As food—what to eat, how to buy it, who should cook it— occupies a bigger and bigger part of the cultural conversation, and as the restaurant industry, with nearly 12 million workers, continues to be one of the largest employers (and wage violators) in the country, news organizations will increasingly look for skilled reviewers, reporters and columnists who can write fluently about food, provide rigorous criticism and put trends in context. This course will train students to write restaurant reviews and cookbook reviews, but it also will teach them how to produce informed commentary on other aspects of the culinary world, including reported pieces on food policy and labor issues, as well as informed critiques of the proliferating food and restaurant documentaries on Netflix and other media. Students will develop skills in reading and analyzing food related laws and economic data. They’ll also read some of the major works in the field of food journalism.