Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Kousba.
Sarah, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
It began in 2012 when I was in 8th grade when I first discovered Yelp. Most of my classmates had gone on the 8th grade field trip to the East Coast for a week. During that week, there wasn’t much to do at school so my parents had called me out and took me out around San Diego that week. I remember telling my mom that I wanted to go to a cafe to have some pastries and boba. I ended up stumbling upon Yelp where I searched for cafes in the UTC and Kearny Mesa. I had no luck with UTC but found several cafes in Kearny Mesa which were located on Convoy St. The one cafe that peaked my interest was Pangea (which has been closed since 2015 unfortunately). I have a slight obsession with coconut and saw that they had pastries and milk tea with coconut, so I had to go.
Off I went to Pangea with my mom where I enjoyed a coconut milk tea, coconut cookies, and taro pastries and this is when my love for finding new places to eat and enjoy with family and friends began. Since that day in 8th grade, I have been using Yelp constantly to discover new places to venture to.
While Instagram had been out for a while during my junior year of high school back in 2014, it became apparent to me that it was a platform where people could post about anything. I had a personal account already, but I thought why not create a joint account with my best friend at the time and create our own blog. I discussed the idea with my friend and she agreed, and together we made Foosh619. Foosh619 was a food and fashion based blog (“Foosh619” had stood for food and fashion in the San Diego area, hence the name). My friend was in charge of the fashion and I was in charge of the food posts on the account. Over time, my friend stopped posting fashion and it was just me constantly posting my food adventure photos. Eventually, I took over the account and changed it from Foosh619 to SavoringWithSarah. From then on, SavoringWithSarah became my creative outlet where I continue to post food photos of my Yelp finds to this day.
Has it been a smooth road?
It has been a fairly smooth road for me since Yelp had made it easier to discover places to eat in the San Diego area. I would say my only struggle is trying to decide where to eat next since there are so many options and I have a list of places to try that I still haven’t had the chance to try out yet.
We’d love to hear more about your work.
SavoringWithSarah is a blog run by me where I share my food adventures with the world. I am constantly sharing places that I enjoy eating for others to go to these places to enjoy as well with their friends and loved ones.
I’ve become the go-to person at my school and religious community to hit up when people are looking for a place to eat. Additionally, I am constantly receiving messages from people who are planning their trips to San Diego. It is an honor to be able to create connections with strangers and to aid in planning the food portion of people’s vacations. What sets me apart is my honesty. If I don’t like something, I won’t suggest it to people. But if I enjoy something, I will suggest it with the hopes that my followers will enjoy those same things as well.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
I do feel that San Diego is a good place for food bloggers. There are thousands of restaurants and the possibilities are endless. For someone starting to be a good blogger, I recommend trying out places with food that they’re familiar with. For example, if someone grew up with middle eastern food at home, they should try a middle eastern restaurant. This way they can gain the confidence of going out and taking pictures of their food. Once they feel comfortable taking pictures of food and writing stories about their food adventures with the food they grew up with, they can slowly ease their way into new restaurants and new cuisine. So when the time comes to take photos of the new cuisine at restaurants, they won’t feel weird but rather confident since they have been doing this practice for a while now.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://savoringwithsarah.blogspot.com/?m=1
- Email: savoringwithsarah@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/savoringwithsarah/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/user_details?userid=EKCVFSkPiT1Wo-QoKkSEBg
Image Credit:
Sarah Kousba
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