Food blogging. It’s mostly written word, complemented by some (hopefully) beautiful photographs of delicious food, with maybe an occasional video or two thrown in the mix. Blogging’s easy. Anyone can do it (lots of people do, and very well at that!)

Then there’s podcasting. Another beast entirely. Wrought with all sorts of challenges and insecurities blogging doesn’t provide. (After all, who doesn’t think it’s really flipping weird, when made to listen to a recording of their own voice?)

Of course, there are also many of the same worries – will anyone show up? Will people like it? Am I just going to sound like an idiot, putting myself out there like this?

So why am I waxing poetic about the differences between blogging and podcasting? Well, I’ve been blogging for five years, two months, and seventeen days. (Not that anyone’s counting.) I’ve gotten that pretty well under my belt, even if we already know that I kind of suck at it (given that I got in… oh, about seven posts last year. Oops.).

But podcasting? Not really something I ever thought I’d do.

Ever.

Pfft. Who, me? Podcast? Yeah, right. I hate my voice! I suck at talking!

But then I was talking to my friend Greg (who is, himself, a podcaster), and he said, “You know, you should do a podcast. Yeah… you’d have a good subject for a podcast.” I came out of that conversation perplexed (I do? What could he possibly be talking about?)… but also intrigued.

After some serious thought (Son can tell you that I was talking about that conversation the rest of the evening), I decided that if I were to do a podcast, it would have to be about Japanese food. Of course. What else could I possibly talk about that would make a good podcast? (I doubt I could make either programming or dance interesting enough by myself to carry an entire podcast… especially with no previous podcasting experience under my belt.)

This was all hypothetical, of course. It’s not like I was actually considering doing a podcast.

But the seed had been planted. I knew I couldn’t do something like this myself (after all, all of my favorite podcasts feature multiple people – Spilled Milk, The Joy the Baker Podcast, The Table Set…) so just days later I asked Rachael Hutchings if she might be at all interested in doing a podcast with me.

(It was a surprise to me too… I asked her on a whim, completely spontaneously, knowing she was the only person I’d want to do a podcast like this with. But once I asked – and she said yes! – there was no turning back!)

In the span of a weekend, I went from never having even considered ever podcasting to seriously discussing putting together a podcast with my new partner in crime. (I’m still not even sure I believe this is all happening.) Two months later, we’ve already recorded several episodes and are ready to launch!

So without further ado, I bring to you the Miso Hungry Podcast!

Rachael and I have gotten together to bring to you a podcast all about Japanese food! So far we have three episodes ready for your listening pleasure: our Introduction, our first whole episode in which we talk about the Japanese New Year, and Episode 2 which is all about Candy!

You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes (and if you feel like it, we definitely appreciate your comments and ratings!)

(And if three episodes aren’t enough for you… we’re also doing a giveaway of Japanese candy over on the Miso Hungry Podcast site!)

Giveaway!

So to celebrate the launch of our podcast, I’m giving away one of these beautiful sushi necklaces from The Frippery Factory shop on Etsy!

All you have to do to enter is go over and check out our podcast, then come back here and leave a comment letting me know what you think, and what you’d like to hear us talk about in the future on the podcast! (One entry per person; you can enter until 11:59pm PST on Monday, January 23rd; winner will be chosen using random.org; anyone can enter – I can have it shipped internationally. If you want to leave a comment but don’t want to enter the giveaway, just let me know in your comment!)

And if you don’t win, or want to buy any of the other SUPER CUTE things she has in her store, the coupon code JAN2012 is good for 15% off throughout Etsy!

What about all those insecurities I talked about at the beginning of the post? Well, they’re still there, of course. (It continues to be seriously weird, listening to my own voice when I’m editing our podcasts.)

But one night, while working into the wee hours on our new podcast, I heard an interview that Carson Daly was doing with Chris Hardwick (The Nerdist), and this quote really resonated with me:

“It’s weird when I think about, that most people listen to the podcast than watch most cable channels. But you know, even if they… even if most of those people went away, we’d still keep doing the show. That’s kind of how I know it’s something I should be doing, because I would do it no matter what.”
-Chris Hardwick, nerdist.com

Even though I still worry no one will listen to the podcast (although it’s turning out far better than I had ever hoped it would), I’ll still do the podcast no matter what… because we have so much fun doing it.