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Clearly Delicious started as an idea.

And really, a simple one:

To share recipes with family and friends from the stony-white coasts of Rockland, Maine, to the swampy bayous outside of New Orleans. In one place, pictures, food stories, recipes, instructions, and a range of appetites could bridge together radically different foodways with just a plate of pasta (your choice of lobster or crawfish).

That was six years ago, and this is now:

Pictured: several shots from a spring Saturday in New Orleans.  Left: Windy City Magician; Right: Street Artist with Boy & Michael at Café du Monde.

Today, Clearly Delicious is the home of over 340+ recipes (of which we add to daily), food stories, travel writings, and photography by cookbook author, Louisiana state newspaper columnist, and podcast host Helana Brigman. Set in south Louisiana, stories range from the everyday crawfish games of Baton Rouge friends and chefs to the more exotic lobster-stories of coastal Maine. Whether it’s Mardi Gras or the Maine Lobster Festival, food is always in season, and we’re here to share our stories, eat real dishes, photograph, and experience it together.

And, we want you to join us.

Who We Are:

Helana Brigman is the creator of the award-winning blog Clearly Delicious (soon to be Dances with Lobsters: Clearly Delicious Recipes from the coast of Maine to the Gulf of New Orleans), a food writer, photographer, and cook whose work has appeared in Louisiana Cookin’ Magazine, and her column, “Fresh Ideas” with Louisiana’s state newspaper, The Advocate.

Her first book, The Fresh Table: Cooking in Louisiana All Year Round, is out this March with LSU Press (more about it here and here).

So, that’s the “snippet” / biography view, and this is me:

My name is Helana (Elizabeth) Brigman, an English educator and culinary enthusiast.

I grew up on the coast of (rocky) Rockland, Maine, with my twin sister and red-headed hippy mother (a poet, a writer, a cook). As a child, I rode fishing boats and danced with lobstermen. I was incredibly wild. The only thing I didn’t do was keep my pig-tails in their proper “place,” and I sometimes thought I should have been a boy since all I ever wanted to do was climb hills, go fishing, or wear hand-me-down plaid shirts.

Pictured: me, age 3 with my twin sister (unfortunately cropped off to the left, but same head shape and shiny hair) and cousin. I literally used to cry my eyes out that I never got to wear red. To keep us straight, my mother would put my twin, Haley, in red, and me in blue. ‘Cause sometimes…it was hard to tell.

I was a tomboy, and I was obsessed with my mother’s cooking:

Pictured: two of the most important images I own. Left: A photo of my mother, Rebecca, doing “galley work” on a friend’s boat in Rockland, Maine, 1974. Right: A photo of my mother (same boat) taking down the sails. The caption reads, “I’ve walked the Plank, Straddled the Boom, and Brought down the Sail. Now to get back onto the Schooner, 1974.”

I moved to the south after my mother’s death in 2000 (a particularly sad time), went through a period of radical culture shock, came to my senses, and fell in love. The people, the food, the world were unlike anything I’d experienced in New England, and the change was great for me (in fact, I stopped wearing plaid shirts).

Later, I attended Columbia College (one of the few women’s colleges left in America) where I felt confident and capable in ways I never anticipated. When going on to my PhD, the natural fit was even farther south—Baton Rouge, LA (near New Orleans), where I could finally eat crawfish and make eye-contact with alligators (and, let’s be honest—boys). Here is where my mother once met my father and had her twin girls. In fact, I was actually born in New Orleans.

Pictured: a candid taken during my visit to Le Creolé in Baton Rouge, LA (home to Chef Ryan Andre). Good food, good wine, good people, and bright smiles. Welcome to Louisiana.

Today, I am a hopeless optimist and workaholic. I’ll forever believe in the good in people, appreciating our cultures and our friends, having good manners, saying “thank you” (which includes sending “thank you” cards), and understanding how valuable every second is while we have it. I’m perhaps more concerned with ethics and “being a good person” at the end of the day than most people I’ve met, and whether I taught a successful class or made a difference in a student’s writings can keep me up at night.

Did I mention I’m also a teacher?

At Clearly Delicious, I share my geographically changing world—tastes, sights, sounds, and the colorful characters in it. I hope you enjoy the range of recipes and voices I share here with weekly contributions from food writers, friends, and my beloved interns.

Pictured: Scenes from this year’s Mardi Gras (2013). I’m, literally, addicted to my DSLR Canon and candid action shots of every place I visit.

As far as I know, we fawn over no pictures of cats (not that this won’t be the case in the future), and you’ll find no food writers with perfectly manicured nails in our blog posts. My nails are chipped from peeling crawfish and shucking oysters, and I’m pretty proud of my sore thumbs.

Welcome to our online home, and please stay awhile. I can promise there will be cookies, and we’d love to meet you.

Below are the other faces you’ll see at Clearly Delicious, so spend a few extra minutes meeting our contributors, technicians, and interns. You may want to remember my interns faces especially—one day, you might be reading their food blogs too.

Contact: helana [at] clearlydeliciousfoodblog [dot] com

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Will Fawcett is one of two Chief Technical and Creative Officers at Clearly Delicious. Responsible for our site’s front and back ends, attractiveness, and overall “beauty” as a food and photo-friendly blog, Will plays an indispensable role in making Clearly Delicious function.

Favorite Kitchen Item?:

Le Creuset baking dish for no-knead bread

Contact: will [dot] fawcett [at] gmail [dot] com

WillFawcett.net

Google+

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Rhett Clement is our Chief Technical Officer at Clearly Delicious, responsible for print functions (finally, a clear way to print recipes!) and hiccups as they occur. Some people say drink a glass of water or hold your breath. We say, call Rhett Clement.

Favorite Beer?: “Hitachino Nest White Ale and Rogue’s Heffeweizen are tied.”

Favorite New Kitchen Gadget?:

“Love/Hate Relationship with my Mandolin Slicer”

Contact: rhett [at] clearlydeliciousfoodblog [dot] com

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— Clearly Delicious Internship Program —

Marketing / PR

Olivia Keen is a recent LSU Marketing graduate and a current second year Law student at LSU. The co-owner of Two Belles Event Planning, Olivia has a passion for parties! A Baton Rouge native and avid tiger fan, Olivia appreciates nothing more than southern Louisiana culture.

Dream Job?: Being the Little Mermaid at Disney World

Favorite Food?: Anything sweet and red wine (wine counts as dinner, right?)

Contact: olivia [at] clearlydeliciousfoodblog [dot] com

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Benjamin Morrison is a sophomore in Public Relations major at Louisiana State University. He is a New Orleans native and loves Louisiana culture and food. A social media fanatic, Benjamin is very excited to be the Social Media / SEO intern at Clearly Delicious.

Favorite food?:

“My mother’s homemade snickerdoodles.”

In his spare time, Benjamin enjoys reading, watching TV shows, and making YouTube videos.

For some of Benjamin’s videos, you can checkout his page, “Ben 4 London.”

Contact: benjamin [at] clearlydeliciousfoodblog [dot] com

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Editorial / Writing