The blog chronicles not only the recipes that Morgan tries out in her own kitchen, but also what she thinks of different restaurants and cafes around town and coverage of any local food events such as a recent dinner at Prairie Fruits Farm and Creamery, located just 10 minutes north of Urbana. She doesn't tout herself as an official restaurant critic, but says her blog entries concerning local establishments often blossom into community dialogue. "I try to be evenhanded even if the food or service wasn't that great," Morgan said. "The people that comment on the blog are oftentimes like reviewers along with me. Most times, the restaurant owner will comment also. So it's pretty nice; it's like a community effort." Morgan, who has lived in Champaign-Urbana for nearly 30 years, puts a lot of effort into ChampaignTaste.com, often waking early before reporting to her duties as instructional designer at Human Kinetics. She doesn't post photos of herself on the blog, nor does she consider herself any sort of a household name or face. However, a visit to her blog shows viewers that despite her anonymity, she really is a presence among the C-U Internet community. Her posts receive anywhere from around 10 comments to 20 or more.
The Restaurant Blog ChampaignTaste.com has been around for more than three years now, and was born from Guatemala RPCV Lisa Morgan's passion for food
Woman's blog chronicles her own recipes, C-U restaurants
By Jean Kim
Friday, July 31, 2009 10:44 AM CDT
Caption: Lisa Morgan enjoys a meal at Escobar'sin downtown Champaign. Morgan is the woman behind the food blog at ChampaignTaste.com. Photo: Jean Kim
Lisa Morgan sat at Escobar's in downtown Champaign, at a table near a large window, having just ordered migas at the nuevo Latin restaurant.
I ordered the Guatemalan breakfast, which had fried plantains on the side. The plantains seem to jog Morgan's memory as she opens up about her experience in Grenada as a Peace Corps volunteer.
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"There are so many types of bananas down in Grenada," she said.
Naturally, as the woman behind the food blog ChampaignTaste.com, Morgan undoubtedly remembers details concerning food during her time in Grenada.
ChampaignTaste.com has been around for more than three years now, and was born from Morgan's passion for food. The blog chronicles not only the recipes that Morgan tries out in her own kitchen, but also what she thinks of different restaurants and cafes around town and coverage of any local food events such as a recent dinner at Prairie Fruits Farm and Creamery, located just 10 minutes north of Urbana.
She doesn't tout herself as an official restaurant critic, but says her blog entries concerning local establishments often blossom into community dialogue.
"I try to be evenhanded even if the food or service wasn't that great," Morgan said. "The people that comment on the blog are oftentimes like reviewers along with me. Most times, the restaurant owner will comment also. So it's pretty nice; it's like a community effort."
Morgan, who has lived in Champaign-Urbana for nearly 30 years, puts a lot of effort into ChampaignTaste.com, often waking early before reporting to her duties as instructional designer at Human Kinetics. She doesn't post photos of herself on the blog, nor does she consider herself any sort of a household name or face. However, a visit to her blog shows viewers that despite her anonymity, she really is a presence among the C-U Internet community. Her posts receive anywhere from around 10 comments to 20 or more.
Morgan also supports the local markets intensely and co-founded the Prairieland Community Supported Agriculture in 1992. Although she's not directly involved with that group today, she continues to show her commitment to the local farmers by shopping at the Urbana farmers' market as regularly as she can.
"I'm just a big proponent of supporting smaller operations in general, as opposed to big, industrialized food operations. Of course, there's a place for that as well. Millions of people have to eat," Morgan said.
"I understand that's difficult too, I don't always make it out to the market. It takes a kind of commitment, really."
While some may wonder why Morgan's blog is all about food and not some other subject, maybe the more appropriate question is, "Why not food?"
"As you can see with the proliference of food blogs and foodies and there's always been the idea of gourmets, people have always been interested in food, and it doesn't even have to be gourmet food," Morgan says. "It can be one fresh strawberry, and that might even be better than a gourmet meal."
This story, photos and a related video with interviews was done by Jean Kim, a student in journalism, for a multimedia class in the Journalism Department at the University of Illinois. The class is funded by the Marajen Stevick Chinigo Foundation. To see the video, go to Web Extras on The News-Gazette's Web site: www.news-gazette.com.
