Al Dente seeks contributions from emerging and established writers for its inaugural, Winter 2024 issue. The theme is Devour. Submissions are open through November 22. If Submittable indicates our submission window is closed before that time, the submissions cap has been reached.
All work submitted to Al Dente should be accompanied by a specific, geographic location related to the piece itself (“Everglades National Park,” “northwest Tulsa, Oklahoma,” the address of a public venue). These locations — emphasizing the relationship between food and place — will be used to create a navigable map of writing and art. For a description of the kinds of work we are seeking, please see the links below. Writers may submit in more than one category.
Simultaneous submissions of are accepted. Please let us know via Submittable if your work is accepted elsewhere.
At this time, we cannot pay contributors for their work.
All submissions must be previously unpublished. We ask for first North American serial rights of all work published with Al Dente, and aim to keep contributors’ work available for the lifetime of our journal. Please credit Al Dente should work be republished elsewhere at a later date.
Poetry
“If music be the food of love, play on.”
Duke Orsino, Twelfth Night
Give us a ballad of bread, a sonnet of soups, or haiku for Honey Nut Cheerios. Capture for us the symbolism of over-indulging,
the starving agony of peeling apples with a fork, and the loving lyrics sung by your high school lunch lady. Send up to four poems in separate word documents (.doc or .docx).
Visual Art
Lovers of food and dabblers in visual arts! We invite you to submit original illustrations, graphics, and photographs that connect to food and place. Along with your submission, we ask that you identify the material used to create your work and the date of creation. Please submit your work in PNG or JPEG format, up to 10 MB. If visual art has been edited, we ask that you include the raw, unedited image in your submission. We cannot wait to see your creative submissions that highlight your (and our) passion for food!
(Un)common Recipes
Give us a recipe from the last Thanksgiving with your creepy uncle, that awkward first date at Applebee’s, or the time you lost the Carrolton County hot dog eating contest. Share with us the bitter fuel of your enemies, the taste of your lovers, and the situationship recipes in-between! What was your most recent meal or the food you’d kill to eat again? High tea with the royals or crumbs with society’s delinquents? The house recipe for Zen soup or your church’s sherbet punch? Whatever it is, make sure to include a recipe — nonfictional or fantastical — and short narrative (500 words or less). We want to eat your words!
What I Eat in a Day…
You know those questions you get from your mom she calls and asks, “Are you having enough? What are you eating?” We want to hear answers to mom’s question. What do you imagine Elle Woods, George Washington, or Neil deGrasse Tyson would eat over the course of a day? What do the daily diets of college students and professors have in common? Now is your time to dive into your influencer roots and tell us what those meals look like. Dessert for breakfast (and lunch and dinner)? Fried Friday? Game day eats? We want it all! Short (500 word) submissions welcomed, the serious and satirical.
Food Narratives
We welcome additional, nonfiction prose (up to 1,500 words) exploring the relationships between food and place.