Are you an amateur foodie? Do you like baking or cooking? Want to share your recipe ideas with the rest of the world? It’s time to start a cooking blog .

Cooking is one of the best topics for starting a blog because there are so many different topics you can write about. It’s a big topic and everyone should eat!

A cooking blog offers practical articles, recipe ideas and specific demonstrations. He explains to people how to cook specialties. Instead of cooking in general, the blog can address a specific topic such as exotic cuisine from a distant country or raw food. You can also explain how to reduce your carbon footprint through food. In this guide, we explain how to create a cooking blog and how to make a living from it .

Step 1: Choose a niche and a cooking blog name

blog name

You can use any of these ideas as a starting point and then dig deeper.FREE GUIDE: 50 Pro Tips for Creating a Successful Blog.Once you have chosen your main topic, you need to find the name of your future blog.Think about your topic, your target audience, and what your blog style will look like.

For ideas, you can read our guide on how to come up with a blog name .

Once you’ve decided on a topic and a name, it’s time to start creating your blog!Step 2: Set up the cooking blog.create a cooking blog.Starting a new blog can be a bit daunting, especially if you’re not very technical, but we walk you through the whole process.

Every blog needs three things:

Your domain name which is also the name of your blog should be easy to say and type. See our tips for choosing a domain name.

A reliable host: this is where all files, images and content are stored. Companies like o2switch make it easy to set up your account and blog.

A blogging platform: This is the software you use to write and publish your blog posts. It helps to customize your site design and layout, etc. I recommend WordPress which powers 35% of the web. It’s easy to use, flexible, and offers a wide variety of customizations with themes and plugins.

Many newbie bloggers get stuck at this stage because they don’t want to pay for hosting. It’s normal as a reaction, especially at the beginning. They are considering using a free blogging option instead.

I advise you not to use a free platform to create your blog if you want to make a living from it.

Why? Because it’s essential that you retain control and ownership of all content and assets on your food blog. The free options may disappear after a while and you risk losing all of your content.

Also, free blogging platforms are very limited in terms of features. Most of them do not offer the possibility to place your own advertisements to earn money with your blog.

If you want more flexibility and control, you should use a platform like WordPress and have your own web hosting.

Since 2012, Sabine and I have tried several hosts for our blogs. After sometimes disastrous experiences with some hosting services, we know that choosing a good WordPress host is essential .

We recommend o2switch as a web host because their offer is probably the most advantageous in France.

Bonus o2switch : The domain name is free! This represents a significant saving over time.

o2switch.fr offers hosting for only 5€ per month , without additional plans, hidden costs, additional purchases etc. For this affordable price, almost everything is unlimited: bandwidth, disk space, email accounts… Hard to find better.

create a blog at o2 switch

1) To subscribe to this web hosting offer, simply visit the o2switch website and click on “Sign up”.

2) Then you can complete the registration form and click on “Register”.

3) Select the unique o2switch offer with domain name included.

If you already have a domain name purchased elsewhere, you can point it to o2switch by adjusting the DNS settings.

4) Indicate the domain name (free) which must be available and proceed to payment.

5) Check your inbox for the “Welcome to o2switch” email which indicates that your order has been processed correctly.

Once your hosting plan is available for use, you can install a content creation system (CMS).

WordPress is the most popular blogging platform because it’s free and easy to use. It allows you to create a personalized and scalable website thanks to thousands of free themes and extensions.

Installing WordPress on your o2switch hosting account is relatively easy thanks to a tool called Softaculous . You can access this tool in the general web account administration interface (CPanel).

Install WordPress on your hosting account

Open the “Welcome to o2switch” email and find the login information for the general administration of the web account (CPanel).

email-welcome-o2switch

To access your CPanel, you must connect from a URL (  https://example.o2switch.net:1234  ), with your username (login) and your password.

login-cpanel

Once logged into the CPanel, find the “Softaculous Apps Installer” section and click on WordPress.