband, food writer and photographer, Joe Woodhouse, and two sons in London.
Food Writer & Presenter
Sophie is a freelance recipe writer, supper club host, podcaster and content creator, with a focus on simple comfort food. She formerly headed up the food team at Mob, developing recipes for a large social media audience and now does the same on her own platforms. She has previously hosted podcasts such as ‘A Bit of a Mouthful’ and ‘I’ll Have What She’s Having’. Sophie also hosts regular sell-out supper clubs around London and writes for her fortnightly newsletter Feeder. Her debut cookbook Tucking In is out now.
Food Writer, Illustrator & Chef
“Originally from Devon, I trained at Leiths School of Food & Wine after a degree & Masters in English Literature. After graduating I worked in London restaurants (inc. Spring, The Dock Kitchen, Morito, Moro, Ellory-now-Leroy), as well as cooking for events, weddings, markets stalls and pop ups.
In between kitchen jobs I worked in publishing at Bloomsbury, Profile, Slightly Foxed and Prospect Books where I mostly made coffee and bad jokes.
I’ve been featured in PPC, Code, The Evening Standard and Waitrose, The Guardian, Elle, Conde Nast Traveller, Olive, The Times, The Financial Times, The Telegraph, The Sunday Times, Sunday Brunch, The New York Times, Eater, etc. I’ve also written for The Food Almanac and Il Corriere della Sera.
In 2017 I moved from London to Sardinia and began writing, drawing and cooking full-time, as well as teaching English.”
Food Writer & Founder of The Woolf’s Kitchen
“I’m Dominique, half-Thai food writer, author of cookbooks, Dominique’s Kitchen and The Asian Pantry, content creator, and founder of The Woolf’s Kitchen. I also won The Great Cookbook Challenge TV show with Jamie Oliver on Channel 4 which was a complete pinch-me moment!
I started the business back in lockdown 2020, after trying my Thai auntie’s legendary tamarind sauce. It blew me away and I just knew I had to create my own version – and so The Woolf’s Kitchen was born.
As well as my award-winning Tamarind Ketchup, I also have a range of 6 other award-winning chilli oils and pastes that will transport you across the globe and make meal times as delicious as they should be.
Whether you make one of my recipes or use one of my products, I hope to inspire you to get cooking, and to feel as excited about food as I do!
Dominique x”
A Food Editor is responsible for overseeing the creation and delivery of food-related content for a publication or website. This includes recipe development, food styling, creating food-related articles, and managing a team.
Responsible for creating top quality content for the brand as well as managing the test kitchen and co-ordinating recipe testing schedule
A Food Content Creator produces engaging content about food, such as recipes, reviews, cooking tips, and visuals. They share their work on social media, blogs, or websites, experiment with flavors, highlight various cuisines, partner with brands or chefs, and keep up with food trends to educate and inspire audiences.
