Kennedy's Blog

I just wrote about paint (from Anna Nova) that, wait for it, is made from 90% food ingredients, is non toxic and is coloured the same as the food it's named after. For example, pink champagne, ginger and wild boar, you name it your room can be painted the same colour as your favourite food.. Actually you can paint and sniff now to your heart's content knowing that your room will smell of chocolate for ever more. (See Food and Drink News review for a full report). OK what next ! Come on whatever next?

So Why doesn't someone supply paint - in chocolate of course, with a pack of chocs to eat while you are painting. True art... come on, it is Easter after all and on average kids in the UK will be given 8 Easter Eggs per kid!! Really, no kidding, I heared that if no kids were given any its enough for (don't quote me) but a number of hospitals in the UK!

I wrote Candid this month and then binned it; could that be the best thing that I did this month? I love the ‘not knowing’ of the consequences of our actions. It was a simple idea to say ‘sod that – it’s boring’. The original piece that you will never see was like a friction car that did not get up the hill after frantically pushing it. Writing is like dough, you need to work it and knead it and if you have a bad ingredient, like I had, you are doomed. So I am going to write about ideas instead.

OK, I know that the best ideas are the ones that are delivered and followed through. We all have them and in my case, have far too many of them, and that can be a problem too. But without them, we never get anywhere in life. Ideas are for a clear purpose. There are things in the world that need to be done and can only get started with a simple idea to germinate them. I sometimes think I mostly get other people’s ideas and then just pass them on. Mostly though, people think that I am crazy, but there is no point in having something sitting in your head unless you actually bring it to the world. I am interested in those ideas that you try to forget about and never try, the ones that knock on your door, day after day, year after year, yet you never do anything about it. But why?

Still, you choose to ignore them because you think they will not make any money, or some other daft reason. Well, I gave in this month to an idea that I had since I was 11 years old, so it’s had a long time to ferment into a perfect vintage! I launched a newspaper! Really, no kidding. I’d always wanted to do that. Why? Well, it wasn’t so much the money; it’s just that I felt it was the right thing to do, a rather good thing, in fact. It was just a good idea and I could not bear the thought of being pestered by the damned thing long after I retired.

There are too many rather bad food magazines out there around the globe and that is precisely why we wanted to do this. I thought we could do better. We are launching a newspaper that sums up what all the other mags have said, so we do the reading for the readers. It’s just news, market reports and opinion that people want in this sector. So that’s what we will deliver, just that and nothing else. It’s overcrowded and most titles have no spirit, opinion or voice and the editors are too frightened to say anything for fear of losing their jobs or advertisers.

Features lists are only written to try to sell adverts anyway

There you go, no other publishers would say that either and I guess that’s why you like us because we are honest about it all. But welcome to an idea that will not go away and here it is. It should be with your issue – if not, no worries, call Mark for one and it’s on the way.

So ladies and gentlemen, here’s to you and your ideas. Take care my friends, until next month, which is also a good idea.

It is almost perverse that the less I write about the confectionery industry, the more you seem to enjoy reading. Pilate did not want to execute Jesus, the crowds did, and I think about that parable when I write in general now...