Editorial Guidelines
Who We Are
The First Mess is owned by Laura Wright and is a celebration of plant based cuisine with a seasonal focus. Since 2011, Laura has shared intentionally designed vegan meals and other recipes on TFM and in her debut, internationally published, and award-winning cookbook. She strives to offer an inspiring, beautiful, informative, and welcoming space for all types of eaters and cooks.
Video
When you watch video content on The First Mess, you are seeing the stunning professional work of October Creative. These videos are offered on select recipes to give a stronger visual cue for some cooks.
Awards
Laura is honored to have received awards from the Saveur Best Food Blog Awards (Editors’ Choice Best Special Diets Blog 2014), Gourmand World Cookbook Awards (Blogger category 2018), and the Taste Canada Awards (Health and Special Diets Cookbooks Silver 2018)
History
The First Mess began in the summer of 2011 with the recipe for a vegan rhubarb strawberry pie. Leading into this, Laura had grown up in the presence of seasonal food with her family’s local produce store. After deciding to go vegan over Thanksgiving one year and then graduating from a nutritional culinary program at George Brown College, Laura began to work at a variety of restaurants in all different positions to find the right fit.
Out of curiosity and with the encouragement of friends, The First Mess web domain was purchased. It began as a creative project to share seasonal cooking inspiration, bits of life, photography, and cooking techniques Laura had learned over the years. Today, TFM is a destination for dependable, super flavourful vegan recipes and wholesome meals. Laura aims for a balance of wholesome, easy-to-source ingredients, comfort and familiarity, and a few extra special touches to enhance flavor. With thousands of 5-star reviews, Laura continues to be encouraged by the growth of the plant based movement.
Editorial Policy
Laura is committed to bringing readers delicious, dependable, useful, and inspiring food/recipes/plant based lifestyle content. All of the recipes, photos, blog post copy, and the weekly newsletter are created and double checked by Laura. Video content is created by October Creative and overseen by Laura.
Impartiality
The First Mess is committed to impartiality. The content is not influenced by advertisers.
Any “Sponsored Content” is labeled to make clear that such content is provided on behalf of a sponsor.
Laura is responsible for disclosing any possible conflicts of interest. As with many online publishers and influencers, Laura is sometimes gifted complimentary products or services for the possibility of a feature or review. Laura always aims to be transparent when discussing an item/service that has been gifted.
Recipe Development & Testing
The goal at The First Mess is to inspire and empower home cooks to incorporate plant based cooking more often, no matter their dietary preferences. TFM is a resource of many vegan recipes that appeal to all types of eaters. On this site, you’ll find hundreds of recipes that were developed by Laura with her chef training, restaurant experience, and strong home cooking point of view in mind. These recipes showcase flavors and cooking styles from around the globe. Through test rounds, Laura strives to share recipes that are delicious and that work in home kitchens.
Originality
The goal at The First Mess is to provide original and useful content. All content must not infringe the copyright or anyone’s intellectual property rights. At TFM, we always aim to provide the best quality vegan content produced by actual human beings. Publishing automatically generated content using AI writing tools such as ChatGPT goes against our principles.
Corrections
I welcome readers’ and subscribers’ participation in a general commitment to accuracy. If you believe I have published an error in a recipe or possibly in a blog post, please let me know. I will look into it further and update as necessary. You can draw attention to a possible error via email at laura@laurawright
Commenting Policy
The First Mess welcomes and values your comments, reviews, and feedback on the work published here. We encourage a respectful and productive dialogue. Laura will not tolerate threatening, abusive, harassing, or defamatory messages, or comments that make hateful/offensive statements about an individual or a group. Any comments regarding diets, caloric content, moral value assigned to food, and related topics will be removed. Laura reserves the right to remove comments that cross any of these lines and others at her discretion. The removal of any comment shall be solely at the discretion of TFM. Repeated or serious violations of the commenting policy may result in the user being banned from all comments sections on TFM and related email subscriptions/social platforms.
TFM Archives
Laura regularly reviews the quality of the TFM library and periodically removes copy, recipes, and photos that no longer abide by the current editorial standards. If there’s a recipe that you’re seeking on TFM and can no longer find it, please email Laura at laura@thefirstmess.com. She will do her best to track it down.
Contact
Have something you’d like me to know? Whether you have a comment on a recipe or a suggestion, I would love to hear from you: laura@thefirstmess.com. You can also engage with me on Instagram @thefirstmess